Postby twincitizen » July 22nd, 2015, 1:59 pm
I still think Southdale missed a huge opportunity to downsize & sell of a good swath of land in the NE corner. Obviously Simon Properties isn't in the business of shrinking malls, but long-term I think it will bear out that it would've been the right thing to do at the time. Southdale is filling up spaces pretty nicely and everything, but I swear the foot traffic is still really light. It just never, ever seems busy in there. The restaurant/AMC side gets busy on weekend nights of course, but the mall traffic still seems pretty low.
My downsizing idea is as follows :
1. Instead of bringing in the Herbergers, shift JCPenney over to that space (former Mervyn's - was vacant for quite a while)
(obviously too late for this now, at least until JCP goes bankrupt).
2. Tear down the current JCP building and parking deck. The rebuilt food court could remain and be further reconstructed into a grand "front entrance", facing north towards 66th.
3. Sell entire NE quadrant of the Southdale property for office (including government), medical, and/or residential development. Introduce an L-shaped public street separating the NE corner property from the mall property, laying the foundation of a grid (basically Beard Ave & 67th Street). This probably involves rebuilding/relocating the transit center yet again, but whatevs this is all fantasy anyways.