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Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

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Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#11

Post by ghaff »

al_borland wrote: post #8
PaulHoule wrote: post #2

Our mall has 4 busses an hour and it is becoming a non-profit center as stores fade away, the Hospital moved in COVID testing and vaccination and will be moving in more medical officers, other kinds of NGOs such as toy banks are moving in. (E.g. there is no ‘toy store’ to compete with it, no ‘pet shop’ to compete with the SPCA, etc.

From what I've seen malls are consolidating. The good ones continue to do well and get even nicer, while all the others slowly die as people make the trek to the good mall. There is no room in the market for average. It will be interesting to see what happens to them as they die, as they are quite unique pieces of real estate.

Where I live there is a shopping plaza that does quite well overall with a very busy chain home improvement store and supermarket. Some other stores like Starbucks that seem to do very well also. But the central mall anchored by largely defunct department stores is effectively dead.

At the same time , as you say, there are vibrant shopping malls within 30-45 minutes.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#12

Post by hubblesticks »

jkingsman wrote: post #4

For a bit of a topical giggle, this 1987 woman is... /super/ passionate about her mall walking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMfPDBahbPI

I am having a very hard time telling if this is scripted/ad-libbed or a real person. I hope it's a real person because it's wonderful.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#13

Post by xoxxala »

al_borland wrote: post #8
PaulHoule wrote: post #2

Our mall has 4 busses an hour and it is becoming a non-profit center as stores fade away, the Hospital moved in COVID testing and vaccination and will be moving in more medical officers, other kinds of NGOs such as toy banks are moving in. (E.g. there is no ‘toy store’ to compete with it, no ‘pet shop’ to compete with the SPCA, etc.

From what I've seen malls are consolidating. The good ones continue to do well and get even nicer, while all the others slowly die as people make the trek to the good mall. There is no room in the market for average. It will be interesting to see what happens to them as they die, as they are quite unique pieces of real estate.

Here in Orange County, CA, they are converting some dead malls to apartment complexes.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#14

Post by refurb »

jmyeet wrote: post #7

The real lesson of mall walking is that it came about because in many places there's literally nowhere else you can walk. Non-Americans may be vaguely aware that America has a sickness of car dependency but may be unaware of the extent of it. I present to you the 26 lane Katy Freeway in Houston, Texas [1]. Non-Americans may not realize just how large these cities are geographically. I believe one end of the Houston m…

This is a bizarre take. Most suburbs I’ve seen is actually amazing for walking in.

Sure if there is no sidewalk it sucks, but if you walk where people live usually there is a nice walking path, minimal traffic, lots of families around. I’ve lived in dense urban centers and walking can suck with the crowded sidewalks, always having to cross streets with cars, the noise.

People aren’t walking in malls because of car culture. Usually they walk in malls because it’s too damn hot/cold outside.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#15

Post by pnutjam »

refurb wrote: post #14
jmyeet wrote: post #7

The real lesson of mall walking is that it came about because in many places there's literally nowhere else you can walk. Non-Americans may be vaguely aware that America has a sickness of car dependency but may be unaware of the extent of it. I present to you the 26 lane Katy Freeway in Houston, Texas [1]. Non-Americans may not realize just how large these cities are geographically. I believe one end of the Houston m…

This is a bizarre take. Most suburbs I’ve seen is actually amazing for walking in. Sure if there is no sidewalk it sucks, but if you walk where people live usually there is a nice walking path, minimal traffic, lots of families around. I’ve lived in dense urban centers and walking can suck with the crowded sidewalks, always having to cross streets with cars, the noise. People aren’t walking in malls because of car cu…

This is simply not true, and it was less true in the 80's/90's.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#17

Post by marginalia_nu »

hubblesticks wrote: post #12
jkingsman wrote: post #4

For a bit of a topical giggle, this 1987 woman is... /super/ passionate about her mall walking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMfPDBahbPI

I am having a very hard time telling if this is scripted/ad-libbed or a real person. I hope it's a real person because it's wonderful.

I'm leaning toward scripted. It's a fairly easy set up for a joke.

Like this sort of stuff, they're shorter than that segment but sort of the same idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9hRIjys4Qw

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#18

Post by msandford »

jmyeet wrote: post #7

The real lesson of mall walking is that it came about because in many places there's literally nowhere else you can walk. Non-Americans may be vaguely aware that America has a sickness of car dependency but may be unaware of the extent of it. I present to you the 26 lane Katy Freeway in Houston, Texas [1]. Non-Americans may not realize just how large these cities are geographically. I believe one end of the Houston m…

That's not an actual picture of the road in the article. I'm also not sure one should count the feeder or access road as a part of the freeway. If you can't go freeway speeds it's probably not a freeway.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#19

Post by Ar-Curunir »

refurb wrote: post #14
jmyeet wrote: post #7

The real lesson of mall walking is that it came about because in many places there's literally nowhere else you can walk. Non-Americans may be vaguely aware that America has a sickness of car dependency but may be unaware of the extent of it. I present to you the 26 lane Katy Freeway in Houston, Texas [1]. Non-Americans may not realize just how large these cities are geographically. I believe one end of the Houston m…

This is a bizarre take. Most suburbs I’ve seen is actually amazing for walking in. Sure if there is no sidewalk it sucks, but if you walk where people live usually there is a nice walking path, minimal traffic, lots of families around. I’ve lived in dense urban centers and walking can suck with the crowded sidewalks, always having to cross streets with cars, the noise. People aren’t walking in malls because of car cu…

While the streets are quiet, it’s really not fun to walk in neighborhoods where every house looks the same, and where there’s no visual variety.

Personally I find a 15-minute walk in my suburban neighborhood feels much longer than a 15-minute walk in the town where my college was located.

The other extremely irritating part is the completely ass-backwards design of suburban neighborhoods that makes walking to places much longer than necessary. Eg: there’s a grocery store literally right behind my house, but without a door in my backyard, it would take me 5+ minutes to walk there.

Re: Lessons from the golden age of the mall walkers

#20

Post by gsk22 »

refurb wrote: post #14
jmyeet wrote: post #7

The real lesson of mall walking is that it came about because in many places there's literally nowhere else you can walk. Non-Americans may be vaguely aware that America has a sickness of car dependency but may be unaware of the extent of it. I present to you the 26 lane Katy Freeway in Houston, Texas [1]. Non-Americans may not realize just how large these cities are geographically. I believe one end of the Houston m…

This is a bizarre take. Most suburbs I’ve seen is actually amazing for walking in. Sure if there is no sidewalk it sucks, but if you walk where people live usually there is a nice walking path, minimal traffic, lots of families around. I’ve lived in dense urban centers and walking can suck with the crowded sidewalks, always having to cross streets with cars, the noise. People aren’t walking in malls because of car cu…

This is true in certain American suburbs, but definitely not all. Older and less affluent suburbs, in particular, often have abysmal walking infrastructure.

I'm not sure this fits the prototypical suburb -- but I have spent a lot of time in southern Texas, and look at this amazing pedestrian infrastructure: https://www.google.com/maps/@26.1413614,-97.9581625,3a,75y,3...

They recently (past ~5 years) installed new ADA-compliant pedestrian crossings from which you can walk...nowhere. But you can circle the 4 corners of the intersection all day!

(Incidentally, the restaurant on the SW corner of the intersection is amazing!)

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