Can the American mall survive? | Hacker News Reader

Can the American mall survive?

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78 points0x54MUR41219 comments

I have no reason to think it can't - but the whole premise of malls needs to change. Outside of hyper-specialized, specific products (niche hobbyist sort of things) that require hands-on use/experience before purchase, it's impossible to compete with Amazon on general retail, so malls need to provide an experience. However, those same specific products and the like aren't big money-makers and can't sustain a large retail operation (for the most part - I'm excluding things like Tesla storefronts).

I've seen malls with amusement rides, mini-golf, arcades, rock climbing walls, mom-and-pop food halls, etc. Those are the malls of the future. Nobody is going to congregate around big-box clothing stores or CD/DVD stores, or chain restaurants with crappy food.

I would personally love to see a mall built around community experiences - think cooking classes, LAN gaming centers, woodworking classes, gyms, etc..

I've spent the last 5 years arguing with one of the colleges that I consult with about just that. They are trying to grow their adult education/community education (think GED, ESL, and 'interest classes' like woodworking, cooking, etc).

I have said for at least 5 years they need to rent (cheap) the space in the nearly defunct mall. It's right in the middle of town, with multiple bus routes. It's within walking distance of the community housing where elderly/low income folks live. It's perfect.

But they won't go for it because "the optic of us living in a retail space is not good". That's a quote from one of the administrators.

I don't get it. Community/junior colleges could absolutely saturate that kind of space with community based and educational events.

They are probably right about the optics. Who would want to take, say, craft classes inside a dying building symbolizing the cons of modern life.

Personally, and for many family friends who live where I grew up, near a smallish mall that has been dead for over a decade: tons of people. We'd all love to see the space being used, rather than rotting slowly. There was a lot of community activity when it temporarily reopened for a few events and as an indoor walking space (in between events) several years ago.

edit: bulldozing it and putting something else in that place would also be fine, but that costs a fair bit. and really, even just having a big indoor walking space was quite popular, there were several meetups using it, lots of elderly walkers and readers, etc. it was nowhere near as popular as a Walmart of course, but it transformed into a pseudo-public space for a while and it made me realize that "indoor parks" are kinda not a thing, but maybe they should be. particularly in places with a lot of rain or cold.

that, and a big rotting building in the middle of town is rather unambiguously worse optics for the area than even small use. it inevitably gets covered in graffiti and damage, and even minor use prevents that a lot.

A colocation space took over one of ours for a data center. It's nice inside, but the outside is still a dump, probably worse then before. It's an eyesore and there is no investment in the community or the area around the data center.

That's interesting. It makes sense of course -- the data center isn't selling to customers who come in via foot traffic, so why beautify the outside? A data center seems a bit interesting from a zoning point of view for that reason -- not incentivized to beautify; but not as bad as industrial, not a ton of possibly dangerous waste products...

I guess a not-actively-damaging source of tax revenue is always welcome in a town.

> so why beautify the outside?

Private investors could certainly choose to take a small hit to their return and take pride in how their investment looks from the outside. There's value in that.

Sure! It just isn't a core business need, unlike in the case of a mall.

> it made me realize that "indoor parks" are kinda not a thing, but maybe they should be. particularly in places with a lot of rain or cold

Or heat.

Presumably, they'd fix it up so it's not a dying building -- and it wouldn't symbolize the cons of modern life anymore. It would symbolize building a future in more ways than one.

The building isn't dying. The businesses that once occupied it are.

If you move into it, and have an active student body there every day, then it's not dead anymore, right? It's thriving with activity.

The people wanting to take craft classes are probably not going to ruminate over whether the classroom they're in was once a Foot Locker. I mean, as long as you aren't lazy about converting the space (i.e. take down the old signage and ditch the black and white stripes).

Look at the sibling comment to yours. There's a short video about Austin's CC. The place looks great!

Someone who is on a bus route that goes to the mall (typically, lots of routes will go to the mall, there may be a transit center there as well), or wants to take a class but not deal with the expense and congestion of college parking lots. Mall parking lots can be congested too, but when the mall is struggling to get tenants, their parking lots are mostly empty and easy to use.

Austin Community College has done this and it's amazing.

https://www.austincc.edu/campuses/highland-campus

I think there's a big difference between being in the mall, and acquiring a mall and gutting it. I didn't see the shopping center it was before, but the ACC building is really nice and looks like it was completely renovated from what it was previously.

That's correct. The space that ACC acquired previously looked exactly like a typical mall, and was probably built in the 60s or 70s.

I went to this mall for a New Year’s party when it was in the process of closing. Didn’t seem any different from any other of its age.

Growing up middle class in the 80s and 90s in a midsized city about an hour north of Austin, Highland Mall was a prime destination for the back to school shopping trip. The presence of Banana Republic made it rather upscale to us hicks from Bell County, though The Gap was the real scene of teen girl vs mom drama.

I was mostly interested in it for the ice rink, though. An indoor ice rink was an exciting novelty in Central Texas at the time, and that was the only public one between San Antonio and Dallas when I was a kid.

Community colleges in my area have been taking over and converting old and dying malls slowly.

The real issue is the issue everyone has these days. The rent is too high. What business does enough to justify giving the mall it's cut?

and why is the rent so high? because land costs are too high (this can be addressed, simply open up more land to be developed until the price drops to near zero). as for building costs? these can come down too, with the right regulations/ and lack thereof, we can make it legal for lower cost options to arise.

Just opening up more land for development is not an easy solution.

Environmental problems aside, America's car culture is rather incompatible with this solution. Endless suburban expansion is what lead to the enormous traffic problems currently being faced in Los Angeles and Houston. My home state is well on its way to having this same unsolvable problem by the end of the decade.

If land is too cheap it will be bought and fenced off for speculative purposes. You must force people to actually use the land you have given them. An empty lot barely pays any property tax because there is no property on it.

If you attract enough people your rent will be less. Attract people means someone comes to go to you and then visits other stores. If you can get husbands to go shopping with their wives (the sexism implied here is at least part based on reality, though I make no claim this example is the right thing to focus on)

Fight the good fight! Other comments are validating you, so keep on wearing 'em down.

Sounds like they need to see new optics. How about a field trip to malls that have been converted?

I too believe this is the answer.

In San Bruno, CA a portion of the mall there is dedicated to small experiences for children (a miniature play town, a bounce room, etc). I've taken my toddler there and it was pretty fun.

Pure commoditized retail isn't going to cut it anymore. I think another component is that the rent is going to have to be very cheap in order to lower the bar to entry and encourage rapid innovations in this space. If I were Simon (or a similar property group), I might dedicate a certain percentage of my mall spaces to "incubate" these new ideas by offer cheap or nearly free rent.

Tanforan failed so hard it’s getting torn down to become office space. Not exactly a great example.

Yeah, it's not super well executed by any means and its relegated to a very small section of the mall, but I still believe the idea is good and could be successful if nurtured correctly.

I think the owners might want to rethink that. Malls aren't a great business to be in right now, but I'm not too sure office space is that hot either given the work-from-home transition. Condos and other housing seem to still be a good business to be in though.

There was a place in North Texas (Frisco or Plano) that had a miniature indoor town, where kids could play as various professions, from hair stylist to firefighter to banker and other things. It struck me as a pretty neat use of what used to be a multi-story department store space, though there wasn't much geared toward my daughter who was two at the time. Still, making use of the fairly-recently built space instead of just abandoning it seemed like a decent ethical choice, and they seemed to be doing OK, despite the ongoing pandemic.

Sounds like KidZania:

https://dallas.kidzaniausa.com/

https://g.page/KidZaniaUSA

KidZania is next level tho. Absolutely insane

They already have. Most new malls (at least in my area) are a sort of fake downtown with retail on the first level and apartments above. They are more restaurant heavy and have lawns and such for events.

The malls out by me which are dying are slowly moving to this model.

I think it's a great idea. There are plenty of working examples of housing/retail where people never have to leave indoors to get all their basic needs taken care of.

There's of course megamalls out by me as well, which are doing just fine and don't need to evolve. One is in a wealthy suburb, and has a shopping tourism industry which props up the local hotels on the weekends when business travel is low.

Is it really a fake downtown? I mean, if people are living there and retail is there, it is a real I guess... just, intentionally/artificially constructed (we can pick a adjective to fit whatever spin we want to put on it).

'Fake' in the sense of having been designed to be a sort of downtown-ish space, as compared to real downtown areas that evolved more organically. I've seen what your parent commenter is referring to; it looks a lot like like living at a mall.

Yeah, I get what you mean, I just think artificial is a better word.

Lots of "real" downtowns are also intentional -- they are just the product of zoning and lobbying by local businesses. That something has been designed doesn't make it fake. Places with dense population are attractive for shops, places with good shop access are attractive to live in, and there's a feedback loop there. The degree to which that feedback loop has been spurred on intentionally sits on a spectrum.

For example if the apartment were entirely for show (not actually lived in) I would call that fake.

Downtowns are usually central and towns organically formed around them. These are usually in random places and tend to be islands isolated from the rest of the city.

One thing that needs to be considered is these "fake downtowns" (or "lifestyle centers" as they like to call themselves) are generally owned by a corporation. So things that people might expect to be possible in a public neighborhood (hold a protest, hold a block party, etc.) may not be allowed because it's private property.

That is exactly the solution. I remember when I used to live in a country outside of the US, the first time a mall came to my city. It was built around a community experience. It was a place where people used to go, just like the park, to hang out. There was no obligation to spend any money. We’d hang out after school every day for a few years. Sometimes we spent money, sometimes we didn’t. The time we stopped going, which kind of aligned with overall decline of the space, was when they tried to turn every square inch of the mall into a revenue generating piece of real estate.

The most popular malls had community spaces. There were events for kids, there were spaces to hang out, there were sports being broadcast on the wall for free, the mall itself was an indoor + outdoor experience with plenty of green space, there were gyms, an entire lobby of pool tables and other games (you had to surrender an id to play, but otherwise it was free). So many attractions that would bring people over again and again while driving up business naturally.

I grew up going to this mall during it's peak in the 70's and early 80's, and I think it's done a fascinating job of adapting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BegXB3d6cqk

The indoor swap meet is what used to be a JC Penny's. The dead Sears is now a trade school - the mix of stores in there is fascinating and I think the key - focus on unique and local stores. Leave the chains to the strip malls.

The idea it’s impossible to compete with Amazon is a fallacy.

Can you share a counterexample?

Walmart? Target? Both generally going strong (Target stumbled lately) for decades, I think.

During the pandemic I wished Amazon/Amazon Fresh had been a better replacement for grocery stores and pharmacies, but it wasn't.

God I hope this is the way. I think this is happening to some degree, but malls also seem to have grown into the niche of selling veblen goods. I swear half of the floorspace seems to be jewelry stores.

Absolutely. something that's missing, is opportunities for enrichment. why is there no woodworking classes? or just general purpose learning classes for building stuff like houses or roofs. i'd love to learn how to set up a well, or build my own hand operated water heating tank, etc. Or at least offer a downtown vibe with live music, farmers market, and interesting cafes and museums. I don't want to see a huge parking area filled to brim with cars and heat stroke enducing pavement as far as the eye can see.

most malls, all i see is a sea of materialistic nonsense big box stores. i'll never visit those: and all conglomerates can wonder why no one goes there until the end of time.

Brand stores also seem very popular, just look at Apple. Maybe you will buy your $1K phone on-line but you may want to take a look at it somewhere.

Many people goes to a shop to look at products and then buy them on-line. That is not sustainable as the shop has the high-cost of physical presence but it is losing business to on-line.

Alibaba is not going to open big stores for people to peruse around nor is Amazon. So, the only ones interested in showing product for free to users are the makers of that products.

Even with very generous return policies is a pain in the ass to buy things and return them back again and again because they are not exactly what you wanted. To go to the store and browse all products in one sit is not only more efficient but many people enjoys the experience.

Buying clothing on Amazon is a crap shoot. You don’t know what the fit is like and, while returns are allowed, it is not a simple process. You also don’t know much about the quality of the item or if it even resembles the item advertised. Things are quite as dire as buying clothing from a Facebook advertiser but there is still a risk.

Buying from a brick and mortar store will usually let you try on the item and you can see and feel if it is what you want. Returns are relatively simple, too.

All of what you said is true, but are American Eagle, Gap, Abercrombie, H&M, Uniqlo, and Old Navy sufficiently unique from each other as to justify all of them having floor space in the same mall? Not really. Two or three of them makes more sense.

Your point holds up well for stores with higher-quality offerings (e.g. Nordstrom, J.Crew, or Express), where it's always worth your time to shop around, see things in-person, and try them on.

Of course, some clothing stores have a more narrowly-defined target demographic, and thus they are immune from fast-fashion redundancy (e.g. Torrid, Hot Topic).

Few things sound as out of touch and patronizing as pseudo-elites telling common folk that the brands and the stuff they like are all the same and therefore redundant.

I'm curious about what you find not simple about the Amazon return process. My experience is that it is extremely simple. I request a return in the Amazon app and then drop the item off at the UPS store next to my grocery store next time I need to go grocery shopping.

One of the malls where I live is making exactly this transition. Half the retail stores are already gone, replaced with various entertainment venues. A huge swath of the mall is now dedicated to restaurants. I don't mean a typical food court, but actual table service, bars, and fast-casual places with their own dedicated seating. Most of them aren't even national chains. The closest thing they do have to a food court is a "food hall" with an unusual layout and not a single Orange Julius or Panda Express in sight.

The retail stores they seem to be keeping are less conventional too. One I spent some money at yesterday as a book and gift shop. They have a ton of vintage books and collectibles, and art from local artists. This is stuff that is a lot harder to buy online, and there is a persistent novelty factor that makes walking in the store a unique experience every time.

Our local mall had a Tesla storefront. It moved out into an abandoned Toys R Us on the other side of the freeway. Bad for the mall, but good that an abandoned building got a new lease on life.

You nailed it. Whenever I do visit a Mall especially with my younger kids, the attraction is more about the Fun and Social stuff than those boring stores. Yes, unless you are big into buying things in person or luxury stuff, Amazon has pretty much replaced most mundane stuff. Food, there are restaurants and Mall is not the right attraction for food.

Mall is more of a social place where we need to bring back the "it's cool and fun to hang at the mall" vibe. Whichever mall can do that successfully, it is a win.

I was back in my hometown recently for the first time in years, and I was shocked to see that my childhood mall was busier than I had ever seen it.

The end-cap Sears carcass has been demolished. Apartments are being built in its place, with a private breezeway connecting them to the mall.

Two adjacent large stalls are now an enormous arcade and bowling alley. A stand-up comedy venue has replaced Ruby Tuesday. There's an escape room now, indoor bunjee jumping, and a dance studio too. A deaf people's advocacy group has a neat little cultural center.

There's a bunch of new, huge sculptures in the large center area. Someone finally had the presence of mind to install some seating. The big sculptures deaden some of the noise. It's a genuinely pleasant place to just sit, socialize, and people watch.

The big multi-level carousel is still there. Sadly, they took down the huge steel-cable jungle gym, but the one they replaced it with looks a lot friendlier to toddlers.

For my entire childhood, half the food court stalls were empty. The other half were bland fast food. Today, all the stalls are filled, and the available options span many cultures.

Despite all this, a lot of things are pretty much the same. The retail is still there, there's just fewer redundant stores. Almost every store that remains has an obvious reason for its physical existence.

Conceptually, malls still make sense. They will always make sense, as long as buildings that share walls with each other are cheaper and more energy-efficient. In order to survive, a mall must find ways to make people want to visit the mall.

They would make the most sense if the parking lot that surrounds them were converted into 4 story residential housing, a commuter rail station, and a bus stop.

One thing that will change is the number of people who enter the mall and only spend money in a single place before leaving. Stores in the mall have traditionally benefited greatly from people drawn in by other stores. A customer might enter the mall to buy an article of clothing at one shop, but then also decide to grab a coffee and later also spend money at the bookstore. Very few people are going to spend their money on an hour at the dance studio and then pay for another hour at the climbing gym and then go bowling. When shops were retail it was easy to walk out with bags from several different shops every time you went in, but when shops are experiences they require a lot more time and energy from shoppers.

You're thinking about it backwards, the experiences are what draw them in to then spend money in the other stores after their hour of activity

Once the retail is all gone (and most of it will since it can't compete with online in prices or selection), with the exception of food (which is an experience has it's own limitations) what can the mall offer besides experience/activities? Only a few stores really benefit from hands on, and even the people who do stop into a retail store after an hour at the dance studio, or the gym, or the comedy club will still pull out their phone and check amazon to price check items.

Hands-on also means immediate gratification and no-hassle returns.

Online can't quite match on the immediate gratification factor. If you hit the magic sweet spot of things in the right warehouses, you can get some things in a few hours, but if I go to a in-person store, there's no guessing.

If it's wrong or faulty, I can get an immediate replacement or refund rather than waiting on a RMA process.

That's true, I'll give amazon some credit for trying their best to make returns easy, but it's still obnoxious when the number of cheap counterfeits and poorly made products is so high. No matter how easy they make it, the time and frustration involved with doing without while you wait for another roll of the dice is high.

I think you really underestimate the value of physical stores. For example, browsing for books on Amazon is much more inefficient in my experience than just going to a physical bookstore. Sure, you can preview the text for books on Amazon, but I doubt it's ever going to be as seamless as picking up a physical book and reading the first few paragraphs.

You already see this a lot with the upscale outdoor malls. e.g. the Domain in Austin. These places are always crowded and popular... and tend to have more up and coming brands/niche stores rather than copy/paste main brands.

Fundamentally, people like to go outside and hang out, even if there's not a compelling economic reason for doing so (online is cheaper/more practical).

So I don't think the "mall type" experience will ever die, just needs to be a higher quality experience, as you said.

Also the rents in these older malls will drop dramatically which either leads to repurposing the space (apartment conversion) or previously uneconomical business models starting to work (big box retail again)

> it's impossible to compete with Amazon on general retail

Uh, I don’t know about that. Just not being a weird bazaar filled with garbage differentiates a store from Amazon.

My family used to buy everything from Amazon, but after an accretion of negative experiences, it’s almost nothing. Anything that goes on or in the body is out — can’t be trusted! I’ve even stopped buying computer peripherals after receiving a spate of counterfeit devices “shipped and sold by Amazon”. I still use them for things like basic office supplies, but that’s about it.

Clothes and food are things I cannot buy from amazon (food, because i like to choose, and usually plan "today for todays dinner", and clothes, because I'm tall and not fat, so getting a right size is hard)... and those stores represent 80% of the malls contents here. Then there's an odd electronics store and restaurants.

I think the biggest thing killing malls is parking requirements. When there's a quarter mile of parking lots in all directions from the main building, it makes it impossible to connect to the rest of the city without a bus system.

It's kind of fun to see all the new takes on malls. In/around NYC we have a few that I actually use:

- Hudson Yards - a pretty good destination with a small kid on a rainy day and easy to get to via the subway. Big and open, has a Camp store (with slide and play area), good sit down and take-away food options, and surrounded by some fun outdoor city stuff (my son LOVES watching the train yard across the street, and the highline is right there).

- American Dream in NJ - More like an indoor collection of amusement parks, we use the Legoland Experience and the Aquarium reasonably often and when my son is a little older we'll likely use the Nickelodeon theme park and the indoor water park which looks pretty fun. This poor place opened right at the start of the pandemic, hope it survives.

- Ridge Hill in Yonkers - Sort of an outdoor mall... has another Legoland experience, but also a pretty good mini golf and arcade (it's really hard to find a good arcade for little kids in NYC) and a trampoline park we might get to try one day.

What really makes these malls work is they have unique and fun experiences rather than just the typical department-store-anchored "get your daily errands done like it's 1980 and amazon doesn't exist" experiences.

I do miss the malls of my youth (RIP South Square [1]), but economically most of those stores don't make any sense anymore and I don't see why they'd come back. I'm sure not going to start driving to a mall to go to a Radio Shack anymore.

[1] https://www.opendurham.org/buildings/south-square

and then there's the World Trade Center

The American Dream is going to go belly up soon if I had to guess: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3ZcFguYn3U

It really was constructed strangely (feels like an 80s mall in the darker corridors).

I feel like the actual attractions are cool but the connections between them are not inviting in a way that makes you want to explore our stick around.

We visited Hudson Yards a few months back and it was a beautiful area. Easy to get to, highly walkable and very friendly feeling.

I grew up going to South Square too. Lots of fond memories. I've also been living near Northgate for the last decade or so, and that has been a depressing experience. Watching it decay, finally shut down, and some of the newer, more attractive nearby tenants like Planet Fitness now packing up shop has been incredibly saddening. I just hope Randy's Pizza and C&H Cafeteria will stick around, but it's more likely the entire strip with be torn down to be developed into condos that start at $2k/mo.

I would love to see some of these spaces be repurposed for more affordable housing, which we desperately need, but it isn't "financially feasible" in the eyes of these developers [1].

This recent news clip was almost hilariously blunt in the way things have been trending here [2].

[1] https://indyweek.com/news/durham/northgate-mall-durham-rezon...

[2] https://www.wral.com/local-business-owners-pushing-back-agai...

lol no one goes to Hudson Yards. They were banking on tourists and (The Vessel is closed) and commercial leases. 36% of office space is empty, highest in Midtown [1]. The mall lost Neiman Marcus.

pdf https://www.avisonyoung.us/documents/92404/1115504/AY+Q2+202...

Lol American Dream. Sat half-built for over a decade, sold and resold, opened years late, in a location everyone wants to avoid (due to stadium/arena traffic) in a county already overflowing with malls AND with blue laws that don't allow shopping on Sundays. And now it missed its bond payment.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https:/...

American Dream was basically a bet that casinos would be legalized in North Jersey and American Dream would be the perfect location. 7-out!

> The more you try to control the environment, the more stifling it becomes. I think this is why I turned on malls after spending my formative years inside them. As I got older, I yearned for the unpredictability of a less manicured and mass-produced reality, one more surprising than what a stop at the Gap or Sbarro could offer.

Christ, isn't that the case. I remember as a child visiting different places in the U.S. and it was often like visiting foreign countries. Increasingly though, so much of the U.S. looks so much like the rest in terms of retail/food that I begin to feel the entire country is in fact a mall of sorts.

Similar/ same is happening in Europe. George Carlin gave a tirade against the malls of america in the.....70s?

It's like the NIMBY problem - everyone claims to want the variation and difference, but they act so as to make everything uniform and identical.

> Increasingly though, so much of the U.S. looks so much like the rest in terms of retail/food that I begin to feel the entire country is in fact a mall of sorts.

Here's a good video on the subject: https://youtu.be/UX4KklvCDmg

This is one of the reasons why I can't stand being anywhere in the Suburban dead zone. Everything is devoid of uniqueness and every single one looks just about the same across the US. Both rural and urban areas at least retain some semblance of history or culture.

It’s also been shown that Apple drives so much traffic to malls where they are located (incremental 10% higher total mall sales), that Apple is able to negotiate cheaper rent.

https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/10-mind-blowing-facts-ab...

It's certainly the only reason I've ever gone to the mall around here.

Wow. I just realized the same.

Well are dead-ish to dead malls and then there are malls that are doing pretty well and then there are luxury malls. You tend to see mall Apple stores in the middle category; even though they're not traditional anchor stores they effectively are.

Meanwhile, the former category has/had anchor stores like in the case of local mall such as it is at this point like Sears, JC Penney, and Macys.

Can I ask why? You don't buy things in malls anymore? Why? Thanks!

What would I buy? My clothing isn’t from any store in the mall. I don’t wear jewelry. I’m allergic to most food in the food court. (Literally anywhere in Cincinnati has better food anyway.) IKEA, Target, and Microcenter are in easy driving distance. I can get a lot of stuff from Amazon.

I do know everything in the mall. It’s my backup location for walking when going to the park or zoo isn’t a viable. I might stop by the LEGO store sometime, but would be an expensive mistake. Otherwise, there isn’t any store that interests me.

Everything I would ever buy in the mall can be found online for the same price or less, and I don't have to leave my house and deal with parking.

I hate the parking and crowds, the filth, and hoping that some store will have something I want in my size. I can eat better food at home. Shopping in general is a stressful experience for me.

Depending on the mall (Westfield Valley Fair), parking can be so bad for many years now that we avoid the mall completely. While the parking lot can be near capacity (mall is popular), we still avoid it (parking is too hard to find).

That's impressive, but on reflection it makes sense: these days we can buy almost anything we want with a couple taps of our phone, unless... our phone is broken.

And Apple often does in-store repairs in around an hour. Not enough time that you want to go home and come back, but enough time that you'll wander around the mall.

Plus, Apple does a bunch of other stuff to attract people to their stores. They have in-store classes on all of their products. They have the Genius Bar to answer questions. There's stuff to do there besides just buying the latest thing. You can also learn how to use the thing you bought, or the thing you already have. Good luck finding a sales clerk at the likes of Best Buy or, back in the day, Sears, who can actually tell you how to adjust the TV/washer/dryer/microwave/dishwasher/etc. that you purchased there. All they're interested in is selling the product, getting the sweet add-on of extended warranties and getting you out of the store so they can upsell the next person.

Phones also encompass/replace/compete with many of the goods that used to be sold in retail shops and and mall locations: books, magazines, music, movies/videos (and movie tickets), toys, games, video game systems, cameras, audio and video recorders, GPS systems, fitness trackers, notebooks and personal planners, greeting cards and stationery, desktop/laptop computers, etc..

Note that the only arcade machines that survive are prize machines that can't be replicated on a phone (although phones have gambling games of their own with virtual prizes.)

Phones also compete for time and attention vs. all other activities.

The American style mall should end.

We need more superblocks.

Roughly on a 10 city-block sq area - a giant parking lot underneath, a floor for public transit (eg train station), 2 floors of mall (theater, groceries, bars, food, gyms, sports centers), with residential living towers the rest of the way up, with green space above the mall between the towers.

e.g. https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/energy-and-environment/2019...

The bazaar is dead, long live the bazaar!

I'll do you one better. Behold - the communist superblock where I spent half of my childhood:

https://www.google.pl/maps/@52.1409132,21.0491488,16z/data=!...

Without going over a single pedestrian crossing you can reach a:

-school(grades 1-8, with a soccer and basketball field available to the public) and kindergarten

-mini-mart

-clinic

-dentist

-playground

-culture center

-hairdresser/barber

-tire shop/car wash

-mini spa which somehow is still there after 25 years.

Bars and cafes are across the street. The grassy area in the northern part is used for festivals and the like in the summer.

Note how almost all the parking spots are around the superblock.

All that without being a human pile-up like Barcelona because - and I can't stress this enough - that is not a requirement for having a decent, walkable neighbourhood.

I also grew up in areas like that in Finland. They still worked as intended when I was a kid in the 80s and early 90s. Then most services went away. As living standards increased, population density decreased, as people could afford more space. And as real wages increased, businesses needed more sales per employee to be profitable. Medium-density areas no longer had enough people to support local services.

Some of the buildings here were built much later than the rest - my take is that that spoiled the original idea (removing, among other things, a local farmer's market), but they did increase population density considerably.

But yeah, a few corner shops didn't survive.

A lot of communist designed spaces seem quite nice. Though maybe they just have the potential to be nice like the one that you linked but a ton of them in less developed areas are falling apart from lack of maintenance.

Communist places are nice as long as you can keep your people from leaving to EU or America where they are paid 20x more than at home and have more freedoms. And once those floodgates open it's a nasty negative feedback loop.

Like Begich Towers in Whittier, AK?

See https://stories.californiasunday.com/2015-01-04/begich-tower...

Skyscrapers in Tokyo are similar to this. Subway stations connected to the basement, retail and restaurants in some floors and office or residential above.

Industrialization has shown to decrease happiness and create more stress and health issues. The United States is huge, with the average farm size being approximately 444 acres. Rather than further condense society into cages while the entitled own the vast amount of resources, why not further distribute society into actual green communities that don't require massive cement structures everywhere and instead promote self-sustaining communities that provide actual practical and fair values.

It's more efficient to suck the productivity from the masses when they're actually massed up together, yet still separated enough from each other not to fight it. Smaller communities that are more self-sufficient and connected would upset that, because the people wouldn't agree to giving up their productivity to some non-local entity. Therefore, our overlords ensure that "society" treats that type of lifestyle/community as something anti-modern and degrade it to "3rd world" status, as if the "3rd world" label was anything other than a way to feel superior. This is done through their captured communications channels, such as the media and various blog platforms they control; if they didn't have their fingers on the scale people would probably see that some good ideas could come from a different worldview.

Your comment uses so much loaded language that I'm not actually sure what you're arguing against or for.

> actual green communities that don't require massive cement structures everywhere

I interpret this as meaning more single-family homes rather than apartments and condos.

That would mean urban sprawl which is anything but green. The lower the population density, the less effective mass transit becomes, and more people are driving. Most jobs can't be done from home.

> self-sustaining communities

I interpret this to mean not needing external resources, but this would mean your food choices are limited based on the whims of the local climate. Live up north? Then you're not getting any mangoes or other tropical fruits.

These ways of life and ridiculous scale came with fossil fuel and will go away with it, within this century.

The mall of the future is probably something close to a farmer's market where people will come to sell goods with bikes/animals.

If you think the current lifestyle of developped nations will continue its trends, you're in for a surprise, as early as the next decades.

Within this century? Not even a chance.

Our local mall has been bought, bankrupted, and auctioned off every couple years for the last 20.

There's a Macys and a JC Penny as the anchor stores. The old Sears was a COVID testing center for a while, now it has been turned into a Halloween store for the season.

The food court once had Subway, Panda Express, McDonald's, and Taco Bell. They're all long gone, there is a Bourbon Chicken, cookie place, and a pizza place where the Sbarro was. They flipped the signs around but kept all the pictures and menus.

Inside, it's about half-empty. They've been trying to attract smaller mom and pop stores, but it has had the side effect of giving the place a "flea market" feel.

The next town over has mall that's doing a lot better. There's a Target, Barnes and Noble, Planet Fitness, and a much more vibrant food court. There's still only about half occupancy when it comes to the stores, but the parking lot doesn't look like there's been and earthquake and the bathrooms aren't disgusting.

There was a push to convert the empty anchor stores to office space, but with WFH that option is off the table.

I think we need to re-think and re-zone these. I think the anchor stores could be great senior living centers for independent and assisted living. The stores could all become medical and senior focused stores. You have a nice area for walking and being active, etc.

You could also do the same as low-income apartments where people have all the stores they would frequent without needing public transport or bus/Uber to get the things they need. It could also have job training and other services as needed.

Putting low income apartments near in or near the mall would drive people away and increase crime.

Hell's Grannies terrorising the neighborhood and dealing drugs on their mobility scooters?

They should turn them into housing. Charge extra for the unit that has the escalator. It would be hilariously fun to live in an old mall as long as the walls were good enough that I didn't hear my neighbors.

It's not only Malls. We used to go _shopping_...Service Merchandise, Sears, Circuit City, La Belles, K-Mart, Borders...for better or worse, in a large metro area, you're more likely to only have Food (Kroeger), and Boutique Food (Whole Foods) as places to go hang out.

Sure, there's the Movie Theatre, but having gone last week when they had $3 tickets, people have forgotten how to go to the Theatre...likewise, we went to Cirque de Soleil's OVO and it's clear we've lost a little in the 'how to entertain' and a lot of 'how to behave while being entertained'.

That seems to be the trend in suburbs too - a sort of planned development with single family homes and a denser "main street" area with commercial on the ground floor and condos or professional offices above. Some have apartment buildings alongside too. Sometimes there is a movie theater, library, or community space mixed in as well.

Most of the commercial space is either restaurants/food or service places like hair salons, dry cleaners, etc. Very little in the way of retail stores. Mostly as the occasional Target/Walmart/etc. big retailer nearby. This seems to be the assumption for single professionals/married without kids demographic: more dining, but buying things is mostly online or big box general retail stores.

I value the small amount of retail in my little downtown main street. There is a reasonably sized ace hardware within 5 minutes walk, and I'm there almost every week to pick up lightbulbs, screws, etc. The staff are friendly and helpful. It's so much more convenient than driving to a big box store, finding parking, walking through 20 isles. Sure, it doesn't have whiteware or a lumber yard, but I'll sorely miss it if it ever closes. Same thing with the office supply store. Most tech stuff they have is the same price as amazon, and they offer great printing services.

> people have forgotten how to go to the Theatre

I went to see Top Gun a couple weeks ago, it was my first time in a theater in years. There were five different ads, the gist of all of which were, "Don't forget you're in public, so don't talk or pull out your phone or get up if you don't have to". One of them literally said, "We know it's been a while since you've watched a movie in public, and maybe you've forgotten how that works".

It was sort of condescending but at the same time I totally get the need.

And yet some of the audience ignored all that entirely.

In my particular theater that didn't happen since my family was 60% of the audience (well actually my wife kept getting up and doing stuff until I reminded her we were in a theater) but yeah I've heard it happens a lot now.

I think if theaters want people to keep coming, they will need to make the experience better than home, and that will include enforcing no phone/no noise rules.

We had the usual cadre of Teenaged boys, but we also had an Indian Couple behind us, I'm not sure if that one was cultural or not.

I sound like a shill but Alamo Drafthouse is the only theater I bother with anymore unless it's IMAX or similar.

I refuse to see a movie at Alamo Drafthouse. Overpriced mediocre food & drink options, slow service (my popcorn and drinks would often come 1/2 way through the movie) and less comfortable seating than other local theatres.

This past weekend I found myself in a mall in the East Bay (Bishop Ranch in San Ramon) and holy carp was it bumping with people, like a mall from before the before times. A big open central courtyard with families hanging out all over this fake grass, kids riding the escalator to gawk at people from the second level, I was like "what year is this?" A lot of the shops and restaurants were more bougie than those of past malls, there was a big Williams Sonoma, eating options included The Slanted Door, Mendocino Farms, Delarosa Pizza, so a far cry from the Sbarro and Cinnabon style of the classic mall. Maybe that's their secret.

It's the location. San Ramon is a great town. Stick that same mall in Modesto, CA and it would be something else entirely.

You wouldn’t know there’s a recession at any of the Home Depots. Still short of cashiers.

Whenever I hear about any American mall, I can't help but think of Dan Bell's Dead Mall series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5NsVylQBWM&list=PLNz4Un92pG...

Oddly enough, I live in Melbourne, Australia and the humble mall AKA shopping centre is well and truly alive.

Whenever I hear about any American mall, I can't help but think of George Romero's Dawn of the Dead: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077402/

Stayed in Melbourne across the street from the giant underground mall above the metro station. Quite the place! Has a whole bullet factory inside. Also, the open airflow structure of many places was so weird coming from the US, and I was there in the depth of winter. 32°F, 0°C the day I left.

Westfield seems to have figured out how to make malls profitable. Everyone else, not so much.

The secret sauce seems to be high-end luxury stores. Nordstrom and Bloomingdales, not Sears or JC Penney.

Around the SF Bay Area, all the non-Westfield malls are dying and the Westfield malls are so crowded you can't park on a weekend.

Or, much more pithily, "stores with stuff you can't reasonably get off Amazon".

Not just that -- people like the luxury shopping experience. Even if you could buy an LV bag or a Rolex on Amazon, people would still do it in person if they could.

If you buy a Rolex on Amazon, it's almost guaranteed to be a counterfeit.

Keeping Sears out of the mall may be one of the biggest reasons why they're doing so well. Sears was poisonous for the Vallco Mall in Cupertino and why Westfield bailed on it. [0]

[0]https://www.unitedcupertino.org/single-post/2017/06/01/histo...

I recall watching a program on KQED many, many years ago about the mall. This one was focusing on the Metreon. It's premise was that that malls needed to be mini-vacations and what we are witnessing is a change in what people want from a vacation.

There was a time when going to the Metreon was a mini vacation. I recall a Discovery store on the first floor, Sony and Microsoft, the Airtight garage with games that you'd never find at the arcade, a "how things work" store where I got a tensirigitoy, Expandagon Construction System, and other cube things that still find their way into the back of my video calls. There was that kids area at the top which I believe I would have loved if I was in the mid single digits.

But things changed and the vacation feel left. I recall the last time I was there there was a pop up store where the discovery store was and the comic book store that was in the place of the how things work store was struggling. Sony and Microsoft had their spat.

The other examples they had were of big outdoor gear stores - Bass Pro Shop or similar with in in store aquarium or the REI store with rock climbing.

Going to a bunch of stores that are under the same roof and scraping by with a flea market like atmosphere isn't the type of thing that I enjoy as a vacation. I'm sure some do, but that's not what I'm after.

At one time, the malls were something that just having Aladin's arcade, KB Toys, a hobby shop (that had model rockets and plastic models), a small book store, a few restaurants with better than acceptable food (but not a food court), Spencer's (with those weird posters that had a different image under a black light in the back)... that was enough of a vacation for a pre-teen or teenager and a place you asked to go.

They dumped all of the malls they own here

Westfield is dumping all their North American malls: https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/orange-county/business/2022/04/...

That's a sign that they see something in their numbers, and it's not good.

Would anything of value be lost if it didn't? I cannot find it in me to cling to shopping malls.

I personally don't like shopping malls. But I can't deny that they're a social outlet, a "third place", a hangout location for a lot of people (senior citizens, teens and children). Not everywhere has Northern California climate.

Malls can certainly be done right. For example, Ikea run ones (I mean the rest of the mall not just ikea store) are usually pretty nice. It’s just that in US they tend to be very low quality and there are too many of them and location usually sucks. West coast tends to be worse at this too

Where I am they're an oasis in a hot humid summer, and freezing winter where people can hang out.

It's nice to walk around in South Texas during the summer when heat indexes are pushing into the one-teens.

> Would anything of value be lost if it didn't?

Yeah: online shopping is terrible, especially for clothes. If shopping malls die, your options will be online or driving all around town between strip malls and the like.

The choice isn’t between malls and the internet. There are plenty of brick-and-mortar stores in, say, town centers.

Or living in a walkable city, or advocating for walkable areas in your city/town.

> Or living in a walkable city,

So, basically: be rich or make worse tradeoffs in other areas?

> or advocating for walkable areas in your city/town.

Doubt that would happen in any reasonable timeframe, with any amount of certainty. In the mean time, I still have to buy clothes.

I generally prefer shopping for clothing in-person over online shopping. It's just too hard to get the fit right online without some luck and the back-and-forth of returns and re-orders. I had to get a dress shirt and pants ASAP for a funeral recently when I realized my old ones no longer fit. I went to the mall, and I had to go to multiple stores to find something that I liked and that fit well, but I found it -- without having to drive all over to visit multiple stores, and without having to wait for shipping and/or deal with returns.

I don't visit malls often, but I can see some value in having them around.

True. Clothes are perhaps the only thing that can be hard to shop online. However, getting the wrong fit when shopping online is kind of understandable. The real frustration for me comes from brands that fail to size their clothes properly. How hard is it to make all jeans models of your brand to measure the same waist-wise and length-wise?

Pretty hard when they're 'brands' and not actually making anything, I imagine.

I'm not sure what it's like these days, but when I was in my early teens, before I could drive, my mother would drive me and maybe a friend to the mall, and we could walk around and hang out without our parents. They'd go get something they needed, and we'd go to the record store, or the food court, and just talk and stuff. It was a place where you could meet kids who went to other schools than you. It was basically our first taste of freedom from parents and freedom of choice. If we had some pocket money we could pick up an album we liked, or buy a shirt or poster we thought was cool, or whatever. As mentioned in the article, as we got older, it became a place of conformity, but from about age 10-15, it was a really nice reprieve from family life, and was a relatively safe place to have that reprieve.

multi level parking, 2-3 story housing built over existing mall, build high rise housing in unnecessary parking areas, put some grass/parks in. not sure why this is complicated.

starts with rezoning

They're trying to do that with a local mall. One of the main objections of the city council is that new residents cost them money in terms of necessary services like schools, whereas the mall itself is a cash cow because of the sales tax, with minimal city services for the mall.

It's taken as a given that housing is generally too expensive for the mall workers to live nearby...

That would probably require demolishing or substantially remodelling existing buildings. At which point it's probably cheaper to build on an empty lot.

To start, malls tend to be built on highways removed from a municipality's center. Many of the people in this area will need certain amenities (for example, schools) and will have commutes. The entire surrounding area would have to be redesigned before you can plop 2,000 new residents in an empty lot.

I'm not saying it can't be done, but making something more desirable is more complicated than just rezoning. And making something less desirable could be absolutely dystopian.

In areas I've seen, the older malls are effectively closer in due to decades of sprawl. If one converts those, the effect isn't as stark.

The mall is perfectly suited to adapt to 2000 new residents; shift one store to a grocery, one to a daycare, and you're 90% of the way to rebuilding a nice little town center that lets people live most of their lives without a car.

The real problem is the planning profession, which has taken to such micromanagement of central planning that there's no way to dynamically adjust spaces to better uses. In my local downtown area, there are extremely strict rules about which type of retail are allowed where. And how close to which corners. It's a disaster.

> for example, schools

I know of at least two malls near a place I lived a few years ago that have been partially converted into schools.

> not sure why this is complicated.

I wish this made people less inclined to have a strong opinion.

> not sure why this is complicated

IMHO, if you're presenting a solution with the length and grammar of a telegram, it's probably more accurate to say, "however, this is surely more complicated than I understand."

I'm currently looking out the window at a shopping center with exactly this format.

It's very nice, and not really any more complex than regular zoning and planning.

> I'm currently looking out the window at a shopping center with exactly this format.

FWIW, I don't think the op was actually describing a shopping center.

It's not technically complicated, but it is politically complicated, because you're fighting against vested interests who desperately and selfishly want to stop you.

> you're fighting against vested interests who desperately and selfishly want to stop you.

There are no such vested interests and this is a YIMBY fantasy. People would be overjoyed if it were easy to convert malls into neighborhoods.

Yeah my local mall is doing this. If they can pull together some tasty and healthy-ish options at the food court the mall could get a lot of traffic just from lazy people trying to get an easy dinner.

The roof of most malls probably can't hold much more weight than AC units. It would probably be cheaper to just demolish the entire site and restart.

> not sure why this is complicated.

And here's your answer;

> starts with rezoning

Not to mention, who's going to build all of this?

I have found that (some) malls can be a good place to work remote. I can grab some food, a latte, get in a quick walk, and do a bit of shopping at the end of my work day. There's a variety of places to sit and wifi is generally just fine (and even better if there's a Starbucks in the mall).

If I owned a mall right now, I'd be focusing on this angle.

Funny title. Funny because perspective. In my (European) home town people are worried if old-established retail on high street can survive now that an (American-style) mall opened gates outside the city center recently. So, yes, I can relate somehow.

If you were to get the standard grouping of Costco/Target/Walmart/IKEA/Best Buy/Home Depot/Lowes/Staples/Nordstrom Rack stores near that mall, then the mall would also be threatened.

Those businesses I listed have optimized delivering the most commonly needed items, and then the internet came along and provided access to the uncommonly needed items. So the mall is not needed for the uncommon items, and they cannot compete on margins for the common items at the other stores I mentioned, so they have no use.

Some malls (the smarter ones?) have integrated those stores listed into the malls themselves; I've certainly seen Target, Walmart, Best Buy, Staples, Nordstrom Rack, and IKEA built into a mall. Even more if you consider "strip malls" to be malls.

Sweden's already been through that. Now both malls and the inner city shops are dying.

The malls in my area that have died over the last 20 years all share 1 thing in common... violence.

I will not go to a mall that has 6 shootings a year.

The mall near where I grew up suffered from that problem 50 years ago, and was shut down by the late 1970s...

And was finally demolished in 2012.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixie_Square_Mall

I'd argue it was actually demolished in 1980[1].

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIdGxR-aU6o

I didn't want to assume Chicago or Detroit, but wiki says Dixie mall is in Chicago. Timeline matches my preconceived ideas.

We had way more violence at malls in the 90's when malls were far more popular.

'Were'

That's the thing with decline... Something WAS good until it wasn't.

> I will not go to a mall that has 6 shootings a year.

Agreed, a mall needs to be up around 12 shootings a year to even be considered these days.

' const mallsIMightGoTo = mallsInMyArea.filter(mall => mall.shootings_last_year < 6) ... '

I suspect violence is not the cause of the demise of those malls, but one of many symptoms of the root cause.

Malls generally have retailers that are more expensive than big box or strip mall alternatives. Lower income neighborhoods have both more violence and more residents with a preference for value pricing.

We have outdoor malls around Atlanta that are incredibly active.

We also have Lenox where people get shot over shoes on what seems like a weekly basis. It’s still very pretty active, though.

Most American malls are so badly designed -- they aren't places where people are hanging out but just shopping and leaving. Well, most folks shop online nowadays, what's the point of coming to the mall? There's no place to sit or talk or create a community.

When I was a kid in the US, the mall was the #1 place to hang out. We could see a movie, grab some food, and browse some clothing stores, and our parents knew where to find us.

I suppose this is less of an advantage with cell phones these days, and teenagers don't really have much disposable income.

How long ago? Malls have spent the last two decades discouraging or even outright banning teenage loiterers.

Yeah, they have. But I still see kids hanging out at malls in my area, although well behaved and in not in gigantic groups.

"Hey honey, do you want to go to the giant aircraft hanger filled with stores that sells junk we don't want, surrounded by a giant parking lot? Maybe we can go to one of the chain restaurants inside staffed by people who don't give a shit, and have a microwaved slice of pizza!"

Or I can go have a nice hike in the park, go to an actual restaurant afterwards, and buy the shit I don't need off of amazon.

For me the greatest disdain I have for malls is the lack of green space. I spend all day indoors. I don't want to go to a larger, more expensive room.

The better question is, "Should it?". Malls are awful and in their heyday, they decimated downtowns and small businesses. Good riddance.

I assume financially this would probably not be feasible or sustainable everywhere but I really wish malls could lean further into theme parks rather than shopping hubs

Most of them are half way there with movie theaters, arcades, etc. I recently went to one with an attached Medieval Times.

I'm curious how much filling in laser tag, rock climbing, and other in person only activities would generate turnout.

> lean further into theme parks rather than shopping hubs

And yet, it's still 'shopping' in a sense. You're mostly just buying experiences vs buying 'stuff'.

Yes. I love going to the mall and spending a good half day there. And I see lots of people now that the pandemic is over. This may not be representative of the introvert male FANG coder who lurks on HN - it helps I'm not that lol

Also, saying "things will be fine" don't write cool articles for the new republic, while doom and gloom certainly does.

They seem to do pretty well in the denser parts of socal. Glendale even has two across the street from eachother, each with a separate apple store. I'm not sure what the secret sauce is for southern californian malls. Denser population perhaps? Better/unique food options drawing people into the mall just for that?

I think they can, but they may need to evolve away from a goods marketplace and more towards entertainment centers. Most of the times we find ourselves going to a mall it’s to do something (eat out, watch a movie, engage in some kids activity) rather than to buy something.

Of course it can, by evolving with the times. Our local mall changed from being a typical indoor American mall to something that still has some indoor stores, but now with a lot more anchor stores facing outwards, along with newer standalone stores along the edges. The popularity of the place -was- declining, but nowadays they're doing quite well.

The real problem was probably more about having a bunch of little stores that were not by themselves a big draw. The anchor stores are really important. I kinda wonder if the decline of the mall was more to do with Sears, JC Penny, Mongtomery Ward, and the like going out of business, and there was a slump while we collectively decided what to replace them with.

The Decoder Ring podcast did an episode[1] recently about the supposed death of the mall. It's a fun listen and covers a lot of the history and evolution of the mall as a concept and how it shaped, and was shaped by, transportation changes in the US. It also goes into the social importance they have had over the years and how that has evolved.

[1] - https://slate.com/podcasts/decoder-ring/2022/07/is-the-shopp...

I suspect malls will be more economically viable in developing countries than in the first world. Payroll at $15 an hour is a high bar to meet for outlet stores which already struggle with high rent.

Hopefully no, and good riddance.

As edifices, they are better suited to being campuses for any number of other things, and the sooner we get out of the habit of creating endless ziggurats for mindless bland LCD consumerism the better.

I'm all for the model of town/city planning that actually builds communities and neighborhoods; use the building for affordable art studios, performing spaces, community centers, small business incubation, etc. Pure feckless retail doesn't cut it.

Is it that time of year already? "Dying malls" is like the "The suit is back" type of meme. Malls have been dying for most of my adult life (and I'm old enough to have used an 8088 processor on our home computer as a kid).

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26944850

Yes absolutely, just the way foodcourts are, malls are the center of a small town circle.

The question is, what kid of stores will be in them?

My naive idea is. that the winner of the each branch will absolutely do stores. Imagine an amazon outlet, for everything Kitchen related. or everything tech related, with prices that you have online as well.... hopefully very carefully regulated.

The one assertion is rather questionable. In fact I struggle to find a context where it makes sense.

> In contemporary “ruin porn” photography, the empty shells of malls represent the just deserts of late-stage capitalism.

Put aside the questionable ascribing of meaning to a photographic genre that has included everything from abandoned hospitals and schools to abandoned factories. Even by the standards of the leftist fundamentalist concept of late-stage capitalism (implicitly playing prophet declaring doom against foes). A mere collection of failures after a profitible heyday is supposed to be some sort of just retribution?

Yeah, those sets of photos are just as often large projects or other "commieblock"-style buildings, so you could say they're an inditement of modern socialism or something.

I think it's much simpler, people like looking at ruins.

For general commerce? No, malls are dead in that respect. Online shopping will dance circles around it in 100 out of 100 universes.

For purposes like food, entertainment, physical arts, social functions, and very niche goods you may not find as much of online?

That is where the mall may pivot to survive.

Some data suggest that USA mall are still (slowing) growing https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/shopping...

Simon is hanging onto something like 93% occupancy despite the last few pandemic years which is pretty impressive.

I've noticed that at least some of the "buy online" things are being shipped from stores. So ordering something from Kohl's or Walmart or Home Depot actually has someone in a store (not a warehouse) pick and pack it and send it off.

That may help keep the malls alive even as traffic dwindles.

I hope not. Malls exist to satisfy people's need to walk around in their environment in our otherwise un-walkable cities. Maybe without malls, we will start to demand more walkable areas in our cities and towns.

It sounds funny, but there's something to your comment.

I'm visiting my girlfriend's parents in Monterrey (MX) and we have incorporated the nearby mall into our daily 10k-steps walking habit. It's air-conditioned in this awful heat. It's fun to people-watch. It's more interesting than doing yet another stroll around the neighborhood/park in gym clothes. Maybe while there we incidentally buy an icecream, coffee, or a new t-shirt as a bonus, or maybe not.

We joke (darkly) that when we buy a house, we'll need to be sure it's near a mall so that we stay in shape.

I would add that the mall is also a destination to be around people, to see and be seen. There aren't a lot of places to do that. At the upscale one near me, people dress up. They aren't just romping through it to buy some shoes from Macy's and gtfo. They are walking with loved ones and lovers. Teens and quinceañeras are meeting up in it.

That said, the semi-upscale mall in my hometown in Texas was also thriving the last time I was there. Clearly, not all malls are doomed. "Why not just use Amazon?" seems to miss something that malls have that Amazon.com can never have. Hopefully malls build on that.

The mall next to me in Monterrey just built a new section with an indoor jungle gym for kids (basically a local park with A/C, imagine), a museum, roller-blading, and it has various community events. That seems to be the right direction. It's people things. We need more people things! I suspect we are desperate for it.

Seconded. Walking around without much goal in mind other than to walk around where people are is the strong suit of a mall.

It's just a shame in much of NA, there's no malls open late night for night owls. I gather it's more of a thing in Asia.

Yeah, exactly. There aren't many places to just enjoy existing and walking around in public in most U.S. cities because we've built most of our cities around automobiles. U.S. cities consist of islands to hop between in a sea of traffic, instead of places to just be. Malls satisfy that very human need. Dense, walkable, neighborhoods also satisfy that need.

Let's not forget the safety factor as well. Mall shootings are a thing, especially in the "dying" malls. No matter the strategy, families avoid places with violent crime.

This is the #1 problem for our local malls. the gangs that have decided the mall is their turf and causing criminal activities in and around it. car thefts, catalytic converter thefts, strong-arm robberies outside, etc. People don't want to go to the mall because they're sitting ducks for the criminal element that surrounds it.

Has anyone else found large indoor spaces just feel kind of artificial? I always got a weird vibe from malls. I’m not sure how to explain it.

If the American mall goes into the dustbin of history, would that be a good or bad thing overall? I lean toward "good".

It's interesting how much of my childhood is obsolete these days. Malls, arcades, and theaters.

I'd be hard-pressed to imagine a reason I would ever step foot in an old-fashioned indoor mall again. But arcades and theaters? They are thriving. Look at the spread of arcade bars in every hip American city and college town, and the popularity of Alamo Drafthouse and other alternative movie theaters. It's not the same as in the 80's and 90's, though I'd argue theater and arcade options are actually much better now.

Alcohol seems to be the common factor in those thriving establishments, and unfortunately for malls, alcohol probably doesn't mix well with an indoor mall format.

What's that law where you can answer any headline question with "no?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...

Bertridge's law of headlines. Malls have been doing just fine at the high end boutique level though, at least last I checked.

*Betteridge*

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines

Those are the only variation I see around now. Unless you could strip-malls, which do fine owing to density/accessibility.

I’m my area we have high end and ethnic malls, both approaches do well but ethnic (eg Chinese, Filipino) needs much cheaper rent to thrive.

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