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As a young, prospective, downtown entrepreneur in the city of Scranton, I'm keeping a close eye on the current "Mall Wars", as many have dubbed them, between Scranton/Wilkes-Barre's three existing malls (Wilkes-Barre's Wyoming Valley Mall, the Viewmont Mall just north of Scranton, and Downtown Scranton's Mall at Steamtown), and the upcoming "Shoppes at Montage" outlet complex, slated for completion in March, just south of the city limits of Scranton in a growing suburban area of Moosic.
I was unhappy about this new project right from the very beginning; Montage Mountain used to be a wooded, pristine paradise just outside of the city limits, home to nothing but a ski resort and a minor-league baseball stadium. Since then, the mountain has been scalped of most of its vegetation to make room for office buildings, multi-million dollar homes, a country club, a cineplex, restaurants, etc., and now this new mall will only add to the "suburban" feel of this once-rural area. My grandmother used to hike and pick berries on that same mountain growing up. Now, doing such an act would warrant you being arrested by the Moosic P.D. for trespassing on someone's property. Not only am I distraught by our loss of open space, but I'm also frustrated to think that all of this new development was unnecessary. The hundreds of residents of Glenmaura Estates' townhomes and McMansions could have just as easily settled into one of Scranton's many liveable, middle-class neighborhoods if they would come down from their "snob status" and be willing to live amongst the "common folk." The major corporations on the mountain (CIGNA Healthcare, Bank of America, MetLife, Prudential Financial, JcPenney, IBM, WNEP-TV, etc.) could have just as easily chosen a downtown office building for their new locations in the Scranton Metro. The newer Lackawanna County Visitors' Center would serve a much more useful purpose in Center City, near to the University of Scranton and some of the downtown's more alluring areas, as we need to focus on rebuilding our core city of Scranton FIRST before we start raping the suburbs of their woodlands. While the ski resort and stadium were both necessities for Montage Mountain due to their topographical and space requirements, the rest of the sprawled-out mess that is "Montage" is nothing but a WASTE OF OPEN SPACE, as even the new outlet center could have been tactfully located in a largely-unoccupied industrial warehouse in Scranton's SouthSide to create a unique, urban, refurbished "loft-style" shopping experience, complete with exposed piping overhead.
Now, I'm even more opposed to the "Shoppes at Montage" than ever; I've just viewed their list of the first 65 tenants currently committed to the project, and the following are stores that are already located in the area, most of which are just a hop away in the downtown mall, which I fear will collapse by the end of next year as tenants leave the downtown mall en masse for the new suburban one:
Aeropostale
American Eagle
Bath & Body Works
Cingular
Claire's
Eddie Bauer
Finish Line
Gap
Hallmark
Hot Topic
Journey's
Kay Jewelers
Lane Bryant
Limited Too
Oreck
Pacific Sunwear
Panera Bread
Quizno's
S & K Menswear
Sprint
Starbucks
Talbot's
The Children's Place
Victoria's Secret
As you can see, while the developers of the "Shoppes @ Montage" promised us a unique shopping experience, 24 out of the 65 tenants are already located near to the new center, meaning that around 40% of the new mall will be comprised of tenants that already have themselves established in the region or will be RELOCATING their stores from the existing malls. How is creating a new mall in suburbia that will nearly kill off the downtown mall considered "economic progress," as Moosic Borough officials are patting themselves on the back for? Sure, they're laughing all the way to the bank with new tax revenues; we'll see how much sympathy I have when much of Moosic floods, as the new project's runoff is being channeled into Spring Brook through town. Don't expect me to come rushing to their aid when urban sprawl finally catches up to them, as I'd be laughing at the irony of those who were being so supportive of the project like sheep being lead to slaughter and then losing their homes to the same project! Also, what good is touting yourself as being "Scranton's premier suburb" when you've only risen to such status by KILLING the city itself?
Considering I'm a future downtown resident and business-owner, I'm very worried that if the Mall at Steamtown in Center City collapses in on itself due to mass abandonment, what will happen to all of the new nearby boutiques and restaurants that were thriving from the mall's foot traffic? Will they collapse as well? What will become of Poochie's Dog Bakery, New Laundry Clothiers, Brixx Eatery, Molly Brannigan's Pub, Northern Lights Espresso Bar, Vidas Tapas Bar & Grille, Penn Furniture, and all of the other downtown "mom-and-pops" that are serving as the backbone of Scranton's renaissance? Where will that put my future business idea? In the garbage...(As I'll never set foot in suburbia again once I move out of my parents' home!) I've never ceased to be amazed by the stupidity and lack of intellect of our local residents, and that's sad considering I know more about urban planning at age 20 than seemingly all of Lackawanna County's officials (perhaps with the exception of Scranton Mayor Chris Doherty). By shifting "vibrance" out of Center City and into suburbia, what is trulybeing accomplished? Scranton's tourists want to saunter in on the Central Scranton Expressway en route to the Steamtown National Historical Site and be "wowed" by the proliferation of unique boutiques, restaurants, nightlife, etc. that has just started to grip the city in recent years after decades of terrible decline; they don't want to see a vacant downtown area surrounded by suburbs that are the mirror-image of suburban areas elsewhere in the nation. How many cities of 75,000 can lay claim to having loft apartments, art galleries, and a dog bakery in their downtowns? Not many (Scranton being among the lucky ones). How many can lay claim to having a network of sprawl around them? (ALL of them). What's so special about the latter? Nothing. What's so special about the first example? A nostalgic, "Main Street" flair that people are desperately-seeking a return to across our nation as they realize that "big-boxes" have now become synonymous with mountains, trees, and rivers as parts of the American landscape.
Please offer your insight into this matter. Do you support the "Shoppes at Montage", or do you support the downtown, and why? I look forward to a good debate from BOTH sides of the issue! What's my opinion---support your local stores, as they're the true "fabric" of your communities and set you apart from other cities. That's just my opinion, but what do I know---I'm fresh out of high school and apparently know nothing about economics (as many have told me on a certain state forum), right?
Here's the layout of the upcoming "Shoppes @ Montage" outlet complex, slated for completion in late-March 2007.
1. Famous Footwear
2. S & K Menswear
3. Journey's
4. Finish Line
5. Aeropostale
6. Cacique
6. Lane Bryant
7. Pacific Sunwear
8. American Eagle
9. Hot Topic
10. Zumiez
11. Bath & Body Works
12. Victoria's Secret
13. Kay Jewelers
14. Gap
16. Eddie Bauer
17. Coldwater Creek
18. Chico's
19. Talbots
20. Ann Taylor Loft
21. J. Jill
22. New York & Company
23. The Children's Place
24. Limited Too
26. Aveda
28. Olympia Sports
29. Hallmark
31. Hat World
32. Yankee Candle
34. Jos. A Bank
37. Panchero's Mexican Grill
38. Panera Bread
39. Claire's
40. Select Comfort
41. Sprint
42. Portrait Innovations
43. The Gourmet Slice
44. Glamour Nails
45. Oreck
46. Beriyo by TCBY
48. Cingular
50. Quizno's
51. Maggie Moo's
52. Starbucks Coffee
53. Longhorn Steak House
55. Kildare's Irish Pub
62. DSW Shoes
63. Sleepy's
64. Christmas Tree Shops
65. Guitar Center
In 1986, when I was born, Montage Mountain was scenic and unspoiled. Just twenty years later, it's Scranton's newest suburban "hot-spot." For those of you interested in seeing what's to come of this "carving of the mountain", here's a siteplan, with the upscale residential community of "Glenmaura" on the left in yellow-green and the entertainment/commerce areas on the right in magenta. (Note how small that massive new retail complex truly is in relation to the mountain as a whole to see just how much "sprawl" really IS occurring!)
It's such a shame to realize that, when you look at the map above and compare what was SUPPOSED to have been the extent of the development on the mountain back when Montage first came into play in the mid-to-late-1980s. (The recently-renamed "Sno Mountain Ski Resort" and the "Lackawanna County Stadium", home to the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees AAA-affilliate) vs. what HAS been developed over the past twenty years, the vast majority of the mountain's greenery and open space could have been preserved through careful urban planning. What a shame that the older generation has ruined even more of Scranton's limited nearby open space in the name of "progress" to leave to its offspring. "Progress" to me would be to have NO DEVELOPMENT ON MONTAGE with 100% of those homes, businesses, entertainment/shopping/dining areas, etc. locating within Scranton's city limits, as doing so would have restored the city into the thriving, cosmopolitan mecca that it once was. Instead, we're left with just another blow to the city's recovery efforts; what a devastating piece of news to those of us who want to see our "Rust-Belt" bounce back again in this nation.
Get used to it, most major urban areas have been thru it many times.
They will call it being some kind of efficiency. Buzzwords like markets finding the best value.
In truth what they always do is kill off any diversity the area has in terms of smaller business. If there is now a downtown, there soon won't be. Plus they will raise taxes in general to pay for it. The Big Boys will have tax breaks.
Plus the traffic patterns will change.
Same thing will happen to the smaller businesses that fail. Multiple stores will become one. Only the big survive, once they have all the competition smashed, they raise prices. Lowes and Home Depot do not compete against each other. They all raise prices to what the traffic will bear. Plus they all carry the same old over priced trash. Anybody else who also survives will raise prices. Then they will cut wages and import illegals to work for even less. The average people just get to run faster to stay in place.
You aren't ready for how that sprawl can morph and go thru birth / death cycles as it gobbles up more real estate that breed more neon and sameness that finally is a drab representation of nothing. You can shut your eyes, spin around and it could be any city or state. Boston, LA or Chicago burbs, they all look and feel the same. Just another urban dream that becomes a nightmare.
Malls may take away business from the mom-and-pop stores but that's life. I like to shop at the mall because of the convienence, I can buy everything I need in a confined area. The stores range from Hot Topic to Gucci, it's truly 1-stop shopping.
Get used to it, most major urban areas have been thru it many times.
They will call it being some kind of efficiency. Buzzwords like markets finding the best value.
In truth what they always do is kill off any diversity the area has in terms of smaller business. If there is now a downtown, there soon won't be. Plus they will raise taxes in general to pay for it. The Big Boys will have tax breaks.
Plus the traffic patterns will change.
Same thing will happen to the smaller businesses that fail. Multiple stores will become one. Only the big survive, once they have all the competition smashed, they raise prices. Lowes and Home Depot do not compete against each other. They all raise prices to what the traffic will bear. Plus they all carry the same old over priced trash. Anybody else who also survives will raise prices. Then they will cut wages and import illegals to work for even less. The average people just get to run faster to stay in place.
You aren't ready for how that sprawl can morph and go thru birth / death cycles as it gobbles up more real estate that breed more neon and sameness that finally is a drab representation of nothing. You can shut your eyes, spin around and it could be any city or state. Boston, LA or Chicago burbs, they all look and feel the same. Just another urban dream that becomes a nightmare.
Actually, Wilkes-Barre and Pittston both have this phenomenon of a first wave of sprawl that is now being killed by a SECOND wave of sprawl, and I'm wondering if Montage will now have the same effect on Dickson City, which is Scranton's first level of sprawl? For example, Pittston used to have a vibrant downtown full of nightlife until the "Pittston Bypass" project was completed. As folks realized they could avoid the hassles of heading through downtown's Main Street to get from Point A to Point B, they began to do so in droves, lessening the car and foot traffic through Main Street. Soon, the "Pittston Mall" was built along the bypass to capture the "new" Main Street of Pittston, which was now in its suburb of Pittston Township. This mall slowly-yet-surely managed to kill off the city's downtown, as the growing, car-dominated, suburban residential population no longer had a need to head to Main Street for any sort of conveniences. Now, the Bypass corridor is dying a slow death as Pittston Township's newest commuter playground "The 3-1-5 corridor", is starting to blossom. A new 18-store shopping center anchored by a Wal-Mart Supercenter is on the way, which will probably all but kill the existing K-Mart and Redner's Market in the Pittston Mall (which has since been renamed the "Pittston Commons.") Traffic congestion on Highway 315 is becoming fierce, often backlogging through several traffic light cycles at rush-hour, yet township officials, seeing the hundreds of thousands of dollars in added tax revenues are laughing all the way to the bank and saying "More, more, more!" Meanwhile, efforts from people such as myself to restore Downtown Pittston are destined to fail, as I've even given up on my "Pittston 2020" project, as nobody from the community seemed remotely-interested. (It could be that the urban population has dropped from 21,000 to 7,000 during this same time period, which leaves fewer people around with an interest in the city, but I digress).
Then you have Wilkes-Barre Township, which has been sucking the vibrancy out of Downtown Wilkes-Barre for decades now. At first, Kidder Street was the "wave of the future", highly-congested with shoppers and highly-profitable for big businesses there. Now, Mundy Street and Highland Park Boulevard is the NEW "hot-spot", leaving vacant big-boxes in its wake on Kidder Street. What a waste of land!
Malls may take away business from the mom-and-pop stores but that's life. I like to shop at the mall because of the convienence, I can buy everything I need in a confined area. The stores range from Hot Topic to Gucci, it's truly 1-stop shopping.
True. There can be a happy medium between malls and mom-and-pops when you have a growing population like that of the Phoenix area, for example, which provides continual new customers for every business owner. In an area like Scranton, which has shed population over the past 40 years at the third-highest rate in the nation, there isn't enough of a consumer population to adequately support four large malls AND keeping downtowns alive. One must prevail; the other must admit defeat. I'm just saddened here, as Scranton was making such strides in "bouncing back" over the past few years, and now that the Steamtown Mall, a major downtown foot traffic generator, may be kaput in a few years, where does that put Scranton's renaissance? On a downward spiral, I'm sad to say.
Unfortunately, developers don't take a long term view of these issues. To them, it's all about "how fast can we build new malls?" and to heck with any existing malls or Mom and Pop stores. They get money for building things, period, all in the name of progress.
This is also why I have no respect for politicians. Most of them don't have a view beyond the next election. (I could go on a diatribe, but I think it belongs in the political thread!)
I'm sorry this is happening. It's sad how much of America is homegenized and looks the same no matter what city you happen to be in.
If fact it will never revert back to farmland, woods or whatever. The typical solution is as one location become "Obsolete", it usually moves down scale to like tire shops, auto parts stores or some type of dirty service industry. In a pinch it can become the super desirable Rent-A-Shed or Condos.
In the end you might claim the diversity comes back but with a twist. Junky, maybe dangerous open ground in many areas.
In the Boston area when it all started there were maybe 15 hardware / building supply places I could buy stuff, usually at a discount and usually found what was required, no matter how rare, all well located. No one place carried the same exact line of products as somewhere else. Many stores were dedicated to just one product like tile, flooring, wall paper, paint, etc. Usually a huge selection and the people knew what they were talking about.
Once that process had run its course over the first wave, only 3 sources survived and one of those was a Surplus place. All raised their prices. Contractors can not use those ones like Lowes or HD, prices too high, quality too low. Over time a number of businesses did spring up dedicated just to service for the builder / contractor trade but it was far less efficient than the old system, lot further to travel, harder to deal with, same deal you got what they had. No more neighbhood lumber yards with their own sources of suppliers built up over many years.
Anybody who claims they can get everything at a mall is either:
1. Blind
2. Not really buying anything
3. Likes crap at jacked up prices
4. Buys it to throw away next garbage day
5. Just another count on the foot traffic meter
6. Wears a pair of those Mickey rat ears and shops only for cheese
7. Or all of the above
The main drivers are always this need for glitz and desire to sell a $.03 piece of plastic for $30 retail. Today it is very rare for me to even go look for stuff in malls. The best shopping is always at Surplus, Factory Outlet, some type of Junk store or yard sales. I want industrial quality at surplus prices.
The kicker is many people are telling others hurry up and move here because guess what we have malls. The best ones are set up like a maze, easy to get into, might not ever get out. About like that idea of putting milk and bread at the back of a grocery. And all those lil islands with the designer plants in the parking lot to dodge.
It is not really complete until like at Wave 10 when they all merge together in one massive mile after mile of continuous bleating come on. The best mall stores are those that sell big things but you actually can't ever get it directly even if you have a truck. Must pay the $50 - 100 dollar "Delivery" fee. But it is super for getting lil botique toe ribbons, bolts to stick out of your head / some body part or black lip gloss but 50 lbs of welding rod in bulk, forget looking in isle #7 behind the paper plates they also like to eat off. About like TV, 500 channels and nothing is on.
In another twenty years you will be able to see the Merged Malls from the moon, just like the Great Wall of China.
In a way the malls present a huge security threat. Just think what will happen if we should have another gasoline cutoff scenario like happened in the early 70's and you cannot drive to the store. But then again, your typical person who loves malls probably doesn't cut their own grass, fix their own car, maybe can't cook, is sort of a slug type of consumer who loves to impluse buy junk.
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My grandmother used to hike and pick berries on that same mountain growing up. Now, doing such an act would warrant you being arrested by the Moosic P.D. for trespassing on someone's property. Not only am I distraught by our loss of open space, but I'm also frustrated to think that all of this new development was unnecessary. The hundreds of residents of Glenmaura Estates' townhomes and McMansions could have just as easily settled into one of Scranton's many liveable, middle-class neighborhoods if they would come down from their "snob status" and be willing to live amongst the "common folk." The major corporations on the mountain (CIGNA Healthcare, Bank of America, MetLife, Prudential Financial, JcPenney, IBM, WNEP-TV, etc.) could have just as easily chosen a downtown office building for their new locations in the Scranton Metro. The newer Lackawanna County Visitors' Center would serve a much more useful purpose in Center City, near to the University of Scranton and some of the downtown's more alluring areas, as we need to focus on rebuilding our core city of Scranton FIRST before we start raping the suburbs of their woodlands. While the ski resort and stadium were both necessities for Montage Mountain due to their topographical and space requirements, the rest of the sprawled-out mess that is "Montage" is nothing but a WASTE OF OPEN SPACE, as even the new outlet center could have been tactfully located in a largely-unoccupied industrial warehouse in Scranton's SouthSide to create a unique, urban, refurbished "loft-style" shopping experience, complete with exposed piping overhead. 
Part Two
Don't expect me to come rushing to their aid when urban sprawl finally catches up to them, as I'd be laughing at the irony of those who were being so supportive of the project like sheep being lead to slaughter and then losing their homes to the same project! 
Also, what good is touting yourself as being "Scranton's premier suburb" when you've only risen to such status by KILLING the city itself? 
I look forward to a good debate from BOTH sides of the issue! 
What's my opinion---support your local stores, as they're the true "fabric" of your communities and set you apart from other cities. That's just my opinion, but what do I know---I'm fresh out of high school and apparently know nothing about economics (as many have told me on a certain state forum), right? 
