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Cornmarket Street
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- This article is about a street in Oxford, England. For the Irish financial services company see, see Cornmarket Group Financial Services Ltd.
Cornmarket Street (often called just Cornmarket by Oxonians) is a major shopping street in Oxford, England that leads north from Carfax Tower towards St Giles'. Its mid-point is . It is a pedestrian precinct.
Located there is a variety of shops and businesses, including:
- Austin Reed
- Boots
- Burger King
- The Clarendon Centre
- Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC)
- McDonald's
- Pret A Manger
- Starbucks
- WHSmith
- HMV
- Virgin Megastore
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 attempt was a failure as the granite sets laid extensively cracked and the contractor went into liquidation. In 2003, it was repaved yet again and new benches installed, amidst reports of budgetary problems.
The Victorian photographer Henry Taunt set up a shop at 33 Cornmarket Street in 1869. It was a small shop and in 1874 he moved to larger premises in Broad Street.
Often missed by Oxford's shoppers in Cornmarket is the oldest building in Oxford, dating from 1040. The tower of St Michael at the Northgate is Saxon in origin. The church is so-called because this is the location of the original north gate of Oxford when it was a walled town. The Oxford Martyrs were imprisoned near here before they were burnt at the stake outside the city walls in what is now Broad Street nearby.