Needless to say, they're very chuffed in Skipton that their High Street is in the final for Britain's greatest street, against the mighty London duo of Kensington High Street and the Portobello Road.
But they aren't as surprised as outsiders may be; small though it is, Skipton ticked all the boxes in the Academy of Urbanism's criteria for the annual competition: vibrant, characterful, human in scale, diverse, walker-friendly, secure and full of vernacular architecture.
Are those tick-boxes right? They almost worked for the high streets in Belfast, Deal, Oxford, Rochester and Wells, which were all on the long list but didn't quite make the final grade. But are they missing things too, or are some of them misplaced?
Clearly one necessary ingredient in any beloved High Street is that they do not qualify for inclusion as an example of 'identikit High Street UK' ... the endless rearrangements of the same predictable shops.
One noticeable thing about Skipton is that it has quite a lot of empty or hard-to-let shops, for example. That could be considered a minus, a sign that edge-of-town supermarkets are threatening the grand local tradition of independent businesses. But you could also see it as a plus, in that local opinion is exercised and galvanized by the issue, as the briefest study of town noticeboards or the Craven Herald newspaper showed when I visited Skipton.
Where do you think the best High Street is and what are the magic ingredients?
The lists are closed for the 2008 awards, which will be announced in Liverpool in November, but things are limbering up for next year and the contest involves public voting.
Local networking greatly impressed the judges when they came up North, so, who knows, perhaps you could seed a campaign now that will see your home town ultimately covered in glory.
