Quite looking forward to this . . . I think.
A Virgin-megastore type place that is opening here in May, about a five-minute walk from where I live. I’m hoping that it will have a good English book section. And I’m curious as to how it will change the face of the already very muched changed Avenida de la Constitución, which is in the process of ‘going pedestrian’ with the exception of a new state-of-the-art tramline. I’m also curious as to whether it will fare any better than the Virgin store that opened and closed here within about five years.
I don’t have any recent photos of the Avenida, but found quite a lovely one over here taken just after Christmas. The change is quite amazing, quite minimalist compared to how it was before, which will take a bit of getting used to. But I think the overall effect is a real improvement.
Looking at the photo, the Fnac store will be on the right not far up from that ‘wedding cake’ building and so far it looks like the building is being redone quite tastefully; hopefully no huge gaudy plastic signs will be installed between now and May 4th. The Avenida has already been despoiled by the presence of two Starbucks, only a couple of blocks from each other – I just noticed the newer and bigger one the other day. Why???
Anyhow, we shall see. I think that once the trams start running the Avenida is going to become a much more popular & pleasant place for people to stroll and shop. But it would be a shame if it ended up losing its very special Sevilliano ‘ambientation’.

I hope the move to get people to stroll and slow down a bit works…
Next town over from here had closed off a couple of blocks of their downtown — and it died. They’ve opened it up to traffic again, and added some residence spaces, above the business/street level, and it’s a popular place again. On the other hand, they did the same thing in Santa Monica, and it’s been mundo popular from the git go…
Starbucks: they’ve been dropping them into banks and grocery stores here; the coffee isn’t even brewed on premises individually anymore, but made in big insulated pots, and doctored up when ordered. What’s the point? I can do that at home, for cheaper, and the coffee doesn’t even taste burned! 🙂
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Virgin Megastores seem to be suffering these days, definitely…they closed one by me, after there was a collapsed roof during a very heavy rainstorm, and never bothered to open it again.
And er…, I reckon that mundo should be mondo, 😳
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Depends – it would be ‘mundo popular’ in Spanish, nena.
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Oh, er…yeah, that’s what I meant, that’s the ticket! 😉
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