Dr Les Dolega

Personal Statement

Les is a quantitative human geographer and his expertise is in retail geography and spatial analysis, in particular the performance of retail centres and their evolutionary trajectories. He completed his PhD at the University of Southampton between 2009 and 2012 under the supervision of Prof Neil Wrigley. He investigated the impact of the 2008-09 economic crisis on UK town centres and high streets. He took a role of a Lecturer at the University of Liverpool in 2016 and was appointed Senior Lecturer in 2022. He has led a number of research projects related to retail: 'e-Resilience' project which investigated the vulnerability of British town/retail centres to the impacts of internet sales, delineation of retail sentre boundaries and economic performance of retail centres in Liverpool City Region.
Currently, he is a Principal Investigator on a Nuffield grant where he is leading research on Inequalities and spatial patterns of aging population in England. He is also a Co-I on a Consumer Data Research Centre grants where he is leading a key research pathway related to retail. These include 'Automated delineation of town centre boundaries', 'Dynamic and multidimensional classification of retail and consumption spaces in the UK' and 'Retail Performance Indicators'. Les is supervising three PhD students who examine Footfall patterns across British town centres, Impact of weather conditions on retail sales and Characteristics of American Retail Centre Agglomerations. Les has published extensively in a range of high impact peer-reviewed geography and retail journals such as Geoforum, Environment And Planning A and B, Geographical Analysis, Cities and Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services. He is also an Assessment Officer for Geography.