Welcome back to #TravelThursday. There’s no denying that America’s love affair with traditional interior shopping malls is over. We first discovered and got excited about them back in the 1960s, as strip shopping centers were enclosed and expanded. Newly-constructed malls dotted the American landscape during its heyday in the 1970s. You could spend hours or even all day at the mall – protected from the elements outside – whether it be summertime heat or wintertime cold or wind or rain or snow. It was the hip social place to be for all ages during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. Many of us “grew up” inside malls – at our favorite stores and restaurants. Parking spaces were especially hard to find from the day after Thanksgiving through the New Year. Remember when helicopters hovered above mall parking lots during the holiday season to report on traffic going in and coming out ?
But then – what goes up – must come down. The slow demise of the shopping mall began shortly after the turn of the 21ST century as we dialed-in and connected to the Interwebs to buy things. (Some would even say that it really started its decline during the late-1990s with the rise of Walmart and Target and Best Buy and other “big box” stores.)
Nowadays what used to be shopping malls are now open-air shopping centers – or vacant plots of land where the mall once stood – or still a mall with few signs of life. Of course there are some areas around the country where shopping malls are not just still alive – but also thriving. (South Florida is one of those areas.)
There are web sites and social media pages that are dedicated to dead malls. They are full of photos from yesteryear when they once thrived – as well as what they look like today – if they even exist today.
Here in my new hometown of Sebring Florida – just 4 miles from my neighborhood – we have the only traditional shopping mall in the county – Lakeshore Mall – and it’s a dead mall. It’s still there. It’s been there since early-1992 (built in 1991). I imagine that it was a booming mall during its first decade of existence. (There are several thousand parking spaces surrounding the mall.) Nowadays – it’s quite the opposite. More than half of the mall (more like three-quarters of it) is vacant. The only movie theatre in the county is inside, and it seems to be doing fine. To bring in customers the mall hosts various flea markets and special community events, and even BINGO once a month in the former food court. They actually do a pretty good job promoting these events on their Facebook page.
As long as the air conditioning is working (which is suspect) it’s actually a nice place to get in out of the summertime heat of South Central Florida, but you’re not going to spend a lot of time there unless you’re seeing a movie or walking laps around the mall. I should add that there is a 24-hour (during the week) Planet Fitness inside the mall.
I’m rooting for the survival of our mall. It needs a really popular anchor store to bring in the residents. I’m not sure what that store could be.
Footnote: One of the main entrances to the mall from busy U.S. 27 is actually blocked. Why ? The big sign for the mall is leaning and about to come crashing down !
Next #TravelThursday – Let’s drink some coffee. Let’s keep traveling together.
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