Cornmarket Street

Oxford, United Kingdom

Cornmarket Street is a major shopping street and pedestrian precinct in Oxford, England that runs north-south between Carfax Tower and Magdalen Street. To the east is the small Golden Cross arcade of small jewellery and craft shops in a historic courtyard, leading to the Covered Market. To the west is the indoor Clarendon Shopping Centre that connects in an L-shape to Queen Street. Cornmarket was pedestrianised in 1999. In 2002, it was voted Britain's second worst street in a poll of listeners to the Today programme. The rating was due largely to the first attempt to repave the street in 2001. This work was a failure as the granite setts, which had been laid extensively, cracked and the contractor went into liquidation. In 2003 it was repaved again and new benches installed, amidst reports of budgetary problems.