New analysis has placed Warrington 2nd in the UK for COVID high street spend recovery.

Centre for Cities’ ‘High streets recovery tracker’ shows how cities and large towns are recovering from the impact of coronavirus.

The strong performance of the town centre following the lifting of restrictions, with large numbers of people once more spending money in local shops, has seen Warrington take 2nd place in the country, behind only Huddersfield.

Centre for Cities’ ‘spend index’ looks at relevant offline sales made in city and town centres at any time of the day, compared to a pre-lockdown baseline of 100.

Warrington’s performance has earned it an index score of 105, meaning that high street spending has bounced back to such an extent that it has been exceeding pre-lockdown levels.

Warrington Borough Council’s Cabinet Member for Economic Development and Innovation, Cllr Tom Jennings, said: “We know how important a successful high street is to our economic recovery, so the latest analysis from Centre for Cities is good news.

“The speed with which we have been able to bounce back from the restrictions is down to the resilience, positivity and adaptability of our business community, along with a real desire from our residents to spend local and support our shops. This will hold us in good stead for the future.”

To view the tracker in full, visit centreforcities.org/data/high-streets-recovery-tracker