Closures, Clusters and Deprivation: The Geographies of High Street Betting Shops in the Early Twenty-First Century

Betting shops have been a familiar, if not always universally loved, feature on the High Street in all towns and cities throughout the UK for some 60 years, but in recent years concerns have been expressed about the undesirability of their presence in the urban retail environment. This paper analyses the geographies of betting shops in six urban areas in the UK. It explores the basic geographies of betting shops in these towns and cities and specifically the charges that they show a tendency to form clusters and that they are disproportionately found in areas of high deprivation. It finds some evidence to support these claims but recognises some important qualifications. This analysis is set within the recent sharp decline of betting shop numbers in the UK. The policy implications of these findings are drawn out.