An appropriate commentary piece from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune covering lots of the same details.
Even Coconut Mall is gone now.
Possibly all the cars zipping through had something to do with it. And the proliferation of mushrooms and banana peels.
It could never compete with more mixed-use urban centers like Delfino Square.
Same as any other stores I imagine. The Lehigh Valley Mall in Whitehall, PA built an open air section adjacent to the older enclosed mall. It’s mostly higher end stores like Pottery Barn with some restaurants.
In 2006, they also built the Promenade Shops nearby in Saucon Valley. That’s more of a high end open-air mall that’s described as a "lifestyle center". That seems to be the trend these days. You have the stores and shops and restaurants all in close proximity. But you don’t have the food courts and enclosed public spaces for people to loiter about.
This is what I was going to say. Outdoor malls in distant suburban locations with huge parking lots or garages are no different than enclosed malls.
The urban villages I’m talking about are located in population dense areas with access to bus and train lines, have bicycle rentals, no huge parking facilities, and are mixed use with not just retail stores but also groceries, weekly farmers markets, and residences.
The Mall of America has been so successful at maintaining a close to 100% occupancy rate that their Phase 2 expansion is due to open next year. They struggle for a while with their 4th floor “entertainment” district but have since reoccupied it with Dick’s Last Resort taking over the old Planet Hollywood location, a comedy club, tex-mex restarant, etc.
People were a tad upset when Camp Snoopy pulled out, but the takeover by Nickelodeon Universe has been great with them investing millions in updates and new rides. A new Radisson Blu opened attached to the south side of the mall and the expansion will link directly to the IKEA.
You obviously know MOA. We last visited about 8 years ago. You can really get lost in that place.
Is it true the locals know the best places to park so they can quickly get into their favorite stores and restaurants? Have you seen the old home plate marker? Is the old Twins bleacher seat still hanging on a wall?
Let’s see: you’ve got a finite but gradually growing amount of retail shopping going on. Then you have overbuilding of malls, competition from the big-box stores, the revitalization of the urban cores in many cities, the decline of the breed of stores that had been the malls’ retail ‘anchors’, the Internet, and finally the crash of 2008 causing an abrupt drop in retail sales.
Seems like it would have been hard to get to now without seeing a lot of malls going belly-up.
The old Met Stadium home plate marker is right in front of the entrance to the Sponge Bob roller coaster. The bleacher seat (marking where Harmon Killebrew hit his 522 foot homer) is still bolted on the wall by the log ride.
Parking has been a real headache lately since the north side surface lot is gone because of the expansion, and the south side surface lot is gone because of the new Radisson Blu. On the weekends it’s best to park in the open lot to the east and walk over. My favorite place to park is on the south end of the east garage near the top. You can then walk across the 4th floor skyway and see the wall of celebrities who have visited the mall.
It’s my understanding that open air malls generally charge their tenants a flat rate whereas enclosed malls a lso tack on a percentage of revenue. That means there has to be a powerful draw from the climate controlled window shopping to make renting in an enclosed to make it worth the difference.
I’m 40 something and grew up in 80’s mall culture. The whole reason I went to the mall was for entertainment (movies and arcades) and to socialize with my friends who were at the mall at the same time. As I was thinking about this thread it dawned on me that I’ve never spent a lot of money at the mall. Sure, I’ve bought plenty of clothes at the mall but beyond that I’ll buy one or two things at a time and only small items that are easy to carry out of the mall. For any substantial purchase I tend to go to stores that cater to those specific needs - I’d never consider buying major electronics, art, furniture, or cookware at the mall for example. It’s just too much hassle there.
Now, the outdoor malls I go to have very nice and clean theaters (The Angelika). They have high end restaurants, nice bars, outdoor concerts when the weather is nice, and nice well kept walking paths and streams to wander around. They even have easy access to shops should I decide to buy something but don’t want to carry it too far. I actually do buy some high dollar items there for just that reason.
From a Generation X point of view malls were always first a place for socializing. When we got older malls were no longer fun so we moved on. The new outdoor malls cater to that original need, instead of focusing on cheap stores with cheap products they offer a nice place to come, sit a while, and spend lots of money on food, drinks, and entertainment.
All good answers but in the end I think that their vulnerability to zombie attack was their downfall. This was pointed out in 1978 and the enthusiasm for malls began to wane.
Then in the '80s came the killer robots as seen in the 1986 classic Chopping Mall. I mean dodging zombies and killer robots, who needs that when they want a new sweater?
Of course high rents, failing anchor stores, the rise of the internet and other things like these played their parts but the bottom line answer is the living dead.
Some of them worked at Sears.
High rents, failing anchor stores, the rise of the internet, and zombies and robots don’t typically have much disposable income.
Daddy would have gotten us Uzis
8 million square foot mall. Read it and weep.
I looked at that and really it would be classified as a mixed use development since it incorporates housing and office towers.
Dubai really goes for the big stuff. They already have the worlds tallest skyscraper and they have this indoor snow skiing facility.
They’re still popular (and big new ones are still being built) in Malaysia (and, I suspect, certain other countries with rising populations with disposable income). The weather being hot as hell there helps. I wonder if there’s any small hot weather effect even in the US – after controlling for other factors, are malls in Florida doing a bit better than in other states?
No, it appears not. Here’s the closest thing I’ve found to a list of closed shopping malls (and it’s already been linked to once). You’re welcome to correlate the number of closed malls to the population of each state:
I don’t see any tendency for there to be more closings in colder states. There may even be a tendency for more closings in warmer states. I think the warm weather in Malaysia has nothing to do with the increase in shopping malls.
You know that MoA isn’t heated? It is passively heated by windows, lights, and shopper’s body heat.
Speaking of heat, the comment that open air malls are just like enclosed malls doesn’t fly here in Arizona. Check out one of the newer ones:
You don’t really want to be walking from Target or Michael’s on the west side to the theater in summer. Think Lawrence of Arabia here. Oddly enough, they have an open air fireplace going all year around in front of the theater.
And the “small town” malls? Who thought that was a good idea? A shopping area set up like a small town, with shops on narrow streets and parallel (or angle) parking in front. Doesn’t work too well with big city volume. Can’t find a space, can’t see to back out, have to avoid the pesky pedestrians while trying to spot a space.
It usually isn’t this empty, though. I’ve never seen it without most of the in front spaces filled.
If you can’t get one of the few spaces, you can always park in the surrounding mall sized lot and walk in. (zoom out to see how big the lot is!)