More than half of Water Tower Place mall could ditch retail – Crain’s*

While moving retail out of more than half the 818,000-square-foot retail portion of Water Tower Place would be a tectonic shift at Chicago’s original high-rise mall, which opened in 1975, it’s certainly not a surprise. In the past three and half years, COVID shutdowns and organized retail theft by smash-and-grab teams have battered North Michigan Avenue and other shopping districts.
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Ex Illini
7 months ago

The Mug Mile is all but dead. Blame Democrats.

debtsor
7 months ago

The cost to build out specialized office space for medical office and nonretail spaces will be astronomical. That’s more of a hail mary attempt that smells of desperation. And the first ten floors of the building have no windows either, so conversion to residential is a non-starter. As for Hawthorne and Northbrook Court, yes, malls have certainly suffered from the own issues. Most mall shopping experiences are expensive, and most malls throughout the country are exactly the same, with the same stores 100 stores selling the exact same products. And the switch to online is real too – most of… Read more »

Sand
7 months ago
Reply to  debtsor

:HAWTHORN CCSD 73 has lost 16.3%” – yet the reason behind the large referendum a few years back was due to increasing enrollment. They hired a company to give them the results they wanted to share with the public – there were those of us who knew better – no one would listen. Now we have expansive buildings and a new dedicated Kindergarten building complete with new staff. BTW, while the building and renovations referendum passed, the operations referendum did not pass. Bizarro

debtsor
7 months ago
Reply to  Sand

4,250 enrolled students in 2018 to
only 3,557 in 2022.

4250-3557=693
693/4250 = 16.%

Sand
7 months ago
Reply to  debtsor

Yeap. It’s amazing how my neighbors were hoodwinked… again.

Where's Mine ???
7 months ago

obviously turning Water Tower Place into migrant shelter is the appropriate use of space.

Sand
7 months ago

Took a trip to Minnesota a couple months ago and was shocked by the bustling indoor malls with every storefront filled. It was explained to me that during COVID many stores pulled out of Mall of America as well as other malls. Those stores came back or were replaced with other stores. It was like walking back into the 90’s. We also visited a suburban mall that was described to me by one of the workers as “up and coming” since it’s decimation during COVID. That mall was awesome; still indoor and lots of people milling around on a late… Read more »

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