Retail has become the key measure of the 'vitality and viability' of a particular location, according to Anthony Glossop, chairman of regeneration specialist St Modwen. "If you have a town that's under-servicing its population - recognising of course that some inevitably have to do better than others - your town is going to decline," he says. "The Government has picked up on this."

And retail has obvious regeneration benefits, Glossop believes. "Retail can produce a feel-good factor: a bustling town centre feels good," he says. But he warns that too many towns are looking for the same solution. "The answer isn't always a department store. You might do better to put in a damn good market - it might do better because it's quirky."

So getting the mix right is important. "We think of our schemes as being town centres, not just shopping centres," Glossop says. "We positively encourage things like libraries, primary care facilities and offices. In fact some of the old 1960s centres had precisely that. They were just poorly designed."

In London, St Modwen is working to rectify this, redeveloping two older-generation shopping centres in Wembley and Edmonton. "I hope they've learned the lessons of the past. To demolish something after just 30 years is a terrible waste of resources," he says.

The Edmonton scheme is truly mixed-use with 130,000 sq ft of retail (half of which will be an Asda superstore) as well as 177 apartments above a large leisure centre and a primary healthcare unit.

Glossop says that funding mixed-use projects of this kind is not a problem. All of the residential has been pre-sold to a housing association for shared equity and key worker housing, and funds are now more flexible, he finds. "It's about design," he says. "You need good clear thinking on the commercial structure so that the investors can identify what they want."

And this is the sort of challenge Glossop likes. "We've only ever built four conventional malls," he says. "The only challenge there is the mall. "Mixed-use is far healthier. Intellectually it's more challenging - you have to get more ducks in a row."

And it's not just grim post-industrial landscapes that are in need of regeneration now. Even well-to-do Bath is getting in on the act. Morley Fund Management is about to appoint a development partner for the redevelopment of the Eastgate area of the city centre, with Multi Development and Lend Lease rumoured to have made the shortlist.

Strutt & Parker partner Nick Young is advising Morley. "This is nine acres within a World Heritage Site," he says. "The redevelopment will help bring Bath back to where it should be."

Morley won consent after a long planning process for a scheme that ticks all the regeneration boxes - it's an open-air scheme, mixed-use with 90 residential units, and the bus and rail stations are on its doorstep.

The appointment of the development partner is the final step, and the first phase should be open in 2008, with the second due in 2010.

One of the most ambitious regeneration plans is at Brierley Hill in the Black Country. Westfield acquired the Merry Hill shopping centre last year as part of the Chelsfield portfolio and it is now its biggest single asset worldwide, accounting for 6.5 per cent of its global portfolio.

Although Merry Hill is still a powerful draw, director Steve Hassell says that Westfield recognises it needs a fresh impetus. "The place has lost momentum," he says. "There's been no significant development since 1996 and in property terms that's a long time. It needs to be re-established as a destination of choice."

He notes that 21,000 new homes are expected to be built in the Black Country by 2021 and his aim is to capture that new spending power for Merry Hill. "Consumers' choices have evolved dramatically over the past decade," he says. "If centres don't meet their needs and aspirations they'll go elsewhere, even if that means sacrificing convenience for choice."

Westfield's strategy has been to link further development around the Merry Hill site to the wider regeneration of the area. "We prefer to talk about Brierley Hill rather than Merry Hill," explains Hassell. "It's not just the shopping centre, but the whole town centre." The developer is working with the four local authorities under the banner of the Brierley Hill Regeneration Partnership and this approach is already bearing fruit with consent for a mixed-use scheme, led by residential and office uses, on the nearby Danielsland site.

Too much, too soon?

So with all this development activity going on, is the market being swamped with new retail space? Not according to Cushman & Wakefield partner Alistair Parker. "Facts are something people tend to ignore," he says. "We've actually lost two-thirds of our shops, and that at a time when we're enjoying unprecedented prosperity."

He concedes that where prime rents are still below £100 zone A - it's harder to justify retail development as the catalyst for regeneration. Citing Dover, he says: "The current zone A is £30. That's below replacement cost."

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