At the Antonine Centre in Cumbernauld, Scotland, the escalators and lifts are the first things many shoppers see when visiting the mall. The new 350,000-sq ft centre, developed by London & Regional Properties and opened in June this year, is linked directly to the town centre's existing Cumbernauld Centre via lifts and escalators.

Karen Johnston, centre manager at the Antonine Centre, explains that it was a planning condition that the two centres be linked internally so that shoppers wouldn't have to walk around the outside of the building but instead can come straight into the middle of the mall via a link.

"The centres are joined by two main links," she says. "The two shopping centres are on two different levels. You come in on the ground floor at our centre and go up two floors to their ground floor level. The Cumbernauld Centre is linked to a third shopping centre. The whole thing really lends critical mass to the town centre."

Altogether there are six Otis escalators and three Thyssen lifts.

"We wanted to be a part of the town centre," adds Johnston. "The Cumbernauld Centre has service-based shops and we lend the retail element."

It is hoped the new centre, which includes retailers such as TK Maxx, Next, Boots and River Island, will reduce leakage to nearby Glasgow, Stirling and Falkirk.

The newly-named The Victoria shopping centre in Southend is currently undergoing a £23m redevelopment to change the face of the old Victoria Plaza. As well as putting a roof over the scheme, which was previously open to the elements, doubling the size of the Wilkinston store on the basement level of the centre and introducing a new transport interchange, refurbishment works include the introduction of new Kone lifts and escalators and new glazed entrances.

Brand new escalators and stairs are now open and within the next two months the new lifts will be finished and in use, and the Chartwell North entrance will be almost complete.

Bill Harkness, chief executive of retail development specialists Delamere Estates, which bought the scheme with the National Grid Pension Fund in 2004, says: "The exciting redevelopment of The Victoria is fast becoming a reality. With the new staircases and escalators providing much needed vertical circulation and the glass roof almost finished, the shopping centre is on schedule for completion by Christmas.

"The refurbishment of the staircases and escalators is very important for the people of Southend. When we began the refurbishment, our research showed that one of the commonest visitor complaints was the accessibility of the different retail outlets and facilities at the centre. We vowed that we would improve not only the accessibility but also the flow of shoppers around the malls.

"We've achieved this with the reconfiguration of the staircases and escalators, and once the lifts and the Chartwell North entrance are finished, I believe that the centre will provide a much improved retail experience for the shoppers of Southend."

A new covered bridge link which joins the new transport hub to the first floor of The Victoria is also due to be completed on October 7. Shoppers will be able to access the bridge, which will have shops on either side, via lifts, escalators and stairs from the transport interchange.

"The circulation pattern has changed," says Harkness, "but it will be a lot more dynamic in future."

The Victoria's centre manager, Jonathan Poole, says: "This is what Southend has been waiting for. The centre is really starting to take shape and we really hope that shoppers will find it easier to move around using the new escalators and staircases. Our customers have been extremely patient throughout the building works and we look forward to continuing to welcome them as the refurbishment proceeds. There's no doubt that the final transformation is going to totally change shopping in Southend."

Pickerings Lifts, which designs, installs and maintains lift installations, understands the importance of getting the balance right in a shopping centre.

National service sales manager Stuart Hibbard says: "The placement of lifts is critical in a shopping centre. The owners need to have an estimate of the amount of traffic they're expecting and need to know how many people will be coming through the door. Hopefully their market research will give them a reasonably good idea about that. And of course you have to ensure that the lifts are able to cope with the expected footfall and that the escalators back that up on either side.

"The hope is, depending on the design of the centre, that most people will choose to use the escalators and those with prams, the disabled and the elderly will use the lifts."

Making a centre accessible for the disabled is an extremely important requirement. With the lift aesthetics designed around the building, Hibbard says it is important that the architects don't get too specific about such things as having coloured marble on the floor because they have to meet various lift regulation requirements, including ensuring that the lifts are compliant with the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA). For the sight-impaired this includes defining the difference between the wall, doors and floors inside a lift and ensuring tactile tiles are in place near any lifts to identify this as an area where lifts are available.

"Most aesthetics are based around people that are sight-impaired," explains Hibbard.

A good maintenance programme is also vital in order to ensure that lifts and escalators remain in action during trading hours. Large shopping centres, such as Bluewater, says Hibbard, will go to a consultant and ask them to produce a service specification which will meet the specific requirements of the site, rather than relying on a generalisation. "They will make a note of traffic management and design a specification around that," Hibbard explains. "Then the lift companies will tender for it. The number of lifts in relation to the number of escalators clearly depends on the environment. If you have a shopping centre that has a multi-deck car park above it then generally it's always serviced by lifts, and the environment means they're critical for getting people in and out of the building. So there's always a health and safety issue as well. It's also about people's first impression of the centre, and that impression will inevitably be dented if the lifts are not working.

"It's important that all the lifts are up and running during store opening hours. Maintenance needs to be higher in some areas than others."

Contacts

Antonine Centre, Cumbernauld: 0141 248 4433

The Victoria, Southend: 01702 460931

Pickerings Lifts: 01642 607161

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