Cardiff city centre

Cardiff city centre () is the central business district of Cardiff, Wales. The area is tightly bounded by the River Taff to the west, the Civic centre to the north and railway lines and two railway stations - Central and Queen Street - to the south and east respectively.

The city centre in Cardiff consists of principal shopping streets, Queen Street and St. Mary's Street, large shopping centres, and numerous arcades and lanes that house some more smaller and often specialist shops and boutiques.

The city centre is going through a number of redevelopment projects, including St. David's 2, which extended the shopping district southwards, creating 100 new stores and a flagship John Lewis, the only branch in Wales and the largest outside London. Compared to nearby cities, the new St David's Centre has more retail space than the whole of Newport or Swansea.

In 2008–9, the annual footfall of shoppers was 55 million, and is expected to have risen to 66 million by 2009–10. Cardiff is the sixth most successful shopping destination in the United Kingdom – behind London, Glasgow, Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool.

History

In the 1960s, planners described Cardiff city centre as "worn out, inconvenient, drab and dangerous". The centre had escaped the extensive wartime bomb damage inflicted on other cities, so little...
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