From the time that it first began to take shape in the mid-1950's the shopping precinct at Coventry has generally been regarded as a pioneering example of its kind. No other historic city in Britain attempted to create a pedestrianised shopping centre on quite the same scale in the post war years, or to such an original design. The only places which acquired shopping centres as notable as Coventry's were the New Towns of Stevenage, Harlow and Crawley. They are all partially pedestrianised, but they do not have the same multi-level circulation as Coventry and their context is radically different. None was designed as early as Coventry, where the masterplan dates from 1941.

The importance of the Coventry shopping precinct has been recognised not just in Britain, but also throughout the world. For instance it features prominently in The City in History (1961) by the great American urbanist and historian Lewis Mumford. He remarks that "the multi-level shopping centre at Coventry with its trees and banks of flowers, its sheltered walks and pleasant relationship of buildings is, by consensus, one of the finest built anywhere". Likewise Sir Colin Buchanan in his immensely influential study Traffic in Towns (1963), singled out Coventry city centre as a model for handling the relationship between people and vehicles: it is, he wrote, "much more than an ordinary street merely closed to vehicles. It is a whole series of connected open spaces with fronting shops, full of variety and interest".

Although many 1950's developments now seem to be at the stage in life where they appear tired and dated, it is still easy to appreciate the inventiveness and originality of the Coventry scheme. As so often happens, the pioneering example has survived as one of the best of its kind.

Despite its location as part of the central shopping core of the City, the Lower Precinct subsequently fell into decline in the City Council's ownership and was viewed by some commentators as a prime example of urban decay.

English Heritage, however, saw the Lower Precinct's buildings as the best example of post war town centre retail architecture and initially proposed to list them as Grade I. Arrowcroft Group Plc, advised by its Consultant Architect, Michael Aukett, secured the support of English Heritage for its conservation-led regeneration scheme, implemented between May 2000 and May 2002.