ShoppingTown is what a mid-century regional mall looks like in the third decade of its managed decline. The anchors are gone. The interior has the particular quality of a building designed for a capacity it no longer runs at: wide corridors, high ceilings, retail footprints subdivided and repurposed into fitness studios and urgent care centers. The original bones are still there. The original purpose has redistributed.
I checked in here with the kids in December 2018. Three stars reflects a place that was already past the point of reinvention but still providing what it could provide: a climate-controlled interior corridor, a few remaining tenants, a food court operating at reduced capacity. My kids found what they were looking for.
There is something worth documenting about regional malls at this stage. Not nostalgia. More like watching a civic institution renegotiate its terms. ShoppingTown is doing that in slow motion.
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December 30, 2018
