ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on an analysis of attempts to induce the retail-led regeneration of Charlestown, a middle-ring suburb of Newcastle in NSW’s Hunter region; it demonstrates the importance of contextual specificity to configuring the opportunities and limits of retail-led regeneration, particularly that focused on shopping centres. The chapter shows that, despite literature which tends to treat shopping centres as homogenous reflections of suburban development, they have specific connections to locally based patterns of retail development, population change dynamics, and transport developments. It explores the redevelopment of one middle-ring shopping centre precinct — Charlestown, in Newcastle, NSW — to illustrate the broader processes, issues and implications of suburban shopping centre redevelopment and the impact on middle-ring regeneration. Projected population growth and planning policies which encourage development around regional centres were important in providing the conditions for shopping centre-led regeneration in Charlestown.
