I am responsible for the recent closure of high street shops...

PaleScene

Just out of interest does Brighton have park and ride facilities?
We visited a couple of years ago (I wanted to see the Doctor Who exhibition!) and had some adventures in parking which would probably be enough of a memory to tempt my public transport resistant oh onto a bus for part of the way.

I like park and ride - I use it in Oxford, both for visiting Oxford to go shopping (I still like just wandering round and looking at shops - for that sort of intention I try not to have a timelimit via parking by the hour) or as a halfway house to London because coaches are frequent and late running between Oxford and London. I'm also quite fond of taking the National Express to London for a day of mooching round shops - but I like the coach ride in its own right (enough time for an audio drama, or getting stuck into a book) so I appreciate I'm weird

I get to use our shared car on one or two days a week and do take it both to retail parks/supermarkets and to town, as well as other exciting venues like variegated local libraries, the farm shop and household recycling centre (though Sainsburys has a good recycling bit of its own). I tend to be a bit of a precision-parker in town - I only drive in when I've got specific goals and a timescale of under two hours. I sometimes park in a teeny but well-placed carpark which I presume is a bit of a local secret or not much sign-posted as despite its size I do normally find I can get in there. It has a two hour limit - but that's fine. Occasionally I want the rapier-precision of parking right by my target (okay okay, lazy days!) and park in the most central and populated car park which is on a higher rate and per half hour, but sometimes having to sweep round a few times dims the pleasure of that. The biggest plus for me of going down to one car and having these new routines is that I *have* to start out at 7and a bit-ish in the morning and it's a lot less busy then and has a knock on effect of going to town earlier too and that helps with parking.

On non-car days I can get into town very easily via bus (and stay as long as I like). Being MSE I get more pleasure out of my ticket purchase on the days when I go on lots of trips back and forth rather than just there and back. I get quite narked that if I want to see my parents in the next village, or go across to the small town next door it is different bus companies who have the tender so the stagecoach structure of 'as many journeys as you like on todays ticket' is negated. Funnily enough I more often see them on car days...

In the local village the car park used to be free to use and unlimited. With the coming of Tesco, it tripled in size, had a nasty flirtation with charging but has now settled on a free to use, three hour limit on stay. It's also next to the library (there are some designated library-user only spaces) and a primary school and twice a day you just can't find a space anywhere. I live ten minutes walk away but used to sometimes drive there on the excuse of heavy shopping, now I plan better I generally shop there less and walk more, plus my family park at my house to do the school run.

This is really rambling I know, but just some thoughts on variegated shopping habits. I shop online as well so think I may hit every beat - online/high street/retail park and driving/public transport and local/further afield.