What Should We Do with Deserted Malls?
- Posted by: Andrew Price
- on April 6, 2009 at 4:15 pm
The American enclosed shopping mall is an endangered species. With retail sales down, chains are closing. That’s leaving malls without tenants. One report put the vacancy rate at the end of 2008 at 7.1 percent. And so malls themselves are closing.
But we’ve still got the buildings. So, what do we do with them? Over the weekend, The New York Times put that question to some people with particularly interesting perspectives on the issue.
Two artchitecture professors who co-wrote the book Retrofitting Suburbia: Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs, predicted: “Smaller malls in older suburbs will increasingly house nonconventional, community-serving tenants, including community college classrooms, branch libraries, spaces for nonprofit arts groups, places of worship, immigrant ‘mom and pop’ shops, and public and private office space.”
Peter Blackbird, the founder of deadmalls.com, says: “Most times, if the building is cheaply constructed, and neglected for years, the only viable option is demolition.”
I like the idea of repurposing malls a lot. But they aren’t the ideal structures for multi-purpose community space. They tend to be designed around the car, surrounded by a sea of parking spaces. You’d have to do some serious relandscaping to make the average suburban mall friendly to cyclists and pedestrians (if they’re even within cycling distance from residential neighborhoods in the first place). And malls aren’t particularly inviting spaces inside. They tend to be enclosed and tacky.
What do you think? Is bulldozing vacant malls the best option or can we make use of them?
Photo by Flickr user Eddie~S, licensed under Creative Commons.
DISCUSSION: 39 Comments
we should turn them into public greenhouses
why not turn these deserted places that are typically open and full of light into schools? divert kids from over-crowded, poorly constructed, dilapidated school buildings to these malls and create more public/private partnership space that could change the face of education?
It would be nice if the land was returned to what it was before the hulking structure was there. How about a nice park?
I’d hate to waste the available space that’s already, in most cases, well-constructed. Demolishing should be a final option. Re-purposing the space is a good idea, but with anything commercial you’re going to run into the same inherent problems hurting the stores that are closing.Perhaps the solution would be to convert the malls into more of a community area – An indoor park, library space, indoor skate park, etc. Another good solution would be to look at the problems that the vacating stores suffer from, and find business that isn’t affected by those problems: Data housing companies, call centers, local non-product-producing businesses, etc. Heck, re-purpose the mall area well enough and you may even be able to keep a couple of the small eateries!Or, we can say “to hell with commercialism!”, knock them down, and reforest the area. Of course, that wouldn’t be profitable, so no one will go for it. Just throwing out ideas.
All great ideas… I’m really into the combination of school and
greenhouse… give the mall the ability to be self contained organic
systems that teaches kids or college students about agriculture.
Anyone remember biosphere 2? No need to lock anyone in but it would be
a great learning experience for students. They can maintain themselves
economically by selling what is produced.
What about redoing parking lots as fields for soccer or basketball or something like that??
Bowling Green, KY, did just as suggested:1. Formerly vacant mall now houses university research center along with office space, call center, small and medium size retail spaces in the rest of the strip center. Big empty parking lot IS and eyesore and out parcels are not selling well. Greenspace would be good use.
A mall here in Saint Louis has been converted into a home for the arts and crafts. Old stores are now spaces for artists, dance studios and other creative pursuits. Great community building, and a terrific reuse of space.Article here
PAINTBALL !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
In this article, “What Should We Do with Deserted Malls?” I believe in the idea from the book, “Retrofiting Suburbia,” that we should make the space available for colleges and libraries to name a few options. I expect that may help to lower the cost of tuition for the college of your choice if they didn’t have to pay as much in overhead costs. In other words, they’d be paying rent instead of a mortgage. Also, because of budget cuts counties have been either getting rid of a few of their libraries or cutting the days or hours when the library will be open is why the mall idea may work for them too.Also, as far as the shopping mall crisis of them closing due to lack of sales is concerned, it may not only be due to the economic situation that is bringing them down but because of the internet. There are probably more online transactions and catalogue shopping over the telephone taking place that is fast, easy and convenient without having to leave your house that is causing the shopping mall “crisis.” The solution for these businesses may be to get their own website.Yes, what may be the real “crises” could be that our way of life is changing and that is threatening to a lot of people. Every change it seems starts out with a type of Armageddon. It also may be that a different way is going to have to be found to distribute money around if it’s going to be condensed in all those shopping malls.
As far as demolishing the building itself is concerned, hopefully it will be done if it is done to make it into a more multipurpose environment. I don’t believe it would be blown up however, just to lay in the dirt. There is always some prospective entrepreneur out there somewhere. Where else did they get the money to tare it down?
Turn them into distribution centers where folks can pick up their online purchases in drive-thru lanes. Sears and Kmart and trying this in Chicago and it might make sense for a while as people transition to online shopping
shopping malls would be great for shoppping malls… just wait few years
Re-use the building as an indoor, climate-controlled farm powered by solar/wind/etc and operated by communities or local farmers. That way, organic food can be locally grown and shipped.
Indoor tent city for those loosing their homes!
What we need to do doesn’t concern just empty malls, but the mechanics of our business viewpoint when it entails managing growth. What happened to the highly paid members of many of the corporate boards that they didn’t even have a hint of the upcoming market downturn. Could it be that many of our old economic models are no longer working? What about the effect of technology on the overall market model, could some of these negative changes have been better managed?about me
Demolishing malls as a widespread solution is a terrible use of resources. If you can repurpose something, you will almost always use a lot fewer resources and have a much gentler impact on the environment. I really like the idea of turning Malls into schools, as they are already set up to have small classrooms (boutique stores), large multi-purpose rooms (anchor stores) and a cafeteria (food court). As a general rule, when you embrace a complex problem, you often are led to creative and dynamic solutions, and I think open discourse and out-of-the-mall/box thinking on what to do with the concrete monstrocities is the best way to go. I really appreciated posts by illustrationism and Karen.J.Levy. ;o) chamberlanderic’s post is just plain funny!
PS – Of course, some may also argue that the best use of a mall is to run around and kill zombies.
shoplifting academies
“Re-use the building as an indoor, climate-controlled farm powered by
solar/wind/etc and operated by communities or local farmers. That way,
organic food can be locally grown and shipped.” AnonymousAgreed. Use them to decentralize the way our country behaves, hell even a homeless shelter would be a better use than bulldozing them.
casino / brothel
prisons.
I vote for skateparks. Since most shopping malls are simulated street environments you wouldn’t even have to change the terrain.
Using the malls for educational centers is a great idea.
how about using the large department stores as Farmer’s market or a gymnasium for a community centre. Having the smaller stores as little offices, or study rooms for students, and having a running library in the mall. Malls have in the past been the bane of existence to many, but now repurposing them to benefit society as a whole can be a very productive and advantageous decision. Utilizing the space can support local businesses and creating a comunicty centre can further encourage better planning in other areas in the community.
Great ideas so far.Use the malls for schools,community centers,homeless shelters,meeting places.If we have to demolish the mall,recycle the materials and use the land for parks..of course,corporate America can’t make much profit from a park.