Continued from post 83132)
Thank you HassanHC, MIT and Hammaid sb for your agreement and kind words.
Darwaish sb, SFGCS sb and Junaid sb
Thank you for your willingness to continue a healthy debate free from emotional biases.
For a commercial hub to thrive there are two basic conditions:
1.
Location in the proximity/middle of larger than average residential plots with a posh area feel to it (it used to be 4 kanal in the times of Gulberg and Model Town back in 70/80's and now the definition of larger than average is 2 kanal residential like in Y and Z block of DHA Phase 3). This ingredient gives the commercial location that posh feel which I discussed in my last post 83132 below.
2. Large number of commercial or the "Critical Mass" below which the commercial activity will not be significant enough to be noteworthy (example is Commercial activity in Model town where condition 1 mentioned above is met but the scale of commercial is below a critical mass and hence it halted and remained just a local grocery/meat shop commercial instead of a big commercial hub like Liberty Market or MM Alam Road)
If you look at overall Lahore commercial landscape for high street shopping or posh eatries you will find that all such high street shopping areas or posh eatries are located in areas where gnerally above conditions are met. This primarily includes Liberty and MM Alam Road (a larger number of 4 kanal residential surrounding it and commercial plots (including the residential that have been converted into commercial now) and Y Block.
Ichra, Shalmi and other such commercial hubs are the ones where there is a large amount of commercial plots (hence condition 2 is met) but since condition 1 is not met in these locations it did not develop as a high end commercial hub.
Phase 8 commercial broadway will eventually develop and thrive as it has a volume of commercial above this critical mass but since it is not surrounded by larger than average residential plots it might take a long time for it to be considered as the shopping/hanging out destination. Comparing it with Y Block at this stage is wrong in my opinion as these two are on two very different timelines. And Y Block has the undeniable edge of condition 1 (larger than average posh residential).
In Phase 6E Block and Phase 7 these two conditions are met. So not today, but when this gets populated eventually, these will have their own place in the "places to hang out" and "places to consider for high street shopping" for Lahoris!
Baki WaAllah ul Ilm
:)