Recession Turns Malls Into Ghost Towns
- By KRIS HUDSON and VANESSA O'CONNELL
Malls, those ubiquitous shopping meccas that sprang up in the 1950s, are dwindling in number, with many struggling properties reduced to largely vacant shells.
Read this very in-depth article that summarizes the mall as it relates to the economic conditions today that are effectively crippling it as a profitable business model. Although, these days what industry is not hurting from the downward economy? I worked with reporter Vanessa O'Connell to help her gather information for this article.
See it here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124294047987244803.html
posted by Brian Florence at
10:02 AM
4 Comments:
You're right, it's a good article. However, I note one major flaw. There's almost no mention of Eastland Mall's (Charlotte) well deserved reputation as a dangerous hang-out for local thugs. No mention of the stabbings or shootings. No mention of the mini-riots between black and Latino gangs. No mention that the police had to ask the transportation system to shut down bus service to the mall after 6pm on Friday and Saturday. The Burger King in the mall's parking lot had to be asked to close at 8pm as gang-bangers, put out of the mall, used it as a point to gather.
Shutting down bus service to the mall had one comical, in macabre sort of way, consequence. Thugs, not realizing the bus service to the mall was suspended, would get as far as the bus transfer station where they would become stranded. This prompted a whole rash of shootings, stabbings and gang mini-riots at this new location.
It's not very credible when you report on a mall like Eastland Mall "suffering" from the recession when in fact it was a "dead mall" long before the recession even started.
You are correct TB201. "Dead malls" aren't dead because the economy is bad. These malls have been limping along, hanging by a thread; the downward state of the economy just acted as the scissors.
TB201 is so right. That mall has been in decline a long time ago, beginning with demographic changes in East Charlotte. Nobody dared to say that there were a rash of serial murders in East Charlotte back in the early 1990s. That area was turning working class to low income back then.
One of the serial killer's victims was urged by her mother to buy a gun because the neighborhood where she worked was getting dangerous. Hence, seeds of the destruction of Eastland Mall were sown in the early 1990s. Eventually that killer was arrested, confessed to killing 10 women during the two-year period, and was sentenced to death in January 1997.
From 1994 onwards, Eastland mall's reputation was tarnished for good. Gangs, problem people, and criminals were taking over, slowly during the 90s but increasingly in this millenium.
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