I was talking last night to a friend who lives near a Tesco Metro which opened in SW London a few years back.

The impact on the local parade was, in their opinion, overwhelmingly positive. They did lose some shops with an overlapping offering but some shops adjusted their offering to differentiate themselves and the premises that were vacated were replaced with new offerings.

They had a strong sense that Tesco brought increased footfall to the parade and the spin off to the whole parade was net positive in increasing it's viability.

Nedless to say, those who owned the businesses which closed would have a different opinion but this is a commercial situation.