• New life for Savannah Legacy Project

    CNU-sponsored plan shows how Southside Savannah could grow by retroffiting an abandoned mall and other sites across from a university campus.
    The Savannah Mall redevelopment/Southside town center plan is one of the more creative CNU Legacy Projects. It envisions the redevelopment of a large indoor shopping mall and other underutilized commercial properties by applying the classic, historic patterns of Savannah, Georgia. Due to the...Read more
  • To build a center on a former mall

    A mixed-use center is the best way to maximize value from a vacant mall site, but it requires proactive city leadership, as seen in Huntsville.
    MidCity District in Huntsville, Alabama, is a 140-acre mixed-use development on the site of the former Madison Square Mall, built in 1984. As the name implies, it is centrally located to the sprawling Rocket City and its largest employment centers, about three miles west of downtown. The District...Read more
  • For the love of mimosas, see Mashpee Commons

    Cape Cod boasts many things, including the first conversion of a sterile strip mall to a village center. It’s a model for what to do with thousands of dead and dying malls.
    My first professional work out of college was on Cape Cod in the 1980s. I read National Geographic, and I loved the photos of village architecture and the picturesque harbors featured in their coverage of the region. Having grown up and studied in Pennsylvania, I had a romantic notion of New...Read more
  • Turning a dead mall into a downtown is not easy, but worth the effort

    As the US seeks a long-term use for hundreds of dead malls, cities can put their faith in urbanism.
    We are amid a massive repurposing of shopping malls in the US. Bill Fulton, author of The Future of Where substack, cites estimates of the US shrinking from 3,000 regional malls down to 200. Alan Ehrenhalt, contributing editor of Governing magazine, explains that the malls have been dying for two...Read more