Insight - Will London’s Oxford Street survive Covid?

Lower sales: People walk past a sign displaying Covid-19 guidelines in the West End of London. Sales from retail, hospitality and leisure in the area are on course to bring in just £2bil (US$2.7bil) in the year to March 2021, down from £10bil in the year earlier. — AFP

“IN a West End town, a dead end world, ” sang the Pet Shop Boys in the mid-1980s.

Fast forward 35 years and the electronic-pop duo would be just about right. Covid restrictions and a lack of global tourism have turned the West End, London’s premier shopping and dining district, into a shadow of its former self.