Is the Brisbane CBD really ‘dead'?
If there is a magical time and day of the week that Queen Street Mall feels like a 'ghost town', I would like to be more across it, so I can plan all errands and endeavours for that specific window.
Our office is in the CBD. It takes about three minutes to walk to the lights on Adelaide Street and up to the entrance of Queen Street Mall. It takes even less time for me to feel smothered by crowds and panicked for a strong perimeter of personal space.
Even recent shopping trips into the city on weekends, or walks through the CBD on weeknights, show strong pedestrian activity and a busy food and drink scene.
These are, of course, surface observations and there's every chance bottom lines are telling a different story. It's also not to say the CBD hasn't faced a few rough years.
COVID reshaped office culture, impacting foot traffic and trade for retailers. There's been the loss of mall stalwarts Myer, the Pig 'N' Whistle and Milano, and growing competition from boutique shopping precincts like James Street.
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But data shows that period of uncertainty is stabilising. In the first half of 2024, Brisbane's CBD had the second-highest retail vacancy rate in the country, with 19.2 per cent of shops empty. By December, this had decreased to 18.5 per cent. We'll find out if that fell further in the first half of 2025 at the end of the month.
In the meantime, activations and new retailers show signs of life, particularly around the top end of the mall where trade was suffering. In January, fashion brand Country Road submitted plans for a new flagship store in the Bank of New South Wales building. Across the way, shoe retailer Skechers opened a store in March, followed by Asics in April.
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