I agree. I think the spawn shop roads/locations are gigantic. Noone is going to go 100 blocks to the end of the road. Basically the first one or two rows are going to get all the traffic and the rest are out of luck.

 

With my current shop design (pre-changes) I was able to sell (and only sell) 180 items, with a sign on just about every available block. In a pinch I found that I could increase that to about 210 or so (but didn't), and that would still exclude my buying anything. Finding 180 items to sell and keep those items in stock was a job and a half sometimes.

There are a lot more items in Minecraft than 180-210. So, the shop size increase would allow for more buying as well as selling, since, given that I have the space for it, I will now plan on doing so. How much more user to user commerce will this generate since we have the space to be more flexible with what we buy and/or sell?

In addition... the shop designs themselves. Before you had a small, often very rigid, box in which to cram in as much as you could, to buy or sell, and there was no chance to decorate or make the shop unique, and therefore, more attractive. I know I would look at a pretty shop before I would look at a box. Yes, the box might offer better prices, but there is nothing to draw my attention there except a lack of effort.

 

I agree

 

I agree with KMax on this one. Though every shop will be bigger, and shops further down the road will have lesser values than those closer to spawn, this new marketplace allows for more user customization. I would almost be willing to buy a shop, just to make it look cool. I had a spawn shop in the old market for a couple months that made me a lot of money, but I just wasn't willing to keep it going because of the room I had to work with. Now in the new market, I can comfortably sell all ores/minerals, buy/sell nstars and exp, and more. I think the small space we had before was a challenge, yes, but I like having more room for customization. Just think: will a "pretty" shop get more attention, or will the shop with signs covering every wall get more attention? I feel in this case, the latter would be more successful.

 

Larger shop spaces allow freedom of architectural customization. With this extra height and width, you can make an interesting shop face, be it letters or pixel art. I'm sure if confronted by a unique design, combined with effective marketing, patrons may actually enjoy continuing to use the same shop.

Though a person could maximize their available sale types, a single person would have a hard time keeping all blocks in stock all the time. This is true even in the old layout of the shops. Some people do team to stock shops. With more space, this could also encourage more team run shops.

4 warps exist per color road, which creates sort of a "second tier" of shop value if you will, of shops located near these warps.

Eventually, this new layout may be able to help with navigation.

As andrew has stated, the main purpose of this event was to reduce market lag, and isolate the market from possible surrounding towns. I think in the end, that will be the biggest contributor to success of the new market.