JUST IN. Century III Mall to close. (Pittsburgh, Lebanon: house, neighborhoods)

[Moby Hick]

Originally Posted by neurodistortion

Just look at the Waterfront as an example. That center has a number of upscale shops and high-end dining from PF Chang's to Bravo.

I wonder what you think of as middle-range dining? Twenty years ago when it was only one location in Columbus, Bravo was higher-end dining. It's still not bad, but is clearly just casual dining. As for PF Chang, having any pretensions about that is just absurd.

Originally Posted by neurodistortion

It might be over 10 years old, but to this day the Waterfront is the only major suburban lifestyle center in the Pittsburgh metro.

I'm not sure what a suburban lifestyle center is or how you are defining the Pittsburgh metro or what you mean by "major," but I don't see how that can be true. The Waterfront isn't upscale. It's just Target and Lowe's and groceries all in one place. I used to go there more often, but now with the East Liberty Target, I'll go to those if I'm already up there.

[neurodistortion]

Originally Posted by Moby Hick

I wonder what you think of as middle-range dining? Twenty years ago when it was only one location in Columbus, Bravo was higher-end dining. It's still not bad, but is clearly just casual dining. As for PF Chang, having any pretensions about that is just absurd.



I'm not sure what a suburban lifestyle center is or how you are defining the Pittsburgh metro or what you mean by "major," but I don't see how that can be true. The Waterfront isn't upscale. It's just Target and Lowe's and groceries all in one place. I used to go there more often, but now with the East Liberty Target, I'll go to those if I'm already up there.

I tend to use high-end rather loosely in the grand scheme of things. Marketing wise, a developer will tout something as being high-end when it might just be mid-range. A place like the Le Mont and Vallozzi's may be in the high-end category but also a chain such as the Cheesecake Factory can still technically be high-end considering many of the items on the menu are at least $15-20 bare minimum. Some may associate high-end as being the type of restaurant that may have a dress code but I look at it strictly from a price perspective. I tend to associate places like Chili's, Longhorn Steakhouse or Houlihan's as mid-range casual. Eat 'n Park and Denny's would be on the lower end IMO. Regardless, there's no barrier or classification as to who might dine at one of these establishments since all of these restaurants, high-end to low-end, tend to be mainly frequented by the same core group of middle class residents.

Upscale is another word I use loosely to describe a property. I tend to use it more to describe the shopping experience and aesthetic appeal rather than just the tenant mix, which can have a mixture of high-end and low-end retailers. Ross Park is an excellent example of this. In a mall that is home to Nordstrom, it also has tenants such as Payless Shoes, Sears, Foot Locker, Old Navy, JCPenney, Claire's and Bath and Body Works, which are low to mid-range retailers. Lifestyle centers tend to be of the upscale classification, have no department stores (rarely they will have one), and are usually anchored by dining, recreational or entertainment anchors such as fitness centers, comedy clubs, movie theaters and theme restaurants. Tenants like Chico's, Abercrombie and Fitch, LOFT, Cache, and Coldwater Creek, all of which have locations at Ross Park, are typically what you would find at a lifestyle center. The Waterfront is a little different from the typical lifestyle center as it's actually a power center and a lifestyle center, the Town Center area is the lifestyle center portion of the complex whereas the power center is home to Target, Giant Eagle and Lowe's. As far as the tenant mix at the Waterfront, they do have a pretty solid tenant mix such as Macy's, Gap/Baby Gap, LOFT, Express and Victoria's Secret just to name a few. While none of these tenants may be high-end, they are typically found at most mid-range shopping centers like the Mall at Robinson and Monroeville Mall. At one point, the Town Center did have a series of upscale tenants such as Chico's and Abercrombie & Fitch but they have since closed. Keep in mind that I distinguish upscale a little differently from luxury retailers such as Tiffany & Co, Michael Kors and Louis Vuitton, which are in its own class.

[Moby Hick]

So a lifestyle center is where you go to the movie and a power center is where you buy toilet paper?

[Clint.]

Originally Posted by neurodistortion

The only question is how much longer can the Waterfront retain its status as the only suburban lifestyle center in the metro?

I agree that given historic trends its days may be numbered if another major retail development is constructed nearby. Trying to turn Century 3 real estate into something comparable would be a big gamble, I think. As Moby Hick pointed out, nothing special about The Waterfront other than it is new which, as you said, is a novelty that wears off once a nearby development springs up.

On the other hand, maybe it could be said that the eastern suburbs have seen wild fluctuations with their malls because of the 70s-80 industrial collapse that disproportionately affected them (communities previously able to support shopping centers see them become underutilized and decline, etc.) and maybe The Waterfront is the stabilization of those earlier retail uncertainties. But who knows.

Plus, it's just retail...more often than not it is an effect of local economic health, not a catalyst for it. There is bound to be some reciprocal affect I suppose, and maybe having it nearby is a minor enticement for people to move to an area, but it alone would not be a sufficient reason. That's just my opinion, though.

Look at Homestead - there was a thread on here not too long ago about how The Waterfront has not been a watershed moment in community development there. Although, the Century 3 area of West Mifflin/Pleasant Hills is not nearly as depressed as the Homestead area around The Waterfront, so maybe it's not a great analogy and the right development could be a shot in the arm for the area. It would just have to be done rather prudently. I'm skeptical that large scale retail is the solution (maybe you are, too - you did mention residential and office as necessary components, which I think is along the right track...).

[Clint.]

Originally Posted by Moby Hick

So a lifestyle center is where you go to the movie and a power center is where you buy toilet paper?

Apparently it is all part of the retail marketing strategy by people who spend millions of dollars building such things. I had no idea:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_center_(retail)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestyle_center_(retail)

[neurodistortion]

Originally Posted by Moby Hick

So a lifestyle center is where you go to the movie and a power center is where you buy toilet paper?

A power center is a strip center as a lifestyle center is a shopping mall. It's basically a modern form of the festival marketplace (think Pittsburgh's Station Square) which was conceived by the Rouse Company back in the late 1980s. It's a series of classifications used by the shopping center industry to describe different retail developments.

[neurodistortion]

Description of the retail lifestyle center (according to Wikipedia):

A lifestyle center is a shopping center or mixed-used commercial development that combines the traditional retail functions of a shopping mall with leisure amenities oriented towards upscale consumers. Lifestyle centers, which were first labeled as such by Memphis developers Poag and McEwen in the late 1980s[1] and emerged as a retailing trend in the late 1990s, are sometimes labeled "boutique malls". They are often located in affluent suburban areas. While modern-day lifestyle centers are fairly new, open-air malls have been around for decades. One such mall is Friendly Shopping Center in Greensboro, North Carolina. The open-air mall opened in 1957 and has adapted to the look and layout of today's modern-day lifestyle centers. An expanded section of Friendly Shopping Center called "The Shops at Friendly Center" includes upscale retail and restaurant establishments such as Brooks Brothers and PF Chang's.

[neurodistortion]

Originally Posted by Clint.

I agree that given historic trends its days may be numbered if another major retail development is constructed nearby. Trying to turn Century 3 real estate into something comparable would be a big gamble, I think. As Moby Hick pointed out, nothing special about The Waterfront other than it is new which, as you said, is a novelty that wears off once a nearby development springs up.

On the other hand, maybe it could be said that the eastern suburbs have seen wild fluctuations with their malls because of the 70s-80 industrial collapse that disproportionately affected them (communities previously able to support shopping centers see them become underutilized and decline, etc.) and maybe The Waterfront is the stabilization of those earlier retail uncertainties. But who knows.

Plus, it's just retail...more often than not it is an effect of local economic health, not a catalyst for it. There is bound to be some reciprocal affect I suppose, and maybe having it nearby is a minor enticement for people to move to an area, but it alone would not be a sufficient reason. That's just my opinion, though.

Look at Homestead - there was a thread on here not too long ago about how The Waterfront has not been a watershed moment in community development there. Although, the Century 3 area of West Mifflin/Pleasant Hills is not nearly as depressed as the Homestead area around The Waterfront, so maybe it's not a great analogy and the right development could be a shot in the arm for the area. It would just have to be done rather prudently. I'm skeptical that large scale retail is the solution (maybe you are, too - you did mention residential and office as necessary components, which I think is along the right track...).

I feel that a town center concept would be practical because that area currently lacks something that resembles a downtown or something that can be the defacto town center in the West Mifflin area. Residential and office are just examples. A medical facility or satellite branch of CCAC would also fit within the master plan for something of this nature. Retail could possibly make up about 50% of this mix but no more. In the end, we could speculate but as far as redevelopment is concerned, we won't know until we get a better picture of the mall's situation 5-10 years down the road. I believe with good certainty that whatever happens there will be mixed-use.

[Clint.]

It would be nice. I agree the area already sees fairly high use of the existing development but lacks any significant center of attraction considering the number of people who live and travel nearby. I Used to think maybe the mall would come back, but now think it is past the point of return and doesn't fit into realistic plans for the future. It will be interesting to see what happens; hopefully something does and it doesn't languish for years.

[UKyank]

The Waterfront is helped by it being the only shopping convenient to areas of the City with lots of disposable income namely Squirrel Hill & the SouthSide whereas Century III falls out of the radius of what constitutes a quick trip. The Costco there helps the area immensely in bringing those with $ to the complex as well.