Out of town retail developments are bad for the environment  Out of town retail developments are bad for the environment. They encourage pollution because they are further from town centres than traditional retail units and encourage the use of cars for fairly short, environmentally harmful journeys. They also frequently involve the destruction of large areas of countryside, not only to accommodate the retail development itself, but also the parking, access roads and secondary development that usually follows. This is made worse by the standard one or two story design of modern malls, which results in wasteful sprawl. Efficient urban development, by contrast, tends to go upwards (or downwards) in multi-storey buildings, often with parking below and apartments above retail space. Friends of the Earth, an environmental lobby, has recently pushed a ban in Northern Ireland on all out-of-town shopping centres, arguing they 'increase consumption and waste and dramatically increase cars on the road'1  1 Friends of the Earth. (2011, June 10). No more out of town shopping centres. Retrieved August 4, 2011, from Friends of the Earth Northern Ireland: