The death of the American mall

[DRW50]

Some chilling, beautiful photographs in this article.

http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/jun/19/-sp-death-of-the-american-shopping-mall

[Soapsuds]

Looks like one of our malls here that is still open but only has a Sears store in it plus other five and dime [!@#$%^&*] in it. It use to have a Montgomery Ward in it...a Mervyns in it to name a few....then the mall just went downhill..

[Cheap21]

I have like 4 malls within a 20 mile radius of me

[allmc2008]

Reminds me of Bioshock.....

Why are the malls dieing? I don't have time to read the article....

[SFK]

There's an interesting website called "Dead Malls". I'm having trouble with the link, but I'm assuming it's referenced in the article. There was a tony mall here in the D.C. 'burbs called White Flint. In its heyday, its anchor stores were I. Magnin, Bloomingdale's, and Lord & Taylor. The mall fell out of vogue and people mostly went there for The Cheesecake Factory, P.F. Chang's, and Dave and Buster's. Now the mall is being demolished for a new mixed retail/residential/office complex in the open air strolling town center layout that's sweeping our area, if not the nation.

[allmc2008]

I don't understand how those open-air layouts are so popular. Has everyone forgotten it gets Hot in the summer and Cold in the winter. When it is 105 degrees I would rather be in a nice cool mall and when it is 30 degrees I want to be in a nice warm mall.

[NothinButAttitude]

Yes! I'm glad that others find dead malls interesting too. It's saddening to see that the American mall is becoming a thing of yesterday. It is true that people favor outlets/outdoor malls/strip malls or online shopping nowadays. Two major malls down here are basically ghost towns with only a few stores left inside. But I doubt they'll make it much longer seeing as the anchor stores (e.g. Macy's, Goodys, JCPennys, Dillards, Belks, etc.) are leaving the malls too.

I do wish though that the government, someone with money would do something with these monstrosities--either revitalize them or make them into independent office buildings. Hell, make them into shelters or apartments for the homeless.

[DRW50]

I have to admit I find abandoned places fascinating, like those photosets you see of people in abandoned amusement parks. I'd never go in them, as I'd be terrified, but the photographs are often just gorgeous.

Seeing those mall photos brought back some memories. I haven't really been in one in years, although some malls are still going strong. It's just the assumption that malls were the American way of life (which peaked in the late 80s) that led to so many malls popping up and reaching overkill.

[AdelaideCate007]

We have a lot of what are "city centres" (buildings filled with shoppes and restaurants). They're still enourmously popular and do really well. I go to the one a couple of blocks up from where I work almost everyday for lunch. We have a lot of those open air shopping centres too. I can only think of one or two American version malls and they're way out in the suburbs I have no idea how they do.

Thanks for the sharing the article. Super eerie and, like Carl, I find abandoned places fascinating. I love how fast nature comes back in some of these places.

[SFK]

Funny you should say that because there's another local mall that started as an open air arcade, two long parallel rows of shops, anchor store at the end. Then in the seventies they built a roof to enclose it. Everything old is new again.

[Mr. Vixen]

Same

[robbwolff]

I think it depends on where you live. Here in southern New Jersey (I'm outside Philly), our malls are thriving. Some have expanded too. We're also seeing a resurgence of small town shopping districts. I live in Collingswood (hometown of Michael Landon of "Little House on the Prairie" fame and Michael Corbett of "The Young and the Restless," "Search for Tomorrow," and "Ryan's Hope"), which has a vibrant downtown.

[beebs]

It's strangely different in Canada. Though we have many a suburban shopping centre (though not as many are dead or dying), we have a history of downtown malls started up to counter the suburban mall culture of the US spearheaded by the now-defunct Eaton's department chain, who opened tens of downtown malls attached to their stores across the country. In my hometown, the local Eaton's store (a rather lovely 1930's art deco building) bought up all the back lots surrounding it's store and constructed a hideous all-black siding monstrosity complete with underground parking and skywalk across one of the side streets.

It seems most of those malls started to really die out in the early 90s, as Eaton's fortunes declined. Indeed our local downtown mall was outpaced by a larger, more auto-friendly mall further south, and when Eaton's closed, so did the business in that mall. It's since been turned into a casino. The only one of those Eaton's malls that still is thriving is the Toronto Eaton Centre, which has moved upscale and will be bookended by a Sak's Fifth Avenue and a Nordstrom by next year, and it seems Pacific Centre in Vancouver (though I've never been). Both malls required massive overhauls to be able to adapt to a post-Eaton's world. It seems the middle-class market Eaton's, and, subsequently, Sears (who purchased Eaton's in the late 1990s) inhabited is out of vogue, and even the suburban malls in Canada are often struggling unless they move upscale.

[All My Shadows]

Our local mall is 45 years old and has barely been cosmetically altered in that time. The makeup of stores/services has changed a lot since I was a kid, however, and even though it's still pretty packed, everyone basically agrees that it's lacking.

[quartermainefan]

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8VpMkDsn6QrXqhsbxMiQZg/videos