Dynamite Or Nitro?

[Reefmonkey]

Who want's to light the match?

Put these faded or fading shopping malls out of their misery. Have been magnets for trouble for some time now. HPD can support. No media over-hype.

1. Sharpstown

2. Northline

3. Almeda

Endangered List:

1. Deerbrook

2. Willowbrook

3. Guns-point

I agree with Sharpstone, though some have tried to defend it here. I remember as a little kid in the 1980s, watching commercials for Sharpstown mall, with the Sharpstown Drill team chanting in unison "Come to - Sharpstown - the shopping center in town." At that time it was a pretty nice mall. Now it is a pit. The "local merchants" all sell junky crap, the mall and area around it are downright dangerous from a crime standpoint, and here is a great recent Sharpstown story - a coupl of years ago I wanted to see a movie that I hadn't had a chance to see in the theatres yet, and was being pulled out. Sharpstown's second-run theater was the only one in the city showing the movie, so I went to a matinee. As I sat watching the movie, I noticed movement on the floor of the aisle. I watched about half a dozen rats running around picking up spilled popcorn. I don't understand why they tear down nice malls like Town and Country and let that one stay open. Although, the area around sharpstown does remind me of L.A. for some reason. Maybe the palm trees.

Northline I think is already torn down.

Almeda, I don't think it is as bad as its sister mall, Northwest.

As far as the endangered list, I think you are dead wrong on Deerbrook and Willowbrook. Both those still have relatively nice, affluent clientele, and mid-market to upscale anchors and boutiques catering to them.

Greenspoint - I remember this mall fondly, it is the mall I went to as a little kid in the late 70s, early 80s, before we moved to Champions Forest and started going to Willowbrook. I saw "The Empire Strikes Back" and "Return of the Jedi" at its theatre. As a kid I loved the children's shoe section in Foley's - it had this space-themed play area, very Star Wars-y. I also loved all the fountains and tunnels and archways throughout the mall, which I guess were torn down because they became great places for muggers to lurk when the mall started to go downhill in the late 80s. As Chris Rock said "There are two kinds of malls - the malls the white people go to, and the malls the white people used to go to."

sabasushi, I totally disagree with you on Memorial City Mall. As a kid and a teenager, I always thought it was a pit. We rarely went there, always went to Town and Country. T&C was a great mall, and it is criminal that Harris County's awful project management of the BW-8/I-10 interchange construction killed this mall. I was sad to see it torn down. But now I go to Memorial City all the time, I can't believe what a great job they did of revitalizing it. It is a very pleasant mall to go to, and versatile, with low-market stores like Target all the way up to upper-mid-market stores like Dillards.

[TexasArchitect]

Isn't Sharpstown where Paul Wall and Johnny Dang have their grill shop?

hahahaha, ok kimberly that's 3 post now that got me laughing here at work

yeah according to street flava that's where johnny sells his ice.

[Vertigo58]

hahahaha, ok kimberly that's 3 post now that got me laughing here at work

yeah according to street flava that's where johnny sells his ice.

They could have Homey the Clown selling his ice too. or Homey dont play that?

[Jeebus]

I agree with Sharpstone, though some have tried to defend it here. I remember as a little kid in the 1980s, watching commercials for Sharpstown mall, with the Sharpstown Drill team chanting in unison "Come to - Sharpstown - the shopping center in town." At that time it was a pretty nice mall. Now it is a pit. The "local merchants" all sell junky crap, the mall and area around it are downright dangerous from a crime standpoint

I don't understand why they tear down nice malls like Town and Country and let that one stay open.

I guess that NO ONE here realizes that if you tear down Sharpstown Mall, with all its junk crap shops and its customers (thugs), that they'll just move over to the nicer mall that you shop at.

Let the thugs have their slice of pie so I can enjoy mine.

sabasushi, I totally disagree with you on Memorial City Mall. As a kid and a teenager, I always thought it was a pit. We rarely went there, always went to Town and Country. T&C was a great mall, and it is criminal that Harris County's awful project management of the BW-8/I-10 interchange construction killed this mall. I was sad to see it torn down.

I didn't like T&C because it was actually inconviently laid out. There was no reason to stack a mall 3 stories high in west Houston. No worries though, because something far better is coming in its place. Ultimately Memorial City & T&C will both have commercial developments that "fit".

[Reefmonkey]

I didn't like T&C because it was actually inconviently laid out. There was no reason to stack a mall 3 stories high in west Houston. No worries though, because something far better is coming in its place. Ultimately Memorial City & T&C will both have commercial developments that "fit".

"No reason to stack a mall 3 stories high in west Houston"?!?!?!?!?!? Your comment makes no sense whatsoever.

Jeebus, have you ever heard the term "Urban Sprawl"? What do you think causes urban sprawl? The central areas of a metropolis get overcrowded, no more room to grow, so they move out to neighboring areas. When those areas get overcrowed, they move even further out. "Stacking" a mall 3 stories high as T&C was built is a much more efficient design, a much less wasteful footprint than building a great sprawling mall. Houston is continuing to grow, and as it does, the area inside BW8 is getting pricier and more crowded. The metropolis continues to spread out into Waller and Fort Bend Counties. More efficient design in commercial construction could abate this somewhat, but since all the greedy developers in Houston have your mindset ("there is plenty of land here now, so why not build big and sprawling") urban sprawl will continue in the Houston area.

It also does not follow that a three-story design is less convenient than a sprawling design. Look at Memorial City - sure, it's beautiful inside, but it is so long and winding that it takes forever to walk through. If you park in the Dillard's wing and shop there, and then want to go to another store located in the Target wing, you have to hoof it through the entire mall, past stores you don't need to shop in. Talk about inefficient and inconvenient. Even though I work close to Memorial City, I can't just pop in there on my lunch break and hit a few stores like I could with T&C, it's just too much ground to cover. Give me a three story mall like T&C, where you can take an elevator or escalator up to another level and be right at the other store you need.

As for Sharpstown, as I indicated in my first post, I have good reason to believe the mall is infested with rats, and therefore a health hazard. Are you saying we should keep an unsafe mall open just to ghettoize low-rent merchants?

[Jeebus]

"No reason to stack a mall 3 stories high in west Houston"?!?!?!?!?!? Your comment makes no sense whatsoever.

Actually it does. It must for it to go unchallenged for over a month on an architecture forum full of some of Houston's most aware when it comes to urban-planning & development, issues of sprawl, and pedestrian friendly environments.

What you have to realize is that most people who go to malls to shop are not choosing specific stores as their destination. Most people go to the mall to window shop and browse from store to store.

The only people that shopped T&C, that will admit to me that they did anyway, were just like you. They liked it for the conviencence of getting in and out. Well, that's why it failed. Malls need continuous traffic to survive. People sporatically stopping in and going straight to one store to make a quick purchase is what killed T&C. You prove my point:

It also does not follow that a three-story design is less convenient than a sprawling design. Look at Memorial City - sure, it's beautiful inside, but it is so long and winding that it takes forever to walk through. If you park in the Dillard's wing and shop there, and then want to go to another store located in the Target wing, you have to hoof it through the entire mall, past stores you don't need to shop in. Talk about inefficient and inconvenient. Even though I work close to Memorial City, I can't just pop in there on my lunch break and hit a few stores like I could with T&C, it's just too much ground to cover. Give me a three story mall like T&C, where you can take an elevator or escalator up to another level and be right at the other store you need.

Why are you in such a rush in your above example that you have to hoof [sic] it across the mall from one end to the next? You prove that you are not the typical customer and that you are not the target customer of a mall. Perhaps you would be better suited to strip malls where you can park in front of the store you desire, run in, grab your item, then run out and drive across the parking lot so that you can do the same thing only 500 feet away. There's no wonder our nation is getting fatter. Are you so busy that you can't make the time to walk across the mall, get your cardio and burn off the calories from that Mickey D's combo you had for lunch?

For that mall to work it would have had to been no more than two stories. Then it would have to do like the Galleria, and segregate the stores by demographic and general price range so that a large stream of customers would cycle through.

MOST IMPORTANT STATEMENT OF MY POST: As for sprawl, its a lost cause in this town. That mall could have been 10 stories tall and not done anything to reduce the TRAFFIC that it could have ultimately brought to it. Reducing sprawl begins with pedestrian friendly environments that encourage people to walk from point a to point b - not drive there and back. This is why I said that its no matter for the fate of T&C mall, as something far better is coming: pedestrian friendly, residential over commercial development.

I can't say this enough. Sprawl isn't how far out the city is spread via low density development. It's how far you have to drive, should you have to drive in the first place (which in an ideal city you wouldn't), to reach your destination.

As for Sharpstown, as I indicated in my first post, I have good reason to believe the mall is infested with rats, and therefore a health hazard. Are you saying we should keep an unsafe mall open just to ghettoize low-rent merchants?

I know for a fact that the Foley's (Macy's now?) is infested with rats. I've seen it first hand. Now, I don't about you, but I would rather the thugs keep shopping there, than shut it down, and force them to start shopping at the next closest malls - which include First Colony, Memorial City, & The Galleria.

So yes, I am saying we should encourage Sharpstown Mall to stay open so that all the ghetto people will continue to shop there, and not where I shop.

[sabasushi]

sabasushi, I totally disagree with you on Memorial City Mall. As a kid and a teenager, I always thought it was a pit. We rarely went there, always went to Town and Country. T&C was a great mall, and it is criminal that Harris County's awful project management of the BW-8/I-10 interchange construction killed this mall. I was sad to see it torn down. But now I go to Memorial City all the time, I can't believe what a great job they did of revitalizing it. It is a very pleasant mall to go to, and versatile, with low-market stores like Target all the way up to upper-mid-market stores like Dillards.

I never visited the old Memorial City mall (I only moved here in 2006). The reason I don't like the mall has nothing to do with the stores -- more to do with the decor. Let me put it this way...it's one of the beige-est places I've seen. Hardly any color -- beige floors, beige walls, et cetera. It's like visiting an apartment for rent, only many times bigger. :-) And the walls are quite high, making you feel like you are shopping in a canyon. Compared to more recent malls like Park Meadows near Denver, Memorial City's design looks a little minimal (and I'm not talking minimial as in the minimalism sense.)

[TheNiche]

"No reason to stack a mall 3 stories high in west Houston"?!?!?!?!?!? Your comment makes no sense whatsoever.

Jeebus, have you ever heard the term "Urban Sprawl"? What do you think causes urban sprawl? The central areas of a metropolis get overcrowded, no more room to grow, so they move out to neighboring areas. When those areas get overcrowed, they move even further out. "Stacking" a mall 3 stories high as T&C was built is a much more efficient design, a much less wasteful footprint than building a great sprawling mall. Houston is continuing to grow, and as it does, the area inside BW8 is getting pricier and more crowded. The metropolis continues to spread out into Waller and Fort Bend Counties. More efficient design in commercial construction could abate this somewhat, but since all the greedy developers in Houston have your mindset ("there is plenty of land here now, so why not build big and sprawling") urban sprawl will continue in the Houston area.

It also does not follow that a three-story design is less convenient than a sprawling design. Look at Memorial City - sure, it's beautiful inside, but it is so long and winding that it takes forever to walk through. If you park in the Dillard's wing and shop there, and then want to go to another store located in the Target wing, you have to hoof it through the entire mall, past stores you don't need to shop in. Talk about inefficient and inconvenient. Even though I work close to Memorial City, I can't just pop in there on my lunch break and hit a few stores like I could with T&C, it's just too much ground to cover. Give me a three story mall like T&C, where you can take an elevator or escalator up to another level and be right at the other store you need.

Jeebus is right. Malls target window shoppers and impulse buyers. The closer to ground-level is a store, the more visible it is, the higher the rent that can be attained. With each additional level, the amount of rent that can be charged decreases even though the cost to build that floor and keep it cool increases. Typically, anything higher than the second floor of a multilevel mall will be occupied more by tenants such as legal, medical, dental, or financial services, and even some office users--tenants that don't rely on visibility to generate customers, but even then, there tends to be greater vacancy on the third level than in other parts of malls. So it costs more and the space generates less revenue. This is why malls are typically one or two stories at the most.

You may view it as a waste of land, but I see overbuilding a mall as a waste of steel, concrete, electricity, among other materials, as well as human labor. And this is a case where walking (a healthy activity) is preferred by people and is discouraged by multi-level malls with smaller floorplates. You may be hard-pressed to get an urbanist on your side, here.

...but what really gave Memorial City the advantage and killed off T&C was that it was in the armpit of the I-10 & Beltway 8 interchange that is presently being rebuilt. Poor visibility and mediocre access from the feeder unless you knew exactly where you were going.

[houstonmacbro]

Who want's to light the match?

Put these faded or fading shopping malls out of their misery. Have been magnets for trouble for some time now. HPD can support. No media over-hype.

1. Sharpstown

2. Northline

3. Almeda

Endangered List:

1. Deerbrook

2. Willowbrook

3. Guns-point

I've been through all the malls listed and while I am not a mall shopper in general, I didn't feel threatened, my car wasn't vandalized, and I wasn't held up at gunpoint. I wonder how many of you have actually been victimized (or even traumatized) by an experience in these malls? Or are you going on crime statistics and hearsay?

[Reefmonkey]

Actually it does. It must for it to go unchallenged for over a month on an architecture forum full of some of Houston's most aware when it comes to urban-planning & development, issues of sprawl, and pedestrian friendly environments.

So you base the reliability of your statement on the fact that it wasn't challenged on an internet forum for a whole 30 days. You must be the kind of person who thinks Wikipedia is an infallible primary source.

Why are you in such a rush in your above example that you have to hoof [sic] it across the mall from one end to the next? You prove that you are not the typical customer and that you are not the target customer of a mall. Perhaps you would be better suited to strip malls where you can park in front of the store you desire, run in, grab your item, then run out and drive across the parking lot so that you can do the same thing only 500 feet away. There's no wonder our nation is getting fatter. Are you so busy that you can't make the time to walk across the mall, get your cardio and burn off the calories from that Mickey D's combo you had for lunch?

Spare me. I have finished the Molokai World Surfski Championship, and am a two-time finisher (2005 and 2006) of Texas Water Safari. Maybe for your flaccid *** walking in an air conditioned mall qualifies as exercise, but for me, malls are a place to buy things. Maybe you like to waste your time strolling a mall sightseeing, that's your business, but I have better things to do. As I mentioned, because both malls are close to my work, I would use my lunch hour to go to them, so I didn't have the time to take a leisurely stoll through the mall. Just thought I would say it once more since your reading comprehension skills are apparently on par with your understanding of urban sprawl.

The only people that shopped T&C, that will admit to me that they did anyway, were just like you. They liked it for the conviencence of getting in and out. Well, that's why it failed.

Nice revisionist history there, but everyone knows it failed because it was practically impossible to get to during the construction of the Sam Houston Tollway/I-10 interchange.

Oh, and nice spelling of "conviencence" [sic]. Word to the wise, there is nothing wrong with using an informal phase like "hoof it" for "walk hurriedly" in an informal medium like an internet chat board, but if you are going to use "sic" to try to ridicule someone for it like you did in the quote before this one, you'd better make sure your own spelling, etc. is flawless or you will get called on your hypocrisy.

For that mall to work it would have had to been no more than two stories. Then it would have to do like the Galleria, and segregate the stores by demographic and general price range so that a large stream of customers would cycle through.

And how many stories is the Galleria again? Here's a hint: http://www.simon.com/mall/images/floorplan...alleriaMall.gif

MOST IMPORTANT STATEMENT OF MY POST: As for sprawl, its a lost cause in this town.

Wow, great attitude. Reminds me of the attitude of most of Lee Brown's appointees on the Land Redevelopment Committee when I was working on it. That is when they actually showed up for meetings. I'm sure with enough people with attitudes like yours, it probably is now a true statement, so you can go...congratulate....yourself on that.

I can't say this enough. Sprawl isn't how far out the city is spread via low density development. It's how far you have to drive, should you have to drive in the first place (which in an ideal city you wouldn't), to reach your destination.

Actually, I would call this the MOST IMPORTANT STATEMENT OF [YOUR] POST, because it lays bare your complete lack of understanding of urban sprawl. Here I am talking about one cause of urban sprawl (low density development), ans you refute that with an effect of urban sprawl (long drive time). You tell me it has nothing to do with the cause I state, is all about the effect you state. It is as if I said "colds are caused by rhinoviruses," and you retort "colds aren't about rhinoviruses, they are when your nose is stuffy and runny." That pretty much sums up your credibility on urban sprawl discussions.

And why would you have to drive far to reach your destination? Because the distance from your starting point and your destination is far, as in spread out. Now that could be just because you happen to be in a really big, but densly packed city. Do you think that is the case in Houston? Here is a hint. Houston: 2000 census population, 1,953,631, incorporated area 601 sq miles. New York: 2000 census population: 8,008,278, incorporated area 322 sq miles. So thats Houston, about 3,200 people per sq mile, NYC, about 25,000 people per sq mile. Houston is a low-density large city, and that is one of it's urban sprawl problems.Now is poor land use the sole culprit? No, according to Census Bureau data, it accounts for about half of urban sprawl. Population growth plays an equally strong role. But contributing to 50% of sprawl, that still seems like a big role for poor land use to play.

As for "something better coming....pedestrian friendly residential over commercial", I am all for it, but that is not going to make a significant impact. Having a starbucks downstairs from your condo is great, but when you still have to drive an hour and a half to work, it isn't going to do a lot of good. Pedestrian friendly is great, but in Houston you still have to drive there before you get out and walk. For one thing, residential over commercial is great when you are a young single, like I was when I was living in midtown, but most people who raise families here in Houston want to do so in a house with a yard in a good school district, NOT a condo on Bagby over a nightclub zoned for HISD. Even if we could convince everyone to live in residential over commerical, where would be the right place to put them? Our Central Business District downtown accounts for only a fraction of Houston employers. If the husband works in Pasadena and the wife in the medical center, Downtown doesn't make much sense, does it? Anywhere they live, someone is going to have to have a fairly long commute, which is going to contribute to some of the ills of urban sprawl - traffic congestion and air pollution. Having people live within walking distance or a short drive from where they work is the REAL lost cause in this town, but we can keep the problem from getting worse by slowing urban sprawl by demanding stopping poor and inefficent land use. Commercial retail developers are some of the worst offenders. Bone up a little more on the causes and effects of urban sprawl before the next time you talk about it.

The only thing you got right is, yeah, I am probably not the target consumer for malls. I do not see malls as a tourist destination. In my free time on a Saturday I am going to be on the water, paddling, not windowshopping. I only go shopping when I intend to buy something specific, and I do it quickly and efficiently (you've made it clear that is comical to you for some reason, so go ahead and sneer). I do like that malls concentrate the places I am likely to shop for that item into one trip. That's efficient for me, and I wil concede it may not be the best marketing strategy for a mall. But that shouldn't give a mall a pass to have a large environmentally unfriendly footprint. "We can't make money if we do it the socially responsible way" - the Yuppie Nuremburg Defense - doesn't cut any ice with me.

As for Sharpstown, fine, whatever, let it be like a colorful souk for southwest Houston. But it wouldn't kill them to send someone in with a dustpan and broom between movies to pick up popcorn so it doesn't attract rats. A visit from the Orkin Man might be nice, too. The "thugs" as you call them have a right to be protected from typhus, too.

[Retama]

While we're knocking down malls, lets take out San Jacinto Mall in Baytown as well, which is owned by the same people who own "Gunspoint."

[Jeebus]

So you base the reliability of your statement on the fact that it wasn't challenged on an internet forum for a whole 30 days. You must be the kind of person who thinks Wikipedia is an infallible primary source.

You're right. How silly of me to come to an internet based discussion board and expect to believe ANYTHING I read:

Spare me. I have finished the Molokai World Surfski Championship, and am a two-time finisher (2005 and 2006) of Texas Water Safari.

So even if they're true, I'm still not sure why you're bragging about your accomplishments. It doesn't really bring any credibility, much less validity to your points.

Maybe for your flaccid *** walking in an air conditioned mall qualifies as exercise, but for me, malls are a place to buy things. Maybe you like to waste your time strolling a mall sightseeing, that's your business, but I have better things to do. As I mentioned, because both malls are close to my work, I would use my lunch hour to go to them, so I didn't have the time to take a leisurely stoll through the mall.

Right, and that's why malls aren't for you, which was my original point brought up in response to your griping about them. But as I'll point out later in this reply, they seem to be for most everyone else.

Just thought I would say it once more since your reading comprehension skills are apparently on par with your understanding of urban sprawl.

And throwing insults helps to prove your point how? Seriously. I'm still debating the investment of my time to have a discussion/debate with you over this subject, especially if you're just going to reduce yourself to slinging mud.

Nice revisionist history there, but everyone knows it failed because it was practically impossible to get to during the construction of the Sam Houston Tollway/I-10 interchange.

Maybe so, but I've been told by many people in the area that the mall was unsuccessful before the construction started - again, based on the mall layout. The interchange construction was probably just the catalyst that killed what was already slowly dying.

And how many stories is the Galleria again? Here's a hint: http://www.simon.com/mall/images/floorplan...alleriaMall.gif

The Galleria works because its unique. The location, types of stores, and international appeal are things that make it unique. The Galleria plan would not work anywhere else in this town, which is why the two examples (T&C & Westwood) have both failed, and why we haven't seen it attempted again in the last 20 years.

Wow, great attitude. Reminds me of the attitude of most of Lee Brown's appointees on the Land Redevelopment Committee when I was working on it. That is when they actually showed up for meetings. I'm sure with enough people with attitudes like yours, it probably is now a true statement, so you can go...congratulate....yourself on that.

I'm very insulted that you would compare me to Lee Brown or any of his inept staff, which of course were mostly the product of nepotism. My attitude is that of a realist. Happy thoughts or picketing strip-malls is not going to make them go away. I've conceded to myself that I live in a town that doesn't naturally support pedestrian friendly development. Maybe that's why I actually think projects like T&C are a good thing, as opposed to some thinking that they're "not good enough".

Actually, I would call this the MOST IMPORTANT STATEMENT OF [YOUR] POST, because it lays bare your complete lack of understanding of urban sprawl. Here I am talking about one cause of urban sprawl (low density development), ans you refute that with an effect of urban sprawl (long drive time). You tell me it has nothing to do with the cause I state, is all about the effect you state. It is as if I said "colds are caused by rhinoviruses," and you retort "colds aren't about rhinoviruses, they are when your nose is stuffy and runny." That pretty much sums up your credibility on urban sprawl discussions.

See, this is where we will disagree. Yes, many feel that sprawl is the product of low density development over great distances. I personally feel that it is the product of mass employee commute. Houston would be fine if everyone were able to work close to their home. The freeways wouldn't be clogged for one. Two, if development was focused on creating job centers around neighborhoods, then pedestrian friendly environments would be more likely to grow organically. If you could get people to work close to home, as in less than 5 miles, you'd begin to see more mass transit, more alternative forms of transit, and even pedestrian traffic. That's where the T&C development comes into play:

As for "something better coming....pedestrian friendly residential over commercial", I am all for it, but that is not going to make a significant impact. Having a starbucks downstairs from your condo is great, but when you still have to drive an hour and a half to work, it isn't going to do a lot of good. Pedestrian friendly is great, but in Houston you still have to drive there before you get out and walk.

I agree, which supports what I just said above this quote.

For one thing, residential over commercial is great when you are a young single, like I was when I was living in midtown, but most people who raise families here in Houston want to do so in a house with a yard in a good school district, NOT a condo on Bagby over a nightclub zoned for HISD.

I'm sure you've read Suburban Nation. Its talked about many times in the book how this type development in the center of a residential neighborhood (eg. single family dwellings with front & back yards) works when just given a chance, and is actually developed.

Even if we could convince everyone to live in residential over commerical, where would be the right place to put them? Our Central Business District downtown accounts for only a fraction of Houston employers. If the husband works in Pasadena and the wife in the medical center, Downtown doesn't make much sense, does it? Anywhere they live, someone is going to have to have a fairly long commute, which is going to contribute to some of the ills of urban sprawl - traffic congestion and air pollution. Having people live within walking distance or a short drive from where they work is the REAL lost cause in this town, but we can keep the problem from getting worse by slowing urban sprawl by demanding stopping poor and inefficent land use.

I agree (see above), but you and I both know that development trends in this city are some of the most backwards in the nation when it comes to creating urban environments. That's why we have to embrace projects like the T&C redevelopment. I'm outraged that the Pavillions cut the residential out of its development. That was a big blow to re-populating downtown. As mentioned above though, I'm not at all suprised by it.

Commercial retail developers are some of the worst offenders. Bone up a little more on the causes and effects of urban sprawl before the next time you talk about it.

What exactly do you want me to bone up on? I agree with this thought and I would think my posts reflect it.

The only thing you got right is, yeah, I am probably not the target consumer for malls. I do not see malls as a tourist destination. In my free time on a Saturday I am going to be on the water, paddling, not windowshopping. I only go shopping when I intend to buy something specific, and I do it quickly and efficiently (you've made it clear that is comical to you for some reason, so go ahead and sneer).

You must realize that your exercise habits are the exception to the rule. You're not going to get the estimated 65% of obese Americans to follow your lead either. In a world of constantly having to choose not right from wrong, but rather the lesser of two evils, the indoor mall provides more exercise than strip-malls ever will.

I do like that malls concentrate the places I am likely to shop for that item into one trip. That's efficient for me, and I wil concede it may not be the best marketing strategy for a mall. But that shouldn't give a mall a pass to have a large environmentally unfriendly footprint. "We can't make money if we do it the socially responsible way" - the Yuppie Nuremburg Defense - doesn't cut any ice with me.

I could understand if malls were as prevelant as strip-malls that are anchored by mega-grocery stores, but they are not. They are strategically placed, and are few in number. My only complaint is the lack of parking garages. I know its an additional cost, but garages would reduce that footprint drastically.

As for Sharpstown, fine, whatever, let it be like a colorful souk for southwest Houston. But it wouldn't kill them to send someone in with a dustpan and broom between movies to pick up popcorn so it doesn't attract rats. A visit from the Orkin Man might be nice, too. The "thugs" as you call them have a right to be protected from typhus, too.

If you want to stand up for the movie patrons at the Sharpstown Mall, I will not stand in your way.

[Reefmonkey]

Jeebus, spare me your hypocritical righteous indignation about me supposedly mudslinging and insulting you in my last post when in your previous post before you had insinuated that I am fat and lazy:

Why are you in such a rush in your above example that you have to hoof [sic] it across the mall from one end to the next? You prove that you are not the typical customer and that you are not the target customer of a mall. Perhaps you would be better suited to strip malls where you can park in front of the store you desire, run in, grab your item, then run out and drive across the parking lot so that you can do the same thing only 500 feet away. There's no wonder our nation is getting fatter. Are you so busy that you can't make the time to walk across the mall, get your cardio and burn off the calories from that Mickey D's combo you had for lunch?

I pointed out that I am a competitive surfski racer, and likely in better shape than you, therefore in no need to get "exercise" from walking in the mall, as a direct retort to the above. You seemed confused about why I brought up my surfski racing in the last post, so I thought I'd connect the dots for you.

I don't really care if you are insulted because I compared you to some of Brown's appointees. I had direct contact with them, and your views echo many of theirs.

See, this is where we will disagree. Yes, many feel that sprawl is the product of low density development over great distances. I personally feel that it is the product of mass employee commute.

This is not where we disagree. This is where you don't understand the difference between the cause of urban sprawl and the effect of urban sprawl. I have already explained the difference between the two, I am not going to waste my time typing it again, so read my previous post again. Jeebus, reading one mass-market book on urban sprawl does not make you an expert on the subject, and certainly does not mean you know more than the US Census Bureau, who has studied the problem for decades and concluded that poor land use, including low-density construction, contributes to half of sprawl. Once again, the distance people travel from their home to their place of work is not a cause of sprawl, it is a symptom of sprawl. People don't live far away from their workplaces for giggles, they do so because they can't find affordable, safe, quality housing with good neighborhoods near their place of work. For office dwellers, that is often because of poor urban planning, one aspect of which is low-density building, and yes, some of the New Urbanist ideas you cherish can allieviate that. But for some people living close to work, even if there were good housing, is not an attractive option. This is where some of the flaws of Suburban Nation and the New Urbanists come into play. For Houston, their ideas aren't very applicable. I personally would love to live in a place like Seaside, FL. It would be great to walk to work. On the other hand, since in my current job I do environmental work for a chemical company, maybe living that close to my job isn't such an attractive option. And that is part of the naivete of the New Urbanist movement - not everyone, or even most people, work in a nice, clean urban office environment. NIMBY is a hard mindset to get around, and people aren't going to want to live around heavy industry. Don't try to discount this, especially for Houston, where the petrochemical industry is a very important part of the economy. For people who work in this industry, living and raising a family within walking distance of a refinery does not create a good quality of life.. While some of the New Urbanist ideals would work well for building master-planned communties where people would not have to drive to go to the store, etc., it isn't going to solve the commuting problem for people like chemical workers. It isn't a pancea, and it is naive to think that everyone can live so close to work.

Also, Suburban Nation considers strict zoning to be an important contributor to urban sprawl, and favors more fluid mixed-use zoning. For a city like Houston which has never had zoning, this is not applicable. The book has also been criticized for its bias and lack of documentation, as well as a lack of understanding of certain issues, like transportation. I am sure you have read How Cities Work by Alex Marshall, which has a lot of criticism of the New Urbanist movement. I tend to agree with him about transportation being one major way to alleviate a lot of the problems of urban sprawl, especially for Houston. Decent mass transit and light rail, something this city has fought for a long time, and then implemented in such a stupid and half-assed way, could do wonders to alleviate congestion. It would take a lot of change in mindset of both commuters and employers. Because we are already so spread out, we can't expect everyone to be able to get off on the train at a station that is reasonable walking distance to work. Therefore, major employers who live outside the concentrated business centers are going to need to run buses from the rail station closest to them. I have personally experienced how this works, as when I go to my company's plant on Tokyo Bay, about an hour or so trainride from Tokyo, I get off at the station near my plant, and board a company-run bus for a 5 minute ride to the plant. Obviously, even this kind of mass transit isn't going to fix urban sprawl by itself, as trains running down from the nice suburbs in the north to Downtown and elsewhere via the EastTex Freeway Corridor and the North Freeway Corridor, especially, but even the Northwest Freeway Corridor, would be running through decaying, low income neighborhoods with poor schools. These neighborhoods need to be seriously rehabbed, and brought back to productive mixed-use, where the ideas you espouse would work great. It will be a herculean labor, as will developing the rail infrastructure, but no one said that reversing Houston's urban sprawl would be easy, or have just one turnkey solution.

[Subdude]

Time to put the flaming to bed.

[CreekDweller]

Willowbrook and Deerbrook hardly qualify as "endangered". Willowbrook's clientele may have grown a little more "diverse" (when compared to 15-20 years ago when it was still considered out in the boondocks) but in terms of the types of stores they have it's gotten nicer lately. I consider Deerbrook a slightly more downscale version of Willowbrook, both in terms of the stores they have & the people who shop there. It's also in a bad location surrounded by cheap houses and old strip centers.

Gunspoint is a lost cause. That ship sailed years ago. It's been a certifiably ghetto mall for at least ten years and started being "endangered" probably 15 years ago.

[Vertigo58]

Willowbrook and Deerbrook hardly qualify as "endangered". Willowbrook's clientele may have grown a little more "diverse" (when compared to 15-20 years ago when it was still considered out in the boondocks) but in terms of the types of stores they have it's gotten nicer lately. I consider Deerbrook a slightly more downscale version of Willowbrook, both in terms of the stores they have & the people who shop there. It's also in a bad location surrounded by cheap houses and old strip centers.

Gunspoint is a lost cause. That ship sailed years ago. It's been a certifiably ghetto mall for at least ten years and started being "endangered" probably 15 years ago.

"endangered" has a certain tone to it.

[BryanS]

"The mall" as we know it today (or maybe 10, 20, 30 years ago)... is dead/dying, pretty much including all the ones discussed here (fairly obvious statement)... When then all get plowed under, they'll re-emerge as door-to-door big box, retail outlets, provided the location is half-way decent. Look at Gulfgate (of the past) and the dramatic improvement that has emerged in its place today. Look across the street from Baybrook Mall @ Bay Area and 45 (Baybrook Landing)... Actually, Wal-Mart is emerging as the mall of the 21st century, because you can do everything right there: buy clothes, shoes, get your eye glasses, do some of your banking, get your medicine, eat at McDonalds, buy your groceries... all they need to do is add child birthing and under-taking services... then you could be born, live all your life (spend all your money), and die - without ever needing to leave the store...

[Vertigo58]

All above true...add wedding chapel.

[gwilson]

I'm still lost as to why obvious sarcasm was racism?

If that is the case, DL Hughley is one of the most racist humans on the planet.