February, 2007 - Labelscar: The Retail History Blog

Parkway Plaza Mall; Madisonville, Kentucky

Self-proclaimed “The Best Town on Earth”, Madisonville is a small city of approximately 20,000 people located in the middle of western Kentucky. Economically, the city has remained prosperous in the post-coal mining period thanks to a highway infrastructure which criss-crosses the city. In fact, the new I-69 corridor linking Canada to Mexico will pass right by Madisonville within a few years, solidifying the manufacturing industry here for the time being.

In part due to Madisonville’s importance as a manufacturing and transportation hub and also due to its relative isolation from larger cities, Madisonville is a retailing center for it and the immediate region surrounding. The closest larger city is Evansville, Indiana which is 50 miles north and the closest large metropolitan area is Nashville, Tennessee which is 100 miles southeast. A large strip featuring a mall and many big box retailers and strip malls exists near the interchange of KY 70/85 and Pennyrile Parkway (Future I-69), just east of downtown.

Parkway Plaza Mall, which opened in 1980, is a small one-level enclosed mall anchored by Goody’s Family Clothing, Peebles, and Dawahares, a Kentucky-based family apparel retailer. There is also an 8-screen Capitol Theatre in the mall, and the mall’s enclosed space is a mere 230,000 square feet. The mall is owned and managed by local Ershig Properties, based in nearby Henderson, who indicate on their website they renovated the mall in 2002.

We visited Parkway Plaza Mall in May 2001, and were surprised to find how substantial it was given the relatively small population of the trade area. However, this can be explained by two factors. First, a small mall building boom took place during the late 1970s and early 1980s, placing enclosed malls of this size in smaller cities and suburbs (as ancillaries to larger centers) throughout the country, such as Beaver Dam Mall in Wisconsin. Second, and the reason why Parkway Plaza has largely succeeded where others such as Beaver Dam have failed is that the mall fills in an important gap. As mentioned above, the nearest regional mall is 50 miles to the north in Evansville, and the nearest metropolitan area with larger offerings is Nashville which is 100 miles away, so shoppers appreciate and use this local offering.

Check out the 80s decor of Parkway Plaza, featuring wood paneling, curving mirrors, and carpeting throughout the mall. If you have any information or anecdotal accounts of Parkway Plaza, or know anything about the 2002 renovation, feel free to chime in with some comments.

Bye Bye Bye: CompUSA to Slice Itself in Half, Federated Department Stores is No More

There’s some big retail news today:

CompUSA. Image: Gizmodo.com

CompUSA, which has long been struggling against rivals Best Buy and Circuit City, and who seem to have lost the geek market to more specialty chains like MicroCenter, will be closing 126 stores, more than half of their remaining store fleet, throughout the country. They’ll be pulling out of many major markets, including Dallas and Boston, entirely.

Macy's store at Meadows Mall in Las Vegas, Nevada

The inevitable has occurred: Federated Department Stores is no more. No, they’re not closing, but they’ve decided to abandon the increasingly-esoteric company name in favor of rebranding the entire chain as Macy’s Group, Inc. The article also notes that Macy’s same-store sales are up, but that they continue to disappoint at former May-branded stores.

St. Charles Mall; St. Charles, Illinois

As mentioned previously in our North Park Mall posting, the Chicagoland area was spotted with small, enclosed neighborhood malls built during the late 1970s and early 1980s during a trend in this type of retailing. In around 1979 or 1980, St. Charles Mall opened on the west side of St. Charles near the intersection of IL 38 and Randall Road, about 40 miles west of downtown Chicago. Anchored by now-defunct Joseph Speiss & Company, an Elgin-based department store which went out of business entirely in 1996, and K-Mart, St. Charles Mall also had a main enclosed hallway of stores connecting the two anchors and shorter side hallways leading out to the main entrances along IL 38.

1991 ushered in the death blow for St. Charles Mall, as a much larger mall opened across town on the east side of St. Charles. Charlestowne Mall, anchored by JCPenney, Marshalls, Carson Pirie Scott, and Kohls, quickly became the dominant mall for suburban and exurban areas in the Fox River Valley in western DuPage and eastern Kane counties and beyond. With two levels and one million square feet, Charlestowne debuted outside of St. Charles Mall’s league and immediately drew shoppers away from it. At the same time, Joseph Spiess declared bankruptcy in 1991, unable to compete with the more modern and popular emerging chains by then; the entire chain folded in 1996. By 1995, St. Charles Mall gave up and shuttered completely, yielding to the emerging presence of Charlestowne Mall and the box retail/strip mall boom along Randall Road to the north and south of it.

By 2000, we discovered St. Charles Mall randomly while exploring the Chicago area and were surprised it had been abandoned for 5 years despite the fact it was in the middle of the most prime emerging retail strip in the western suburbs. Today, Randall Road is a major retail strip and thoroughfare all the way from Crystal Lake in the north to North Aurora in the south, with many millions of square feet of strip malls and big box, including 3 trendy ‘lifestyle’ centers. Nearly all of this strip is less than 10 years old, and much if it is even newer. The blighted St. Charles Mall shell was an eyesore amid this booming success and finally it met the wrecking ball in 2002. Today, the site of St. Charles Mall is an empty field despite promises of turning it into an auto mall.

In a rather funny twist of irony, one of these ‘lifestyle’ centers, Geneva Commons, opened practically across the street from the site of St. Charles Mall in 2003. Featuring stores such as Anthropologie, J. Jill, Williams-Sonoma and Crate & Barrel, which typically locate in enclosed super-regional malls, Geneva Commons is an uncreative, aesthetic failure of a place. The stores are organized mostly in a linear pattern – like a strip mall – and fronted by a giant parking lot, with a cluster of smaller service-oriented merchants and chain restaurants near the main entrance. The rear of the center behind the strip mall is completely disused, and it is entirely unfriendly to pedestrians who would want to walk around. But why would they, considering there is no communal focus or public gathering space whatsoever. Developers, there’s nothing new about this type of suburban development. The only difference between it and the 1950s-era strip malls are the names of the stores. Stop trying to rebrand the decades-old concept of the strip mall into anything more than it is – a boring row of stores and a giant parking lot. Since its debut in 2003, Geneva Commons has been stealing thunder from enclosed malls like Charlestowne, and possibly even other malls like Stratford Square and Fox Valley Center which are further afield.

I took these pictures in July 2001, after about 6 years of the mall being abandoned. Since the mall was only open for about 15 years and successful for only about 10, I’d guess all the decor is original. I wish I would’ve gone in the door that was open for whatever reason and gotten more interior pics. Also check out the old Spiess logo visible at the rear of the mall; it’s the only one I’ve ever seen. In addition, go see the demolition pictures posted by Mike Mustard in 2002.

The following 3 images are vintage photos taken by John Gallo in the early 1980s, probably not long after the mall opened.

Colonie Center; Colonie, New York

Anyone who’s been paying attention–and that likely includes most of the regular readers of this here blog–knows that malls aren’t actually in trouble. Sure, a good many individual malls are in trouble, and far more are closing than opening. But the species itself isn’t troubled; it’s just that why people go to malls has changed.

With our busy schedules and long American workweeks, big box centers make sense. You can swing in, grab what you need, and get home. The functional enclosed mall serves less and less purpose for this reason, but anyone who’s traipsed around to see a lot of malls all over the country (and we’re certainly guilty as charged) will agree that the top-tier malls, the biggest and most dominant centers in every area, are doing better than ever. Why is this? The really large centers are actually shopping destinations on their own, and Americans still love to shop.

That’s why I feel the need to give some kudos to the current, in-progress renovation and repositioning of the Colonie Center, the older of the two mega-malls serving the Capital Region of New York. The larger and more dominant Crossgates Mall, which opened in 1984 just a mile or so away, draws people from over 60 miles in every direction. In the time since, Colonie Center has soldiered on with a different set of tenants, but new owners Feldman Mall Properties have decided to aggressively re-position and retenant the aging center. Here’s the deal:

Colonie Center opened in 1966 as the first enclosed mall in the Albany area, with a strategic location between Albany, Troy, and Schenectady, right near the intersection of I-87 and I-90, and along US-5. Sears and Macy’s were initial anchor stores. For twenty years, the mall was the dominant center in the region, pulling shoppers from all over east-central New York. Even the 1984 opening of Crossgates Mall didn’t seem to dent its success. Colonie Center’s management was proactive during most of the center’s existence, and in 1992 expanded the mall substantially, adding a Steinbach department store in the center of the mall and expanding the length of the main concourse to the north along Wolf Road. At this time, Macy’s moved to the 300,000 square-foot, grand brick facade store (their old one was swallowed up by mall space) that they still occupy today. Steinbach closed in 1995, but was replaced by Boscov’s. Macy’s, Boscov’s, and Sears remain as the 1.2 million-square-foot mall’s three primary anchor tenants today, and they were joined in the late 1990s/early 200s by Christmas Tree Shops and Steve & Barry’s University Sportswear, respectively.

In 2005, the mall was sold to Feldman Mall Properties, and they are attempting to rebrand the mall–which had clearly been suffering at least some amount due to Crossgates–as an entertainment-oriented destination. The front of the mall is abuzz with construction activity, which will add a large, tall Regal Cinemas to be cantilevered over the mall as well as Barnes & Noble and L.L. Bean as new anchor stores, while also bringing new restaurants. The plan? According to the placards placed in the mall, they want Colonie Center to be “Downtown Albany” (a bit presumptuous, but I support the concept); a place to gather, browse, eat, drink, and be entertained. The interior of the mall, which was in good shape to begin with, was given yet another facelift that dressed the mall in an Adirondack theme, complete with working fireplaces, television lounges, and living room style arrangements. I’ve seen much of this at other malls, but it was more well done here.

Most importantly, Feldman seems to “get it:” They understand that the malls of the future will be places people want to spend leisure time, not places targeted towards the convenience-oriented consumer. Plenty of people will still want to get out of the house, to be able to have dinner and browse stores and see a movie. Tenants like Barnes & Noble and L.L. Bean–lifestyle brands that offer leisure products people actually enjoy pawing at and browsing–will thrive in this arrangement. Similarly, mid-sized metropolitan areas like Albany–cities that are substantially-sized but which lack the in-town shopping or entertainment offerings of larger cities–will likely embrace changes like the one underway at Colonie Center.

Here are the placards detailing Feldman’s plans for Colonie Center:

In addition, one of Colonie Center’s new tenants as a result of its repositioning is a men’s formalwear shop called Spector’s, that I include a picture of due to their store’s blatant nod towards mid-century retail design. Could it foretell a trend?

The End of South Street Seaport? New York City Mall May Be Demolished

Since 1983, the South Street Seaport has been one of the country’s most famous “festival marketplace” style shopping malls. Built as part of a craze to introduce suburban style shopping hubs in the center of cities, festival marketplaces were designed to try and stop the loss of shoppers to the suburbs and revitalize struggling cities by building a retail critical mass within cities. Unlike most malls, they tended to be designed specifically with tourists and suburbanites in mind, presenting a somewhat sanitized, self-contained version of city life designed to allay fears of crime and blight that were associated with major cities in the ’70s and ’80s.

Major cities like New York and Boston (whose Faneuil Hall Marketplace probably stands as the country’s most successful development of this kind) didn’t experience this loss of shoppers and tourists as acutely as many mid-sized cities, but developments like South Street helped keep the shoppers coming, and carried parts of America’s big cities through their most troubled days a few decades back. By and large, the Festival Marketplace craze wasn’t terribly successful, but South Street Seaport stood as one of its most prominent success stories into the 2000s.

Unfortunately, it seems as though South Street–which is still a bustling center today–may have outlived its usefulness. Retail Traffic Court alerted us to this story, which announces that General Growth Properties, the management company in charge of the center, plans to raze the center in favor of a tall building and ferry landing, leaving the remainder of the pier as open space. I believe the inland (and older) portions of the development are designated as historic, so they’re likely not going anywhere. The 24-year-old shopping mall, however, may soon be history.

North Park Mall; Villa Park, Illinois

In January 2006 the Goodwin Williams Group of Chicago released a document outlining the current and future development environment in Villa Park, Illinois. In their findings, they noted Villa Park is a mature suburb 18 miles west of downtown Chicago, with a population of 22,000 and an income level near that of adjacent suburbs like Addison but lower than that of Elmhurst and Lombard. They also noted that Villa Park is the geographic center of the entire Chicagoland metropolitan area with easy access to several interstates, including I-355, I-294, I-88, and I-290. In addition, there are two major east-west commercial arteries which bring commuters and residents alike through Villa Park from outer suburbia/exurbia to the west, IL 38 and IL 64. Also, the study outlined there are two commercial centers to Villa Park, both along a former railroad which has been abandoned and removed. One of these centers lays claim to having the first enclosed mall in the world, opening in 1926 and connecting four shops. We’ll let our readers decide that one. The largest shopping center, however, is the North Park Mall along Route 64 on the northern edge of the village.

Like many smaller, enclosed neighborhood malls in Chicagoland, the 340,000 square-foot North Park Mall was never a regional draw like its nearby monster cousins Yorktown Center and Oakbrook Center, at 1 and 2 million square feet, respectively. Instead, it was a collection of local and national stores drawing predominantly from the collection of post-WWII suburbs in eastern DuPage County. In terms of size, North Park is similar to other former enclosed neighborhood malls in the area which have since bit the dust: St. Charles Mall in St. Charles, Washington Square Mall in Homewood, Meadows Town Mall in Rolling Meadows, Forest Park Mall in Forest Park, and numerous others. The one major difference between North Park Mall and these others is that North Park is still open for business and has been virtually unchanged by current retail trends of disenclosure and repurposing – for now, anyway.

We aren’t quite sure when North Park Mall originally opened, but that’s what our peanut gallery is for. We also aren’t quite sure of the original anchors, but we do know that at some point K-Mart flanked the west side and JCPenney flanked the east side. K-Mart closed by 2000, and JCPenney had to have closed by March 2001 because that’s when Ames opened a store there during their brief re-introduction folly into the Chicagoland area before their demise less than a year later. Ames announced it was leaving Chicago in November 2001 and all stores were liquidated by early 2002, including this one. Shortly thereafter, the former Ames there became a HOBO (Home Owners Bargain Outlet) location. In 2005, Staples opened on the west side of the mall, joining a box-sized flea market and a grocery store. There are also ancillary businesses such as Pet Supplies Plus, a women’s clothing outlet, a local sandwich shop, and a Chinese buffet, which have both interior access into the mall and exterior entrances facing North Ave/IL 64. These businesses seem to be holding up, but what about the interior portion of the mall itself?

The enclosed portion of North Park Mall connected the two east-west anchors and has a side hallway leading out to the main entrance facing North Avenue. There are currently very few, if any, remaining retailers who only have access into the mall and don’t have an exterior entrance as well and all of them are on the side hallway leading out to the main entrance. Once in the mall, there are many empty storefronts and kiosks, several of which feature spanish-only signage, for the derelict retail fan’s amusement. Although the enclosed portion of the mall remains open to walk through, both HOBO and the flea market are sealed off completely. On the day we visited in October 2006, the two security guards who were chatting in the middle of the empty mall had to wonder why we even went back there. During our first visit in 2000, the interior corridor had a few more stores and a nacho stand in the middle, but aside from that it has been virtually unchanged since.

North Park Mall’s decor is reminiscent of the 80s, which was probably when it was last partially remodeled: lots of neon strips along the ceiling in the side hallway and otherwise relatively spartan. It’s also notable how wide the main corridor’s hallway is. Wide enough, in fact, for a clustering of normal-sized stores to exist toward the HOBO end of the mall. Also interesting are how old the mall directories are, which still list JCPenney, K-Mart, and a slew of other long-since retired merchants.

Competition from regional mega-malls like Oakbrook Center, Yorktown Center, and even Woodfield Mall combined with the onslaught popularity of Big Box-anchored strip malls have put nails in the coffin for gems like North Park. It’s definitely one of the last of a dying breed, and its current condition proves this. How long will it be before it is flipped inside out or knocked down like many of Chicagoland’s other sMalls like it? Take a look at the photos featured here which were taken in October 2006, and leave some comments of your own. We’re specifically interested in the mall’s history. When did it open, what were the anchors, and when did it fall down the stairs and hit its head?

Clifton Park Center (Clifton Country Mall); Clifton, New York

Perhaps the most disappointing find on my recent trip out to Albany was the current state of the Clifton Park Center, long one of my favorite malls in the area. It’s sadly fallen prey to the “lifestyleing” disease. Seriously, what does such a halfhearted, faux-Main Street set up really offer, anyway?

I first visited Clifton Park Center–then Clifton Country Mall–in March of 2000. At the time, the mall was deeply troubled with vacancies, with very few of its many storefronts occupied. The mall, which probably had around 700,000 or 800,000 square feet of floor space at the time, was sprawled out in a bizarre one-level layout. The northern, older part of the mall (constructed in 1974) was a “C” shape, connecting Steinbach and JCPenney at each end, with a Marshall’s store in the center. In 1984, a long wing was added to the south of the existing mall. This included a wing that snaked around the Marshalls, adding a food court behind the Marshalls store itself, giving an entrance to both the front and rear of the store. In addition, behind the Marshall’s was a large court with a fountain and movie theatre, and this wing continued to the rear of the center where it ended in a large court with a Caldor store. Of course, by 2000, both Caldor and Steinbach were already gone, leaving the mall with only JCPenney and Marshall’s as anchors, and it felt sad and deserted. Still, the decor and layout of the mall were golden–enough to solidify it as one of my favorites. A return visit in 2001 found it mostly unchanged, except that the Caldor store had mercifully been replaced by a large, two-level Boscov’s store, and this seemed to be breathing some new life into the mall–several mid-line chains like American Eagle, Aeropostale, and Bath & Body Works set up shop during this time. I’ve attempted to approximate the floorplan below, although I think it’s sort of confusing (which, frankly, is accurate: it was confusing):

Like many of the malls in the Albany area, Clifton Park Center seemed to have fallen prey to overmalling, as Crossgates Mall in Guilderland stole most of the area’s traffic. Even though Clifton Park Center is located in the center of a relatively modern and affluent suburban area, and is surrounded by almost every form of major box retail, it seems as though it was always somewhat secondary in the Albany area. In addition, it’s not far from the newer Wilton Mall in Saratoga, nor the older (and equally troubled) Latham Circle Mall in Latham.

Fast forward to 2007, and Clifton Park Center is changed dramatically. The oldest portion of the long-struggling mall has been demolished to make way for a boulevard and an outdoor, lifestyle portion, which is currently as empty as the mall ever was. This cut the JCPenney off from the enclosed portion of the mall entirely, along with the still-vacant (after almost a decade) Steinbach store. The remaining “mall” portion is essentially the 1984 addition, which roughly connects Marshall’s and Boscov’s and houses the food court and movie theatres.

I was there last Saturday (February 10th) and to be honest, my pictures sort of stink because there was–surprisingly–quite a few people in the mall. Sadly, they weren’t here to shop. Rather, they were here to see some tie-dyed hippie band (probably from Vermont, which is nearby) playing children’s music. The kids seemed to enjoy boppin’ along, but it encouraged me to not linger for long.

Time will tell if this incarnation of Clifton Park Center will be effective, but my gut says that the mall would’ve made more sense as a genuine mid-level mall serving the immediate area than the configuration it’s currently in. The “lifestyle” portion here is among the more laughable that I’ve encountered, not only because the faux-Main Street decor is forced, but also because it’s visibly not really designed for pedestrians, as witnessed by how difficult it was to cross from one side to the other without walking through landscaping or parking areas. There aren’t even crosswalks or curb cuts to make it easier to cross from the mall side to the area where the former Steinbach is (and where there’s currently some chainy noodle house, whose food looked pretty appetizing).

Indian Springs Mall; Kansas City, Kansas

Indian Springs Mall opened at the corner of State Road (U.S. 40) and I-635 on the west side of Kansas City, Kansas in 1971. The 700,000 square-foot mall looks pretty much exactly the same today as it did when it opened over 35 years ago, save for many stores which have come and gone and very minor decorating updates. Unfortunately, more stores have gone than have come, and today Indian Springs Mall’s days are numbered as redevelopment plans have picked up steam.

For dated retail architecture lovers, Indian Springs Mall is an amazing dream come true. The two-level enclosed mall stretched from Montgomery Ward in the north to Dillard’s on the south end, with a JCPenney in the middle. Impressive high ceilings with windows flank the JCPenney anchor in the middle of the mall which has a long frontage. The lower level of the mall only exists from JCPenney to Dillard’s and not from JCPenney to Montgomery Ward, and feels like a strangely dark subterranean world because it is only open to the upper level intermittently. Several retail fans like us have created a film documentary of the mall and the circumstances surrounding its condition, which is to be released in Spring 2007. You can even view a trailer at their website.

Today, with zero anchors and a hybridized focus, Indian Springs is most definitely a dead mall. It actually died as a traditional retail mall about a decade ago, but like many others it has carried on with other purposes. In 1997, Dillard’s closed, and JCPenney also closed. The last anchor to close was Montgomery Ward, which closed when the entire chain folded in 2001. As the anchors left, so too did many of the typical national retailers. The mall was then repurposed to focus on attracting a mostly Hispanic retail market, and remains with this focus today as about a dozen Hispanic stores and restaurants have opened, many featuring spanish-only signage. In addition to the Hispanic focus, several spaces in the mall have been converted to office use. The large former JCPenney space was retenanted to the Kansas City School District in recent years, which runs their entire operation from within the mall. The former Dillard’s space has been used by the U.S. Postal Service as a customer service center. In addition, several programs featuring humanities and the arts operate at Indian Springs as rent is low and space is plentiful. Also, the mall’s name was tweaked at some point during repositioning from Indian Springs Mall to Indian Springs Marketplace.

In 2006, the Kansas City government got tired of Indian Springs and decided it was time to assign it a blighted status, much to the chagrin of the mall’s owners and remaining tenants. As the city sought a developer to tear down the property and replace it with The Next Big Thing, mall owners have sued the city to challenge the blighted status. Also, as of January 2007 the Kansas City Schools are mulling over where they will move once the mall is torn down.

So why did Indian Springs fail? I suspect a combination of over-malling in the Kansas City area in general, the erosion of the local economy of KCKS, and competition from dominant super-regionals such as Oak Park Mall several miles south in Overland Park killed the chances for Indian Springs’ success. As redevelopment and razing of the structure seems inevitable, we are reminded of how fast many enclosed centers like this one are disappearing. Better catch it while you can. The pictures here were taken in April 2006, but also check out the mall’s aerial photos on Microsoft Virtual Earth.

Muscatine Mall; Muscatine, Iowa

Muscatine, Iowa, which bills itself the ‘Pearl of the Mississippi’, is a small city of about 25,000 residents which lies between the Quad Cities and Iowa City and about 15 miles south of I-80. Like many small upper Mississippi river towns, Muscatine has a rich manufacturing heritage, and is also chock full of scenic beauty and traditional Americana.

The main shopping area of Muscatine, including the mall, is located near the intersection of Park Avenue (Business 61) and the US 61 Bypass on the north side of town. I suspect, though, that many people from Muscatine and the surrounding areas also shop in Iowa City at Coral Ridge Mall and at both Northpark and Southpark Malls in the Quad Cities, all of which are regional/super regional malls and no more than 30-45 minutes away. Muscatine Mall opened in 1971, predating the enclosed malls in the Quad Cities by several years and Coral Ridge Mall near Iowa City by 27 years. In fact, Muscatine Mall enjoyed relative success well after all of the competition emerged, not going downhill until around 2002.

We’re missing some information about the earlier years of Muscatine Mall, but we know it was anchored by Wal Mart, Von Maur, and JCPenney by the late-1980s. Ancillary stores around that time included B. Dalton, Walgreens, Musicland, Radio Shack, and Foot Locker, around 50 stores in all.

Big changes came in the late 1990s and early 2000s, however, beginning with the departure of the north anchor, Wal-Mart, in 1997. However, in 1998, Menards swooped in and took the empty space, making Muscatine Mall one of the few malls anchored by a home improvement retailer. Soon after, Von Maur left the south anchor spot vacant, only to be replaced by Staples. In 1999, a redevelopment plan was announced by Landau & Heyman, Muscatine Mall’s owners, which would flip the inside out and remove the enclosed portion of the mall. However, this never happened. By the year 2000, the mall had transitioned from traditional to non-traditional, with an uncertain future. In 2002, both Staples and Walgreens called it quits and the south anchor once again became vacant, only to be replaced by Elder-Beerman in 2003.

Unfortunately, having 3 solid anchors was not enough to sustain Muscatine Mall’s success, and stores began exiting en masse around the same time Staples pulled out. Today, Muscatine Mall is home to only a handful of stores, most of which have exterior entrances only. The enclosed corridor is barren except for the Plaza Theaters, a Time Out arcade, GNC, a Christian book store, a few other stores and the entrance into JCPenney, which is at the back of the mall. The frustration from locals is evident even from teens who don’t wish to drive to Iowa City or to Davenport to shop and hang out at the mall.

In July 2006 Landau & Heyman sold the mall to a group of local businessmen, and in December 2006 minutes from a Muscatine City Council meeting indicated they were seeking to create a TIF for the mall redevelopment. As of February 2007, work is underway on the north entrance of the mall near Menards, and it is currently closed off. Mall owners claim several national retailers are interested in the mall post-renovation. Also, Menards is leaving the mall for newer digs nearby in 2008. What will become of Muscatine Mall? Will plans for redevelopment some 8 years in the making finally come to light and save the mall? Unlike many dead malls, it’s certainly possible. Leave your comments and messages concerning Muscatine Mall below. The photos were taken February 18, 2007.

Case Study: The Capital Region of New York

The Capital Region of New York, with a metropolitan area population of around 800,000, has an awful lot of enclosed shopping malls. There was 11 at one point, but there’s fewer than that now. It also has a big Pyramid mall that brought on the decline or closure of several of them. Let me explain.

Back in October, we offered a similar study of Syracuse malls, which painted a portrait of another upstate New York city where a very large mall developed by the Pyramid Companies–in that case, Carousel Center–caused nearly every other mall within the metropolitan area to shut or go into decline. Syracuse-based Pyramid has employed similar strategies in other cities in New York, including Buffalo, Poughkeepsie, Middletown, and Springfield, Mass.; where a shiny, new, too-large mall opened near perfectly fine existing malls and wiped them away.

Of course, Pyramid can’t exactly be blamed either. From my own experience, trends favor of a move towards these larger, destinational, super-regional malls, and away from older and smaller malls in the first place, so they were merely riding the wave. Still, it’s sad to see the carnage.

Even with the 1.7 million square foot Crossgates Mall, the Capital Region has quite a few remaining enclosed malls, and interesting ones at that. We’ll be posting about these in much more detail in the coming weeks, but I wanted to offer a bit of an introduction:

Colonie Center – The second-largest mall in the region, the 1.3 million square foot Colonie Center has managed to mostly hold its own over the years, despite its proximity to Crossgates (which may corroborate the seemingly-counterintuitive Freakonomics theory that things like this do better when clustered together to create destinations, versus spread widely to offer convenience). Opening in 1966 and expanded in 1991, Colonie Center is the oldest mall in the region and hosts Macy’s, Sears, and Boscov’s (formerly Steinbach) as primary anchors, with Christmas Tree Shops and Steve & Barry’s as junior tenants. Mall owner Feldman Retail Properties is currently in the middle of an extensive renovation and repositioning of the center that will add Barnes & Noble, L.L. Bean, and Regal Cinemas as additional anchors while adding more dining and lifestyle options.
Latham Circle Mall – This older mall (which was originally constructed as a plaza in the 1950s and enclosed in the early 1970s) is struggling against its larger competition, and was partially big-boxed with the addition of a Lowe’s store in 2003. Current anchors are JCPenney, Burlington Coat Factory, and Lowe’s.
Mohawk Mall – This shockingly ugly mid-sized mall opened in the 1970s to serve the eastern suburbs of Schenectady. Upon my first visit in late 1999, it had only two tenants remaining: a Media Play and a Marshalls both located at the mall’s center court. The remainder of the long, carpeted concourse was completely barren, and the mall would be demolished completely in 2001 to be replaced by a big box center. Mohawk Mall was once home to Bradlees and Montgomery Ward, and Deadmalls has a rather complete photo set of it pre-demolition. Go see the photos there, because I don’t have any.
Rotterdam Square – A mildly dated but successful mid-sized, mid-tier mall directly serving the Schenectady area and points west, Rotterdam Square is isolated enough from the area’s main retail centers that it is able to survive. It counts Sears, Macy’s, Kmart, and a movie theatre as anchor tenants.
Amsterdam Mall – While this 300,000 sqft mall may have at one point functioned as an actual shopping mall, it now houses almost nothing but offices. I’m guessing it was built in the early 1970s, as part of a horrific urban renewal project that demolished most of downtown Amsterdam and replaced it with this unloveable two-story center, which once housed local merchants Carl Company and Present Company as anchors. Amsterdam is an old industrial city along the Erie Canal corridor that functions quite separately from the Capital Region itself, and it seems unlikely this mall ever had any serious chance of being a major retail destination. I wasn’t able to make a visit this time around (I wasn’t even sure it’d be open on the weekends, and it’s somewhat off the way) but Deadmalls also has a few photos of this one.
Clifton Park Center (formerly Clifton Country Mall) – At one point, Clifton Park Center was one of my favorite malls in the area, with its unusual layout and dated mid-80s decor. The mall opened in phases, with the northern, “C” shaped part of the center opening in the 1970s, and the long southern “tail” wing opening in the middle 1980s. At various points the mall hosted Caldor, Steinbach, JCPenney, Marshalls, and Regal Cinemas as anchors. Despite anchoring a major retail area in a large and somewhat affluent suburb, the mall reportedly never did terribly well. An unfortunate 2006 renovation tore down half of the mall (the original mall, minus the mid-80s expansion which remains) and replaced it with a rather cheap-looking lifestyle portion that is currently more vacant than the mall ever was. Current anchors are Boscov’s, JCPenney, Marshalls, and Regal Cinemas.
Wilton Mall – This large and somewhat bland 1-level mall opened in 1990 to serve the affluent Saratoga Springs area. Current anchors are the Bon Ton, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Sears, and JCPenney.
Saratoga Mall – The original enclosed mall serving the Saratoga Springs area, this two-level center was completely demolished in 1999. Immediately adjacent to the large Wilton Mall, the center stood very little chance once its neighbor opened. One of two malls in the area I never got to see firsthand, it opened in 1974 and was anchored by Montgomery Ward, Barker’s (later King’s, and then Jamesway), Carl Company, and Service Merchandise. There’s a bit more about it at Deadmalls.
Aviation Mall – A mid-sized, Pyramid-owned mall serving the Glens Falls/Lake George area. It’s relatively non-descript but successful. Current anchors include Sears, Target, JCPenney, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and The Bon Ton (replacing a former Caldor).
Crossgates Mall – The regional behemoth, this 1.7 million square-foot center originally opened in 1984 and was more than doubled in size in 1994. Located at the crux of I-87 and I-90, the center pulls shoppers from most of the eastern half of upstate NY as well as western Massachusetts and southern Vermont. The third largest mall in New York, it is today anchored by Best Buy, Cohoes, Borders, Dick’s Sporting goods, DSW, H&M, JCPenney, Macy’s, and Old Navy, but also hosts several anchor vacancies, most notably the former Lord & Taylor and Jordan Marsh/Macy’s spaces.
Northway Mall – Upon my first visit in 1999, this mall was already gone. Located directly across US5 from Colonie Center and only a few miles from Crossgates, this small mall was likely far more valuable as a site for big box, which is what it does today (as you’ll see in the below pictures). Beyond Montgomery Ward, I’m not even sure what the original anchors were. However, behind the mall is the remains of a large (and now heavily-vandalized) Lechmere store that closed when the chain folded in 1997, and was never replaced. I really miss Lechmere, who had a heck of a lot more personality (and much wider offerings) than contemporary superstore chains like Best Buy. There is also an abandoned cinema complex near the Lechmere, which is equally heavily vandalized. Bizarrely, the original Northway Mall pylon still remains, a decade or so after the mall closed, reportedly due to some skirmishes with the Colonie Planning Board. The big box center that replaced the Northway Mall still has no signage of its own!

And if you want even more, the Albany Area Chamber of Commerce has written a history of Crossgates and Colonie Center with some more details.
And here’s a fun bonus: Some photos from the former Cohoes Commons located in downtown Cohoes, NY, near Troy and Latham. Cohoes is an off-price department store very similar to Kohl’s in format, and the historic building seen here is their original flagship store, which shut sometime in the early 2000s. For a period, Cohoes liked to build small enclosed malls attached to their sporadic locations, and I even remember a similar mall to this one attached to their Cranston, RI store in the Garden City Center (I believe it was called Post Office Square, and I can remember almost nothing about it–can you?). This downtown Cohoes location was dictated by history moreso than strategy, and as a result was terrible for retail; it’s located away from through roads and in the middle of a Hudson Valley town whose best years appear to be behind it. It couldn’t have helped that Cohoes also opened a store at Crossgates, and that malls of this size (probably less than 100,000 square feet) never seem to fare well. It’s still an interesting artifact, even though it now houses state offices and appears to have been reconfigured.