oneboredjeu Mashup me too, what’s with malls and how when you stop and look are actually insanely weird / interesting / deeper than you think environments??
Can you make more videos like this? Like a live, populated mall? It’s a change of pace from the dead mall videos. I like those videos but seeing this is a breath of fresh air.
there are honestly lots of really busy malls, but they're usually in pretty well off areas or close proximity to high population. In Northern Virginia / DC alone I can think of Tysons Corner, Potomac Mills, Fair Oaks, etc. The 'dying' mall popularity/interest is somewhat perplexing given there is still a huge demand for supermalls for convenience/socializing. If you look up some of the busiest malls in the country you'll find like zero videos or discussion about. People like a tragedy story I guess, maybe due to nostalgia and missing something that's gone. Malls are still very much alive
I just went here on Friday for the first time in 3 years, the mall is still thriving, I didn't see any stores that were closed, and it's beautifully decorated for Christmas! Still my favorite mall!
I grew up in the area of Arrowhead Towne Center. When the mall was being built, my best friend and I rode our bikes inside the mall and explored the back hallways. Fun times.
My closest mall is the Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance, CA, and it's absolutely THRIVING. Same as this one, if not even slightly busier. It was starting to die off a few years back, but they did a major renovation, adding a whole new section, opening a new anchor altogether (a Nordstrom), and moving the food court to a more centralized area, adding new "hip" restaurants to it like Pink's Hot Dogs. And for the first time that I've ever seen, the act of renovating ACTUALLY SAVED the place. Virtually no closed stores, and the mall is always busy, especially on weekends. It's still a WEIRD mall, though -- only mall I've ever seen where one of the anchors, Macy's Men's, is actually a choke point that you HAVE to go through in order to progress from the newer half of the mall to the older half, as there are no corridors leading around it. Interestingly, though, we have an open Sears here, and it seems to be doing relatively OK. And is in a pretty primo location, as a Dave & Buster's opened literally right next door to it, along with a massive Marshall's.
Awesome video. I think you're right about the problem being too many malls, because you can clearly see some of them are still alive. I guess it's survival of the fittest.
5:38 I got so emotional seeing that. I have a photograph of my mother, my older and younger sister and I sitting there. The picture is from around 2006 and its insane to see it exactly the same. Im moving back soon to Phoenix and I've been dying to visit this mall for the past 8 years to re-live my childhood. Seriously, this mall was my happy place.
This is such a delight to see ! We have some malls that are busy in California as well ! It does bring a lot of hope and positive energy ! Great vid ! I live Southern California "Riverside county". I am in Los Angeles much of the time as well. Our Temecula and Tyler malls seem to be doing well. The areas I go to in Los Angeles are always busy as well !
California seems to be a similar situation to Arizona were some malls are thriving and some are dying. I have covered some malls Southern California and it seems to be a similar problem where just too many were built. It seems like the newer malls are doing good but the older malls are dying which is kind of a shame because those seem to be the ones with the most character.
That's so true ! I loved the old Sherman Oaks Galleria ! That was my favorite mall back in the 80's Valley girl days ! South Coast Plaza does well but some of the others in Laguna beach, Anaheim not so well. Thank you so much for the vids ! I really enjoy watching them !
Yeah, some malls here in Cali are doing quite well, one of my favorite malls in the L.A. area is Westfield Santa Anita, it seems to get a lot of business, the mall in the video reminds me a little bit of it, actually.
In my theory, one of the easiest ways to help dead/dying malls in the States is to start attracting supermarket chains to fill in the vacant anchor spots. Here in Australia, most of our shopping complexes are literally built around them, mandating their entrances be indoors and giving smaller retailers a steady stream of foot traffic/customers. It might be a bit hard to convince a Walmart to take an abandoned Sears lot, but giving them cheap leasing fees, building permits to convert/renovate the interior with supermarket equipment (eg, cold storage, on-site butcher, bakeries, etc) and expressly forbidding them from building an outiside entrance in the anchor's walls, will guarantee a longer-term survival for the entire mall.
I go to this mall probably every other weekend. That empty restaurant at 6:22 was a Johnny Rockets and is now a Fired Pie as of 1/18/2019, so it wasn't empty for very long.
A point of interest, part of the pyramid collapsed from a major storm (I think in 1997) and also at the foot of the escalator, there's a plaque for Jordan Sparks who's from the area.
I live in Shoreline,Washington just north of Seattle and we have an outdoor shopping center known as Aurora Square and Shoreline Place who know about the up coming major renovations. It used to be Anchored, if you can call it an Anchor, by Sears but that closed earlier this year yet the Sears outlet store is still open. We also have two malls ruffly the same distance from Shoreline, one in Northgate, Seattle, Washington and the other in Lynnwood, Washington. Seattle also has 2 major outdoor shopping malls and 2 indoor malls,both located downtown and 2 blocks apart from each other. Bellevue, Washington has as many as 7 malls depending on how you count, one of which contains like 90% high end retailers that are most of the Seattle residents wouldn't be able to afford. In Tukwila, Washington we have the largest mall in the Pacific Northwest which is Westfield Southcenter Shoppingtown simply know as Southcenter. Then further out we have several less popular malls and 3 Outlet Malls which include what I think is the largest in the state the Seattle Premium Outlets up on the Tulalip Reservation in Marysville, Washington.
I’m kinda late to this, anyways, I’ve been going to this mall ever since 2012, and even as I’ve matured in taste and style it’s still as enjoyable as it was 7 years ago, there’s certainly something there for all ages. The Arrowhead mall is definitely one of my favorite places, heck, my favorite place, it has such an amazing vibe.
Omg, that vintage Bath and Body Works logo at 7:15! I read that Express used to sell the brand in their stores before they were stand alone, that must've been one of the original stores! The busy-ness of this mall reminds me of Baybrook Mall here in Houston- it looks like this every day.
The white restaurant that was closed @5:54 was a Johnny Rockets. I've been to this mall also when I lived in the Glendale area back in the 90s. It looked much different back then. (Jan Griffiths).
I lived in Arizona briefly during high school and would be here every Friday night. Compared to the east coast this mall wasn’t as busy or updated...or at least back then lol. Seeing this really brought me back. I loved this mall because it has an insane amount of stores and I’m glad it’s still going strong. Great video.
Growing up in Northern Illinois we had 4 enclosed malls in the Rockford Area: - Cherryvale Mall (Cherry Valley, IL. - South East Side) - North Towne Mall (Rockford, IL. - West Side) - Colonial Village Mall (Rockford, IL. - East Side) - Machesney Park Mall (Machesney Park, IL. - North Side) In addition, we had several regionalized or neighborhood strip malls. Today, things are quite different. The Machesney Park Mall lost all of it anchors, and turned into more of a glorified strip mall, with Burlington Coat Factory & Big Lots as the main-stays. The inside of the mall was essentially eliminated by incorporating it into parts of the remaining storefronts. Most of the businesses, that once occupied this mall have moved north to the Route 173 Corridor, where they are either free-standing or incorporated into a strip mall. The Colonial Village Mall lost both of its anchors and was bought by a church. Today the main enclosed portion of the mall is used by the church, while a few stores remain in a portion of the outdoor section/strip mall. The North Town Mall has lost it only anchor store, and most of the main-stream stores that once occupied the mall. The enclosed portion was ‘day-lighted’, effective returning the mall to a strip mall. Gone are most of the restaurants, book stores, clothing stores, shoe stores, arcade, hardware, automotive, bank. Other than a Subway & a Sav-A-Lot, the remaining storefronts are mostly unoccupied, with a few locally-own novelty establishments. The criminal element has really destroyed the dynamic of this mall. Lastly is the CherryVale Mall, which has lost one of four anchors, with the threat of losing 1-2 more soon. It’s a 2-level mall, with a host of clothing stores, shoe stores, a food court, nation-wide branded stores, as well as a handful of locally-own novelty establishments. This is the last remaining ‘true’ shopping mall in the Rockford Area. Sadly, with a depressed economy, crime has begun to exert its negative influences on this mall, with recent shootings both inside & outside the mall. If current trends continue, more businesses are expected to leave. Rockford & the surrounding communities were once well-known for both their furniture factories & industrial manufacturing. Unfortunately, much of that has either closed or simply moved away. As a result, many supporting businesses have closed their doors. This has had a detrimental effect on jobs, the local school system, & consumer buying power. Consequently, crime has picked-up, & the local economy has struggle to survive. It’s sad to say this area, once known for a stable economy, and family-friendly environment, has now turned into a bit of a pariah of towns.
I live in Greenville, SC and our mall, Haywood Mall, is the largest in the state and always busy. We had three malls at one time, but one is now a hybrid space, having shops and a technical school campus. The third was demolished and turned into a mixed use development. Being a child of the 80s, I still love thriving malls.
I live kind of near St Louis and there are four malls that are reasonably close to me, one of them is pretty dead whilst the other three are doing fine. Two of them are outlet malls, one outlet is better than the other with more things but the other outlet mall just recently got a Top Golf right next to it. The last mall is doing pretty good with a soon to be H&M with the inclusion of a Sears that seems to be doing better than other Sears, a Zumiez, and some other decent mall staples. The malls closer to stl seem to be doing better (Galleria, West County Center, And Plaza Frontiac) which makes sense.
I live fairly close to this mall and I've not been inside it for a while. I maybe make 2 trips to it a year if I'm browsing for a gift or some shoes or something. A few years back I figured this mall would start to die off like the rest of them. Good to see it's still doing well.
In Australia, malls are thriving. Centres are so keen on updating and putting renovations in place and people flock to the really big, modern ones. The mall or shopping Center near my home however hasn’t been updated since 74 when it opened and has carpeted interior
Late to the party here but I spent a fair bit of time at arrowhead in the mid 90s. Always loved the skylights at night when they lit them up blue, dont know if they still do. I live in the bermuda triangle of malls now, between the now gone rolling acres, the quickly dying chapel hill and slowly declining belden village. Sorta ironically, all the dead malls around here are being demolished to build amazon fulfillment centers, like euclid square, randall park and rolling acres
That Champs across from the food court used to be a massive arcade where I spent a lot of time as a kid. I remember that there was a giant Ridge Racer cabinet straight at the back that absolutely dwarfed everything around it. There also used to be a carousel in the food court just outside of that arcade too, which I think was one of the more famous centerpieces of the mall for years
I used to spend a lot of time at the mall outside of work. However I am finding online shopping at the stores websites to be easier to find things and more relaxing.
More human than human! Awesome screen. I'm watching all your vids. I was just at the Sears outlet center here in Dallas. They just Demo'd the old Valley View Mall they (Sears) use to be in. The Bed Bath& Beyond outlet was next door. I was looking for tools to DIY my Toyota. I almost teared up.
In Akron (Home of Rolling Acres), we have Chapel Hill, which is a dead mall with only JcPenney left. We also have Summit, which has an Apple store and also 2 Dillards stores (mens/houseware and women) and a macys and Belden Village near Canton which still has a Sears a Macys and a JcPenney
Ah a breath of fresh air indeed. I like walking the malls around town and we really cant right now. Not safely anyway. Strange to watch this and see so many people and think how weird that is right now. Oh well. Thanks for these videos. Might not be something we see for awhile.
I used to go to this mall all the time in High School. There used to be a place there called Allied Games where you could pay to play Lan games of Counterstrike against other kids in the mall. Back off the food court where that Champ Sports is, there used to be a pretty awesome arcade there. I remember playing through and beating the 6-player Xmen Arcade game there, and they had a ton of other games, like even a Japanese cabinet of Rival Schools. At that gamestop there, is where I also picked up Gunstar Heroes and Pirated Gold on the Genesis for a mere $13 each in the early 2000's.
Sbarro rules!!! They closed down the one we have remaining in our ONE remaining enclosed mall in Montgomery, AL (Eastdale Mall), so now there is NO mall pizza! There's just something about mall pizza and mall Chinese food! I mean there is a Chuckee Cheese in Eastdale Mall, but that doesn't count, and it doesn't even have an inside-mall entrance anyway. Before they closed, we used to go to Sbarro when they had the $10 pizza specials, and we'd buy three pizzas every week on that day for lunch at work. But now, no more :(
This gives me hope still for malls. Honestly, you have a great idea there. A classic arcade would seem to do well, at least from having heard about places like Ground Kontrol, Galloping Ghost, and having been to this awesome place in NW Arkansas called "Arkadia Retrocade". The only problem would come with the limited availability of CRTs if a cab needed a replacement, or parts for some pinball tables. Now as far as malls go, there's a buttload of them in central FL. Many aren't doing as hot as they should be, some bustling, some on the verge of closure, and some abandoned and long-closed. I can provide examples: Florida Mall, Orlando: Extremely-bustling, given its location between the Tourist Area and Orlando International Airport Seminole Town Center, Sanford: surprisingly-high occupancy for halfway 'tween Orlando and Daytona Beach. Altamonte Mall, Altamonte Springs: Last I was there, seems to be doing very well, high occupancy. Oviedo Town Center, Oviedo: Doing ok, but still a good few empty storefronts. Food court's kinda pretty with the fountain. Mall I know not the name of in either Merritt Island or Melbourne Beach: Long-since-closed, abandoned, had an early-80s aesthetic to it, curious about what it was like inside if it hasn't been torn down yet. Lakeshore Mall, Sebring: Very mid-80s to early-90s aesthetic and coloring, last I went about seven or so years back, still had a K-Mart as an anchor, but extremely empty. Not sure if it still closed. Fashion Square Mall, Orlando: doing fairly ok, few weeks ago I did see construction of something where the demolished Sears anchor used to be (and even the Auto Center was demolished). West Oaks Mall, Ocoee: This one was covered a few months ago by Ace's Adventures. NOT doing well at all, and sadly a lot of it has to do with the part of Orlando it's neighboring. Many other stores like Target in that area closed down. Area wasn't affectionately-called "Crime Hills" by locals without reason.
Always liked Arrowhead Mall. So nice to see a busy mall. Love yiyr vids but at times they can be a downer...but I still watch them. Great work my friend
I live in Oakland County, Michigan. We have three malls that are doing well, Twelve Oaks, Great Lakes Crossing, and Somerset. Most of the others have died out or are dying.
Scottsdale Fashion Square Mall is doing well, seems to always be busy when I go through there. We did lose Los Arcos Mall in 1997. ASU SkySong is there now at Scottsdale Rd. & McDowell Rd. Yeah, seems like there is too much retail in general in this valley.
That looks like a nice mall! It was fun to see it looking like a real mall with people and most of the stores occupied and everything. I think you're right that there will always be some malls, and if we learn from what has happened and go for quality over quantity, it should be good in the long run. Plus, to me some places you just have to. I mean, I wouldn't want to spend a lot of time at an outdoor mall in summer in Phoenix any more than I would in my home city of Minneapolis in winter. Nice to see the Hallmark and DQ in the food court. Both have become very rare in LA. My favorite mall here is a mid size one, built in the 70s. It had gotten run down to the point where there were just a couple anchors and most of the inline stores left were mom and pop things. They redid the whole thing about 10 years ago, added a Target, Best Buy and a lot of restaurants and now it's a really nice busy mall again with national typical mall stores. The location is great so I'm glad they had that happy ending.
This mall and the one on the east side of Phoenix (Fashion Square) or basically the last two real mall left for the area. There's Paradise Valley but that mall won't be around too much longer and is on its deathbed. This is pretty why Arrowhead and Fashion Square are doing well, one covers the west and the other covers the east.
Factoria Marketplace Mall in Bellevue, Washington is *very busy* on the weekends, a lot like Arrowhead Towne Center. The parking lots get pretty crowded, too.
Our mall has been picking up, it looks like that on the weekends, despite the fact that we lost our macy's and our sears. The theater in the mall has an arcade, and one of the games is a GIANT space invaders game, Like, sit down in a chair with guns to aim at the aliens, and a giant 10 foot screen. It's amazing.
I live in the Triangle area of North Carolina. My malls are half busy / half dead: Crabtree Mall: In Raleigh, by far the busiest with several restaurants & anchors. Southpoint: Also a ok busy mall in Durham with several stand alone stores outside of the mall including Urban Outfitters, Barnes & Nobles, Lush etc. Cary Towne Center: dying mall, half vacancies, one of the tiniest crammed dead Jcpenneys ive ever seen. Other weird vacancy fill ins include Knockerball, VR place, Military recruitment, tutoring places. It has a Dave & Busters attached that gets busy most nights though. Triangle Town Center: In Raleigh. Somewhat busy at times, has lots of carpeting & odd stores. Only found this mall because the Hello Kitty Truck stopped by it for an event. ???: Supposedly there is a small mall in Morrisville with 3 stores left & it has a food court. My coworkers claim its open but yelp says its closed. It has cars in the parking lot when I drive by but I have yet to stop there.
We have one mall in town that is always busy. The next mall is in the next city and both have been around since the 60s, but after then you have to hop on the freeway to get to any other mall.
I highly recommend if you can ever make your way to Saint Louis to check out the St Louis Galleria Mall. It gets pretty busy on weekends and the architecture is amazing.
You really need to go to Plaza Las Americas and Plaza Del Sol in Puerto Rico. Jam packed and Plaza Las Americas is Hugeeeee Also you can visit The Mall Of San Juan ! Very Beautifull!
FINALLY! Would ask for any of you from the "mall" vibe that come to Puerto Rico and dig into the story and how does it compare (most of them favorably, although we have a couple of duds here as well) with Stateside malls. Also, please do the comparison of how does mall operator DDR (used to have 15 malls here, none of the 5 largest ones, now down to 12 and are supposed to get out of the Island by 2020) fare within the operator community.
I love Box Lunch! It's like Hot Topic without the edgy-ness. Ive gotten a lot of cool stuff there, including some retro video game merch. You shoudld check it out.
More like fye instead of hot topic and i wouldnt call hot topic edgy unless you consider the music they play edgy but its good for me when i need a shirt from and anime,game, or njpw
@@vagamer522 never been to an FYE. I just meant edgy as in dark stuff. Like hot topic has band stuff and goth style type clothing jewelry. And box lunch is strictly pop culture merch. Didn't mean to offend anyone by saying "edgy" lmao like I said I like hot topic too.
there used to be a little sort of splash pad thing outside the food court where the big pillars are but they were for show even though kids still played in the water
I live in MD and there's a mall in columbia is thriving. Others not so much but usually they have been replace by open air shopping like there was one in laurel was demoloshed but rebuilt as open air same for owings mills mall
Western suburbs of Philadelphia PA the Granite Run Mall is practically gone. The sears and Boscov's anchor stores are still there but the reconfiguring the area as like a strip mall like place. There is recently expanded King pf Prussia mall probably making it the largest in the country. Then two smaller malls Springfield mall and Exton mall.
A little late but since you're asking, where I live, in the Toronto area (Canada) we have a lot of malls that are generally doing quite well. The main big ones, especially in the city (ie. Toronto/Mississauga/Markham) are quite busy. In the 'burbs, where I live, somewhat less-so but they're definitely not dead by any means. Aside from maybe some of the smaller ones and those are the ones that are deliciously trapped in other decades. All the big malls here are renovated and managed by large companies. I'd like to get out and start shooting them more once the pandemic calms down - I am so ridiculously inspired by both you and Dan Bell and have a history of UrbExing and am OBSESSED by retail history. I'd like to do some Canadian stuff for you all! :D If you're interested, I perused Woodbine Mall in west Toronto back in the fall where there is the famous Fantasy Fair. It's the fist 10 or so shots on my Flickr here! www.flickr.com/photos/_chantallylace/
"Its nice to see a crowded mall!" *continues to sell his own merch online* 🤣 Love this series!! Next time you're in Colorado the Westminster mall is where its at. So dead eeeeeee
Moved from Phoenix in early 2016 and if memory serves correct I think the Johnny Rockets closed not long before I moved. Hope this mall will still be doing well when I move back. Most of the malls in the area where I currently am are dying or on life support
When we went shopping near Christmas and moms dragging me around the from store to store I would love to have a time machine so could go back to 1989 smell the smells and hide in the clothing racks what fun. What I took for granted fascinates me now
I worked at the Mervyn's when the mall opened. I knew it closed, but didn't know what it had become afterwards. Interesting to know heh. The dead restaurant was a Johnny Rockets.
@2:25 Boxed Lunch is a fandom store. Harry Potter (90% Gryffindor/10% Slytherin kind of fandom, whatever sells), Naruto, Rick and Morty, stuff like that. I got 2 pairs of Pokémon PJ pants when I went. I'm wearing a pair now. 😂
If you like “Live” malls, too, in addition to dead malls; also check out Cielo Vista Mall in El Paso, TX. I believe it’s one of the top performing malls in the entire nation. It’s still SUPER busy. Quite the opposite of Sunland Park Mall just 30 minutes away which is on its last leg.
Love your work RA, been watching you since I've been living in Texas. Recently moved to Phoenix and it's great that you visited this particle mall, I started working there recently and hope to run into you someday 😁👍
Nice to see a thriving mall. In the Chicago area there are some core malls that are doing well. Fox valley, despite the loss of Carson's and Sears, Joliet is almost at 100%, Woodfield is like the mall you just did, oak Brook is an upscale outdoor mall that is good, Yorktown is doing well despite being just down from oak Brook, Orland Park. Malls that are in trouble are spring hill, and Stratford. Charlestown mall is dead and closed except for von Maura and a theater. Like you said only strong survive.
I moved like less than a half mile away from this place with it first opened in the 90's. My friends and I would ride our bikes there. It was us and a bunch of old people. It was dead at the beginning. Today it is had to be the most busy mall in Phoenix for sure. Sears is dead now and not occupied and Forever 21 is now a place called Round 1(arcade, bowling, roller skating)
my closest mall is Arrowhead Towne Center, and I am glad to see it is doing well, as I havent been to a mall in a very long time... due to being trapped at home taking care of a sick mother....
I grew up by that mall. Looks fairly the same other then a few updates and the carousel is missing from the food court. I now live in Austin and we have two indoor malls, both sad and pathetic looking. But we have a new open outdoor mall that is amazing and so crowded.
If you haven't visited Southdale mall in MN then I really recommend it. It's the first indoor mall in the country and it's still pretty busy (especially on weekends). It's had 2 anchors close in the past 2 years or so but one of them is being turned into a massive, fancy gym.
We have three busy indoor malls in Charlotte NC, as well as Concord Mills outlet mall up by the speedway. The mall near me, Southpark Mall, is an upscale Simon owned mall. The Anchor stores are Belk, Macy's, Neimam Marcus and Nordstroms. My favorite area is the outdoor concert venue used by the symphony in the summer and other events during the year. We go to window shop lol.
I'm all for dead malls but seeing a busy mall with a fully active food court and a ton of shoppers makes me happy.
is it weird that i'm starting to enjoy videos of super healthy malls as much as the dead ones?
oneboredjeu Mashup me too, what’s with malls and how when you stop and look are actually insanely weird / interesting / deeper than you think environments??
I perfer healthy malls. I still have hope.
No, you're a mall rat like me, so you're ok!
Can you make more videos like this? Like a live, populated mall? It’s a change of pace from the dead mall videos. I like those videos but seeing this is a breath of fresh air.
there are honestly lots of really busy malls, but they're usually in pretty well off areas or close proximity to high population. In Northern Virginia / DC alone I can think of Tysons Corner, Potomac Mills, Fair Oaks, etc. The 'dying' mall popularity/interest is somewhat perplexing given there is still a huge demand for supermalls for convenience/socializing. If you look up some of the busiest malls in the country you'll find like zero videos or discussion about. People like a tragedy story I guess, maybe due to nostalgia and missing something that's gone. Malls are still very much alive
I like the dead malls more. I have a very much thriving mall right by my house, so it's nothing new.
@@user-vi4xy1jw7e same but that's not really the norm.
I just went here on Friday for the first time in 3 years, the mall is still thriving, I didn't see any stores that were closed, and it's beautifully decorated for Christmas! Still my favorite mall!
All I want to say is that this mall is usually not busy so it is a huge surprise to see it busy
I grew up in the area of Arrowhead Towne Center. When the mall was being built, my best friend and I rode our bikes inside the mall and explored the back hallways. Fun times.
Oh wow, we did this too.. They had like super lax security when it was being built
Man that sounds so much fun haha
Fired pie is coming in to replace Johnny rockets. Also it hasn’t been that long since Johnny rockets closed.
I miss Johnny Rockets. My brother and I would go there and get a burger and milkshakes.
My closest mall is the Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance, CA, and it's absolutely THRIVING. Same as this one, if not even slightly busier. It was starting to die off a few years back, but they did a major renovation, adding a whole new section, opening a new anchor altogether (a Nordstrom), and moving the food court to a more centralized area, adding new "hip" restaurants to it like Pink's Hot Dogs. And for the first time that I've ever seen, the act of renovating ACTUALLY SAVED the place. Virtually no closed stores, and the mall is always busy, especially on weekends. It's still a WEIRD mall, though -- only mall I've ever seen where one of the anchors, Macy's Men's, is actually a choke point that you HAVE to go through in order to progress from the newer half of the mall to the older half, as there are no corridors leading around it.
Interestingly, though, we have an open Sears here, and it seems to be doing relatively OK. And is in a pretty primo location, as a Dave & Buster's opened literally right next door to it, along with a massive Marshall's.
I've not been to del amo for 42 years since moving to Arizona
Awesome video. I think you're right about the problem being too many malls, because you can clearly see some of them are still alive. I guess it's survival of the fittest.
The fortnite dance kid got me dying of laughter, this is the generation we live in and i love it
GRM adventures?
2:36 fun fact. I was the first person to walk in that store. I waited with my grandparents until the moment it opened and walked in first lol.
5:38 I got so emotional seeing that. I have a photograph of my mother, my older and younger sister and I sitting there. The picture is from around 2006 and its insane to see it exactly the same. Im moving back soon to Phoenix and I've been dying to visit this mall for the past 8 years to re-live my childhood. Seriously, this mall was my happy place.
I hope you’ve been back! ❤
This is such a delight to see ! We have some malls that are busy in California as well ! It does bring a lot of hope and positive energy ! Great vid ! I live Southern California "Riverside county".
I am in Los Angeles much of the time as well. Our Temecula and Tyler malls seem to be doing well. The areas I go to in Los Angeles are always busy as well !
California seems to be a similar situation to Arizona were some malls are thriving and some are dying. I have covered some malls Southern California and it seems to be a similar problem where just too many were built. It seems like the newer malls are doing good but the older malls are dying which is kind of a shame because those seem to be the ones with the most character.
That's so true ! I loved the old Sherman Oaks Galleria ! That was my favorite mall back in the 80's Valley girl days ! South Coast Plaza does well but some of the others in Laguna beach, Anaheim not so well. Thank you so much for the vids ! I really enjoy watching them !
Yeah, some malls here in Cali are doing quite well, one of my favorite malls in the L.A. area is Westfield Santa Anita, it seems to get a lot of business, the mall in the video reminds me a little bit of it, actually.
That is a great mall ! It's a very good sign ! I love the L.A. area !
In my theory, one of the easiest ways to help dead/dying malls in the States is to start attracting supermarket chains to fill in the vacant anchor spots.
Here in Australia, most of our shopping complexes are literally built around them, mandating their entrances be indoors and giving smaller retailers a steady stream of foot traffic/customers.
It might be a bit hard to convince a Walmart to take an abandoned Sears lot, but giving them cheap leasing fees, building permits to convert/renovate the interior with supermarket equipment (eg, cold storage, on-site butcher, bakeries, etc) and expressly forbidding them from building an outiside entrance in the anchor's walls, will guarantee a longer-term survival for the entire mall.
Wow a busy crowded mall a lady that didn’t know what a camera was did you find a way to time travel back to the 80’s ?
Such a happy change of pace. At least things are (were) going well somewhere in the world. Of course, this was two years ago …
I go to this mall probably every other weekend. That empty restaurant at 6:22 was a Johnny Rockets and is now a Fired Pie as of 1/18/2019, so it wasn't empty for very long.
A point of interest, part of the pyramid collapsed from a major storm (I think in 1997) and also at the foot of the escalator, there's a plaque for Jordan Sparks who's from the area.
I live in Shoreline,Washington just north of Seattle and we have an outdoor shopping center known as Aurora Square and Shoreline Place who know about the up coming major renovations. It used to be Anchored, if you can call it an Anchor, by Sears but that closed earlier this year yet the Sears outlet store is still open. We also have two malls ruffly the same distance from Shoreline, one in Northgate, Seattle, Washington and the other in Lynnwood, Washington. Seattle also has 2 major outdoor shopping malls and 2 indoor malls,both located downtown and 2 blocks apart from each other. Bellevue, Washington has as many as 7 malls depending on how you count, one of which contains like 90% high end retailers that are most of the Seattle residents wouldn't be able to afford. In Tukwila, Washington we have the largest mall in the Pacific Northwest which is Westfield Southcenter Shoppingtown simply know as Southcenter. Then further out we have several less popular malls and 3 Outlet Malls which include what I think is the largest in the state the Seattle Premium Outlets up on the Tulalip Reservation in Marysville, Washington.
So refreshing to see a mall that's still busy!
You should do the Chandler Fashion Center as well, also in Phoenix, it’s probably even busier than Arrowhead.
Please!
Also check out the Christown Mall in Phoenix as well. It's at Bethany Home/19th Ave, fairly busy mall which has a lot of cool, nostalgic decor.
Arizona mills?
@@colewhiteley9951 Christown is going to be abandoned its so empty.
@@edgarh252 Have you been there recently? It's pretty busy as of late. A lot of the stores there get a ton of traffic from the light rail nearby.
Finally... I watched this mall get built. Happy to see it thriving still. Being right next to Sun City helps.
I’m kinda late to this, anyways, I’ve been going to this mall ever since 2012, and even as I’ve matured in taste and style it’s still as enjoyable as it was 7 years ago, there’s certainly something there for all ages. The Arrowhead mall is definitely one of my favorite places, heck, my favorite place, it has such an amazing vibe.
This is my local mall. It's a couple miles away from me. Love this mall.
This is so comforting to watch during quarantine.
Omg, that vintage Bath and Body Works logo at 7:15! I read that Express used to sell the brand in their stores before they were stand alone, that must've been one of the original stores! The busy-ness of this mall reminds me of Baybrook Mall here in Houston- it looks like this every day.
The white restaurant that was closed @5:54 was a Johnny Rockets. I've been to this mall also when I lived in the Glendale area back in the 90s. It looked much different back then. (Jan Griffiths).
I lived in Arizona briefly during high school and would be here every Friday night. Compared to the east coast this mall wasn’t as busy or updated...or at least back then lol. Seeing this really brought me back. I loved this mall because it has an insane amount of stores and I’m glad it’s still going strong. Great video.
Good to see some thriving Mall's videos too.
Awwww! 🥰 I used to work at the Macy's there. The most beautiful mall I've ever worked in.
Growing up in Northern Illinois we had 4 enclosed malls in the Rockford Area:
- Cherryvale Mall (Cherry Valley, IL. - South East Side)
- North Towne Mall (Rockford, IL. - West Side)
- Colonial Village Mall (Rockford, IL. - East Side)
- Machesney Park Mall (Machesney Park, IL. - North Side)
In addition, we had several regionalized or neighborhood strip malls. Today, things are quite different.
The Machesney Park Mall lost all of it anchors, and turned into more of a glorified strip mall, with Burlington Coat Factory & Big Lots as the main-stays. The inside of the mall was essentially eliminated by incorporating it into parts of the remaining storefronts. Most of the businesses, that once occupied this mall have moved north to the Route 173 Corridor, where they are either free-standing or incorporated into a strip mall.
The Colonial Village Mall lost both of its anchors and was bought by a church. Today the main enclosed portion of the mall is used by the church, while a few stores remain in a portion of the outdoor section/strip mall.
The North Town Mall has lost it only anchor store, and most of the main-stream stores that once occupied the mall. The enclosed portion was ‘day-lighted’, effective returning the mall to a strip mall. Gone are most of the restaurants, book stores, clothing stores, shoe stores, arcade, hardware, automotive, bank. Other than a Subway & a Sav-A-Lot, the remaining storefronts are mostly unoccupied, with a few locally-own novelty establishments. The criminal element has really destroyed the dynamic of this mall.
Lastly is the CherryVale Mall, which has lost one of four anchors, with the threat of losing 1-2 more soon. It’s a 2-level mall, with a host of clothing stores, shoe stores, a food court, nation-wide branded stores, as well as a handful of locally-own novelty establishments. This is the last remaining ‘true’ shopping mall in the Rockford Area. Sadly, with a depressed economy, crime has begun to exert its negative influences on this mall, with recent shootings both inside & outside the mall. If current trends continue, more businesses are expected to leave.
Rockford & the surrounding communities were once well-known for both their furniture factories & industrial manufacturing. Unfortunately, much of that has either closed or simply moved away. As a result, many supporting businesses have closed their doors. This has had a detrimental effect on jobs, the local school system, & consumer buying power. Consequently, crime has picked-up, & the local economy has struggle to survive. It’s sad to say this area, once known for a stable economy, and family-friendly environment, has now turned into a bit of a pariah of towns.
day 17 in quarantine:
miss going out so source too going into TH-cam to look at the mall i miss
5:00 When arrowhead opened, there used to be a carousel in that windowed corner, and the fountains out that north exit shot water into the air
Nice to see a thriving mall! The dead malls are so eerie!
I live in Greenville, SC and our mall, Haywood Mall, is the largest in the state and always busy. We had three malls at one time, but one is now a hybrid space, having shops and a technical school campus. The third was demolished and turned into a mixed use development. Being a child of the 80s, I still love thriving malls.
Very nice mall! You have a real talent to make both dead and thriving malls interesting.
Nice to see someone else who loves malls as much as me
I live kind of near St Louis and there are four malls that are reasonably close to me, one of them is pretty dead whilst the other three are doing fine. Two of them are outlet malls, one outlet is better than the other with more things but the other outlet mall just recently got a Top Golf right next to it. The last mall is doing pretty good with a soon to be H&M with the inclusion of a Sears that seems to be doing better than other Sears, a Zumiez, and some other decent mall staples. The malls closer to stl seem to be doing better (Galleria, West County Center, And Plaza Frontiac) which makes sense.
Pikachu On TH-cam I used to LOVE Plaza Frontenac. It was very elegant.
I live fairly close to this mall and I've not been inside it for a while. I maybe make 2 trips to it a year if I'm browsing for a gift or some shoes or something. A few years back I figured this mall would start to die off like the rest of them. Good to see it's still doing well.
In Australia, malls are thriving. Centres are so keen on updating and putting renovations in place and people flock to the really big, modern ones. The mall or shopping Center near my home however hasn’t been updated since 74 when it opened and has carpeted interior
Late to the party here but I spent a fair bit of time at arrowhead in the mid 90s. Always loved the skylights at night when they lit them up blue, dont know if they still do. I live in the bermuda triangle of malls now, between the now gone rolling acres, the quickly dying chapel hill and slowly declining belden village. Sorta ironically, all the dead malls around here are being demolished to build amazon fulfillment centers, like euclid square, randall park and rolling acres
That Champs across from the food court used to be a massive arcade where I spent a lot of time as a kid. I remember that there was a giant Ridge Racer cabinet straight at the back that absolutely dwarfed everything around it. There also used to be a carousel in the food court just outside of that arcade too, which I think was one of the more famous centerpieces of the mall for years
I used to spend a lot of time at the mall outside of work. However I am finding online shopping at the stores websites to be easier to find things and more relaxing.
I agree I would love to see more vids like this! 🙌
Interesting video and mall. I really like your mall videos. Thanks for filming.
Thank you for visiting my favorite mall.
More human than human! Awesome screen. I'm watching all your vids. I was just at the Sears outlet center here in Dallas. They just Demo'd the old Valley View Mall they (Sears) use to be in. The Bed Bath& Beyond outlet was next door. I was looking for tools to DIY my Toyota. I almost teared up.
In Akron (Home of Rolling Acres), we have Chapel Hill, which is a dead mall with only JcPenney left. We also have Summit, which has an Apple store and also 2 Dillards stores (mens/houseware and women) and a macys and Belden Village near Canton which still has a Sears a Macys and a JcPenney
I love these live mall videos. Keep em coming!
Ah a breath of fresh air indeed. I like walking the malls around town and we really cant right now. Not safely anyway. Strange to watch this and see so many people and think how weird that is right now. Oh well. Thanks for these videos. Might not be something we see for awhile.
It's as safe as it's always been
I used to go to this mall all the time in High School. There used to be a place there called Allied Games where you could pay to play Lan games of Counterstrike against other kids in the mall. Back off the food court where that Champ Sports is, there used to be a pretty awesome arcade there. I remember playing through and beating the 6-player Xmen Arcade game there, and they had a ton of other games, like even a Japanese cabinet of Rival Schools. At that gamestop there, is where I also picked up Gunstar Heroes and Pirated Gold on the Genesis for a mere $13 each in the early 2000's.
Sbarro rules!!! They closed down the one we have remaining in our ONE remaining enclosed mall in Montgomery, AL (Eastdale Mall), so now there is NO mall pizza! There's just something about mall pizza and mall Chinese food! I mean there is a Chuckee Cheese in Eastdale Mall, but that doesn't count, and it doesn't even have an inside-mall entrance anyway. Before they closed, we used to go to Sbarro when they had the $10 pizza specials, and we'd buy three pizzas every week on that day for lunch at work. But now, no more :(
This gives me hope still for malls. Honestly, you have a great idea there. A classic arcade would seem to do well, at least from having heard about places like Ground Kontrol, Galloping Ghost, and having been to this awesome place in NW Arkansas called "Arkadia Retrocade". The only problem would come with the limited availability of CRTs if a cab needed a replacement, or parts for some pinball tables.
Now as far as malls go, there's a buttload of them in central FL. Many aren't doing as hot as they should be, some bustling, some on the verge of closure, and some abandoned and long-closed. I can provide examples:
Florida Mall, Orlando: Extremely-bustling, given its location between the Tourist Area and Orlando International Airport
Seminole Town Center, Sanford: surprisingly-high occupancy for halfway 'tween Orlando and Daytona Beach.
Altamonte Mall, Altamonte Springs: Last I was there, seems to be doing very well, high occupancy.
Oviedo Town Center, Oviedo: Doing ok, but still a good few empty storefronts. Food court's kinda pretty with the fountain.
Mall I know not the name of in either Merritt Island or Melbourne Beach: Long-since-closed, abandoned, had an early-80s aesthetic to it, curious about what it was like inside if it hasn't been torn down yet.
Lakeshore Mall, Sebring: Very mid-80s to early-90s aesthetic and coloring, last I went about seven or so years back, still had a K-Mart as an anchor, but extremely empty. Not sure if it still closed.
Fashion Square Mall, Orlando: doing fairly ok, few weeks ago I did see construction of something where the demolished Sears anchor used to be (and even the Auto Center was demolished).
West Oaks Mall, Ocoee: This one was covered a few months ago by Ace's Adventures. NOT doing well at all, and sadly a lot of it has to do with the part of Orlando it's neighboring. Many other stores like Target in that area closed down. Area wasn't affectionately-called "Crime Hills" by locals without reason.
Always liked Arrowhead Mall. So nice to see a busy mall. Love yiyr vids but at times they can be a downer...but I still watch them. Great work my friend
I live in Oakland County, Michigan. We have three malls that are doing well, Twelve Oaks, Great Lakes Crossing, and Somerset. Most of the others have died out or are dying.
Scottsdale Fashion Square Mall is doing well, seems to always be busy when I go through there. We did lose Los Arcos Mall in 1997. ASU SkySong is there now at Scottsdale Rd. & McDowell Rd. Yeah, seems like there is too much retail in general in this valley.
That is an awsome mall and it is so good to see a successful mall now days hopefully it can stay that way for years to come
That looks like a nice mall! It was fun to see it looking like a real mall with people and most of the stores occupied and everything. I think you're right that there will always be some malls, and if we learn from what has happened and go for quality over quantity, it should be good in the long run. Plus, to me some places you just have to. I mean, I wouldn't want to spend a lot of time at an outdoor mall in summer in Phoenix any more than I would in my home city of Minneapolis in winter. Nice to see the Hallmark and DQ in the food court. Both have become very rare in LA.
My favorite mall here is a mid size one, built in the 70s. It had gotten run down to the point where there were just a couple anchors and most of the inline stores left were mom and pop things. They redid the whole thing about 10 years ago, added a Target, Best Buy and a lot of restaurants and now it's a really nice busy mall again with national typical mall stores. The location is great so I'm glad they had that happy ending.
This mall and the one on the east side of Phoenix (Fashion Square) or basically the last two real mall left for the area. There's Paradise Valley but that mall won't be around too much longer and is on its deathbed. This is pretty why Arrowhead and Fashion Square are doing well, one covers the west and the other covers the east.
I live in Bogota Colombia. Every mall is busy and seems to do well, and you're right. The food courts are the busiest part of the mall
Factoria Marketplace Mall in Bellevue, Washington is *very busy* on the weekends, a lot like Arrowhead Towne Center. The parking lots get pretty crowded, too.
1:00 The Macy's store at Arrowhead Town Center was originally Robinsons-May.
Our mall has been picking up, it looks like that on the weekends, despite the fact that we lost our macy's and our sears. The theater in the mall has an arcade, and one of the games is a GIANT space invaders game, Like, sit down in a chair with guns to aim at the aliens, and a giant 10 foot screen. It's amazing.
I live in the Triangle area of North Carolina. My malls are half busy / half dead:
Crabtree Mall: In Raleigh, by far the busiest with several restaurants & anchors.
Southpoint: Also a ok busy mall in Durham with several stand alone stores outside of the mall including Urban Outfitters, Barnes & Nobles, Lush etc.
Cary Towne Center: dying mall, half vacancies, one of the tiniest crammed dead Jcpenneys ive ever seen. Other weird vacancy fill ins include Knockerball, VR place, Military recruitment, tutoring places. It has a Dave & Busters attached that gets busy most nights though.
Triangle Town Center: In Raleigh. Somewhat busy at times, has lots of carpeting & odd stores. Only found this mall because the Hello Kitty Truck stopped by it for an event.
???: Supposedly there is a small mall in Morrisville with 3 stores left & it has a food court. My coworkers claim its open but yelp says its closed. It has cars in the parking lot when I drive by but I have yet to stop there.
Yooooo I love Southpoint. I like that some of the stores are outside
We have one mall in town that is always busy. The next mall is in the next city and both have been around since the 60s, but after then you have to hop on the freeway to get to any other mall.
Lol, I think my name at the end has been on almost all your videos! But I’m proud to be your patron! 👍🏼😎
Thank you so much!
Retail Archaeology no problem man! Really enjoy your channel. Keep up the good work!
I highly recommend if you can ever make your way to Saint Louis to check out the St Louis Galleria Mall. It gets pretty busy on weekends and the architecture is amazing.
You really need to go to Plaza Las Americas and Plaza Del Sol in Puerto Rico. Jam packed and Plaza Las Americas is Hugeeeee
Also you can visit The Mall Of San Juan ! Very Beautifull!
FINALLY! Would ask for any of you from the "mall" vibe that come to Puerto Rico and dig into the story and how does it compare (most of them favorably, although we have a couple of duds here as well) with Stateside malls.
Also, please do the comparison of how does mall operator DDR (used to have 15 malls here, none of the 5 largest ones, now down to 12 and are supposed to get out of the Island by 2020) fare within the operator community.
@@syxepop agree
I’m happy you covered this mall because it’s my local mall, I haven’t been there in a month but last time I was there that Johnny Rockets was open.
The empty store at the 11:20 mark used to be a toy store. They mostly carried cheap Chinese R/C cars and drones.
Box lunch is a cool store you should check it out. We have one at Woodfield mall in Illinois
I love Box Lunch! It's like Hot Topic without the edgy-ness. Ive gotten a lot of cool stuff there, including some retro video game merch. You shoudld check it out.
There's usually stuff for kids there too so your daughter would probably like it as well!
But the edgy-ness is fun...
It’s also owned by Hot Topic
@@wow42022 haha I like Hot Topic as well. I was just trying to explain what Box Lunch was like.
More like fye instead of hot topic and i wouldnt call hot topic edgy unless you consider the music they play edgy but its good for me when i need a shirt from and anime,game, or njpw
@@vagamer522 never been to an FYE. I just meant edgy as in dark stuff. Like hot topic has band stuff and goth style type clothing jewelry. And box lunch is strictly pop culture merch. Didn't mean to offend anyone by saying "edgy" lmao like I said I like hot topic too.
there used to be a little sort of splash pad thing outside the food court where the big pillars are but they were for show even though kids still played in the water
I live in MD and there's a mall in columbia is thriving. Others not so much but usually they have been replace by open air shopping like there was one in laurel was demoloshed but rebuilt as open air same for owings mills mall
Western suburbs of Philadelphia PA the Granite Run Mall is practically gone. The sears and Boscov's anchor stores are still there but the reconfiguring the area as like a strip mall like place. There is recently expanded King pf Prussia mall probably making it the largest in the country. Then two smaller malls Springfield mall and Exton mall.
The Diner used to be Johnny Rockets. They are turning it into a Fired Pie.
I really liked the Johnny rockets. The burgers were really good and the place looked like one of those 80’s diners.
6:04 it was Johnny Rockets, now its Fired Pie. Subway and Opa Life is closed, but they're opening a Johnny Rockets.
I can confirm that the closed restaurant at 6:00 was indeed a Johnny Rockets for many years.
A little late but since you're asking, where I live, in the Toronto area (Canada) we have a lot of malls that are generally doing quite well. The main big ones, especially in the city (ie. Toronto/Mississauga/Markham) are quite busy. In the 'burbs, where I live, somewhat less-so but they're definitely not dead by any means. Aside from maybe some of the smaller ones and those are the ones that are deliciously trapped in other decades. All the big malls here are renovated and managed by large companies. I'd like to get out and start shooting them more once the pandemic calms down - I am so ridiculously inspired by both you and Dan Bell and have a history of UrbExing and am OBSESSED by retail history. I'd like to do some Canadian stuff for you all! :D If you're interested, I perused Woodbine Mall in west Toronto back in the fall where there is the famous Fantasy Fair. It's the fist 10 or so shots on my Flickr here! www.flickr.com/photos/_chantallylace/
the sears in that mall has closed & a new tennant has moved into it's bottom floor
the top floor remains vacant
the exterior still screams 1990s
"Its nice to see a crowded mall!" *continues to sell his own merch online* 🤣
Love this series!! Next time you're in Colorado the Westminster mall is where its at. So dead eeeeeee
Moved from Phoenix in early 2016 and if memory serves correct I think the Johnny Rockets closed not long before I moved. Hope this mall will still be doing well when I move back. Most of the malls in the area where I currently am are dying or on life support
When we went shopping near Christmas and moms dragging me around the from store to store I would love to have a time machine so could go back to 1989 smell the smells and hide in the clothing racks what fun. What I took for granted fascinates me now
I worked at the Mervyn's when the mall opened. I knew it closed, but didn't know what it had become afterwards. Interesting to know heh. The dead restaurant was a Johnny Rockets.
Robinson Township Mall near Pittsburgh has a Boxlunch, too.
@2:25 Boxed Lunch is a fandom store. Harry Potter (90% Gryffindor/10% Slytherin kind of fandom, whatever sells), Naruto, Rick and Morty, stuff like that. I got 2 pairs of Pokémon PJ pants when I went. I'm wearing a pair now. 😂
If you like “Live” malls, too, in addition to dead malls; also check out Cielo Vista Mall in El Paso, TX. I believe it’s one of the top performing malls in the entire nation. It’s still SUPER busy. Quite the opposite of Sunland Park Mall just 30 minutes away which is on its last leg.
Love your work RA, been watching you since I've been living in Texas. Recently moved to Phoenix and it's great that you visited this particle mall, I started working there recently and hope to run into you someday 😁👍
I actually live in Tucson, but haven’t been to a mall in a while. But from what I’ve heard, every mall (besides Foothills) is doing pretty good.
Nice to see a thriving mall. In the Chicago area there are some core malls that are doing well. Fox valley, despite the loss of Carson's and Sears, Joliet is almost at 100%, Woodfield is like the mall you just did, oak Brook is an upscale outdoor mall that is good, Yorktown is doing well despite being just down from oak Brook, Orland Park. Malls that are in trouble are spring hill, and Stratford. Charlestown mall is dead and closed except for von Maura and a theater. Like you said only strong survive.
I moved like less than a half mile away from this place with it first opened in the 90's. My friends and I would ride our bikes there. It was us and a bunch of old people. It was dead at the beginning. Today it is had to be the most busy mall in Phoenix for sure. Sears is dead now and not occupied and Forever 21 is now a place called Round 1(arcade, bowling, roller skating)
In my area, we have 6 malls including an outlet. the outlet and the biggest mall are doing really well and the rest are dying except 1, kinda.
Arrowhead won't die like Metrocenter because the entire neighborhoods around it are HOA's unlike ares around Metrocenter/Christown/Fiesta.
The Johnny rockets actually closed pretty recently. Id say august or so.
my closest mall is Arrowhead Towne Center, and I am glad to see it is doing well, as I havent been to a mall in a very long time... due to being trapped at home taking care of a sick mother....
You say Bladerunner and I'm all... omg! I was hoping a lady pops out of the ad screen and makes you an offer to purchase your very own A.I. assistant.
I grew up by that mall. Looks fairly the same other then a few updates and the carousel is missing from the food court. I now live in Austin and we have two indoor malls, both sad and pathetic looking. But we have a new open outdoor mall that is amazing and so crowded.
If you haven't visited Southdale mall in MN then I really recommend it. It's the first indoor mall in the country and it's still pretty busy (especially on weekends). It's had 2 anchors close in the past 2 years or so but one of them is being turned into a massive, fancy gym.
We have three busy indoor malls in Charlotte NC, as well as Concord Mills outlet mall up by the speedway. The mall near me, Southpark Mall, is an upscale Simon owned mall. The Anchor stores are Belk, Macy's, Neimam Marcus and Nordstroms. My favorite area is the outdoor concert venue used by the symphony in the summer and other events during the year. We go to window shop lol.
I'm so happy to see this!
Nice seeing a thriving mall for once...LOL!