Since London Thameslink Kings Cross has packet it in in favour of the splendours of St Pancras and its multinational stores, the shops along Kings Cross Road have faced a real starvation of income.
Amongst the real victims are a flower shop, a smoothie bar and the Vietnamese Pho Restaurant I only recently gave a feature on them on Daniels Counter (Blog). Now they are all barricaded and closed up, having lost their regular customer intake. Of course Ican’t ask them exactly why they closed down, but if "one minus one equals still zero," then it probably is most likely that it is because of the close down / moving of the Thamelink Station to St Pancras international.
In f
act according to the owner of veteran Cafe Costas , Paolo, many regular customers have simply disappeared. Not helped by the fact that recently street works have fenced up Kings Cross Road, business is dire in an area that was just about managing. Only the three hotel tourists and some local residents an d businesses are keeping local service shops going.
One
wonders if Camden and Islington have consulted sufficiently with the planners of of the Kings Cross / St Pancras Development. Kings Cross Road would need some financial assistance and improvements in business planning to get it going again, rather than allowing it to die a slow death. What is needed is some hands on planning in what sort of licences are given out. Amongst others Kings Cross Road would require visible restaurants and cafes (with out door terasses) perhaps a mini super market such as Sainsbury Local or Tesco Central, a bank or something similar in my opinion – in other words something that makes ordinary people come into the area on a regular basis.
In my opinion four news-agents / off licences are three too many, and neither do the fry up places make the area any more attractive, nor the now boarded up shops and restaurants.
I h
ave warned on a constant basis that the Kings Cross regeneration is not to forget regenerating the South East side, but it seems that’s exactly what has been happening, whilst businesses in St Pancras / Kings Cross are thriving (making as said multi national chains rich rather than local businesses.
Pictures: Some of the closed down businesses.
This is a guest column from Daniels Counter
with kind mutual agreement between KCLE and DC
Co Creative Common Licence
Kings Cross Environment 
I have to say I welcomed the smoothie bar however the smoothies were very disappointing. ie. Adding milk when it wasn’t stated in the ingredients. Adding about 25% fresh fruit topped up with a large amount of processed orange juice – that was supposed to be pineapple smoothie. I never went back a third time.