Dd131_Tma01

Module DD131 Assignment No. TMA01 Drawing on what you have learned about City Road, outline some of the inequalities on a street that you know.. For this assignment piece I have chosen Knutsford, Cheshire and one of its busiest shopping streets; Princess Street; to discuss differences and inequalities when they are compared to City road in Cardiff, with particular reference to the study materials that I have used. I will be exploring the two streets by looking at the people and objects of both and exactly how they are assembled into our social lives. Knutsford has existed as a town for many hundreds of years and was recorded in William the Conquerors Domesday Book of 1086. (www.domesdaybook.co.uk,. Pg 73, 74) The population of the town now reaches nearly 19,000 people and some use Princess Street as a shopping destination, with the buildings themselves dating from around 1800 and many of them being listed. City Road is approximately 1 mile long and is the busiest street in Cardiff (‘The Street’, 2009). There is a wide and diverse range of cultures and this is evident with the shops, restaurants and takeaways which are mainly aimed at the ever growing student population and the local ethnic minorities. Princess Street; however; is 0.9 miles long and a very narrow street which follows a one way traffic system with shops and boutiques on both sides. These include banks, small supermarkets, high class clothing retailers, art galleries etc.. One inequality which is immediately obvious on Princess Street is the competition for space between the road traffic and the pedestrians. Very narrow pavements make it nearly impossible for people in wheelchairs or pushchairs to negotiate them and yet there is parking on both sides of the streets for cars etc because the street is used mainly as a destination for shoppers in the area, which is in contrast to City Road being a conduit for traffic through Cardiff hence the red tarmac and blue bollards being an attempt to make lives easier for the pedestrians in the area (Blakeley et al., 2009, p. 27). It is interesting to note that while City Road attracts a diverse range of people to its shops and restaurants the same cannot be said for Princess Street which attracts a mainly white, middle class shopper with a greater disposable income. This has the effect of driving a certain amount of the local population to shop outside the town where there is a greater choice. However, this has not stopped the ‘hunt for a bargain’ mentality in these harsh economic times, as an independent wine merchant has recently been replaced by the very type of retailer; namely a small Sainsburys supermarket; which drove him to close the shop and relocate, as most people now buy their wine while buying their groceries. This now sees 3 supermarkets within a mile of each other opened in the last few months. These are Waitrose, Sainsburys and Co-Op supermarkets and although some retailers on City Road have found the chain stores are having a detrimental effect on their business; Colin who owns the local newsagents states in the DVD; “It has Knocked me a bit, the Tesco opening” (‘The Street’, 2009, Scene 1) the reverse can be said for Princess Street with the resident independent retailers seeing this as a positive move for the area by bringing into Knutsford business which would have travelled out of the town before. “Knutsford’s independent food outlets can continue to boost trade in the town despite the influx of large supermarkets” (James Wilson., 2011, Knutsford Guardian). Will they find however that they eventually become obsolete, as the lady shopping for the ingredients for a cake on City Road states that she “didn’t want Tesco to open but now shops there all the time.” (Blakeley et al., 2009, Pg 26). So while some retailers are gaining from supermarkets due to their speciality products, then some may not as Georgina Blakeley points out that some people gain from the reshaping and some people lose (‘The Street’ , 2009, Scene 5). The DVD, ‘Making Social lives’ explores City Road in Cardiff. This street has been used to understand social life in contemporary UK and it can also be applied not only to Princess Street but any street that you care to investigate in the UK and beyond (Blackeley et al., 2009, Pg 22). By comparing Princess Street and City Road and discussing how some people have access to more resources on these streets than others, and how some people benefit while others lose, this illustrates the fact that society comprises differences and inequalities. Blakeley, G., Clarke, J., Raghuram, P., Silva, E. and Taylor, S. (2009) Learning Companion 1, Introducing The Social Sciences: part one, Milton Keynes, The Open University. ‘The Street’ (2009) Making Social Lives [DVD], Milton Keynes, The Open University. www.domesdaybook.co.uk. http;//www.domesdaybook.co.uk/cheshire1.html. Retrieved 9 February 2009 . Dodgson 1970, pp. 73, 74