Mallville : mixing uses in the shopping center of the future

Abstract

(cont.) product allows municipalities an alternative strategy for large scale development than simply consenting to the construction of Wal-Marts and power centers. The alignment of private and public interests in the development of mixed-use projects create the potential for an attractive (and rare) win-win situation for developers and cities, alike, and the potential for lasting economic and social value.

Changes in consumer preference, supply and public policy are producing momentum for the introduction of new real estate products into suburbia, calling into question the homogeneous propagation of entrenched forms. Suburbs need to be viewed as what they are in some places: underutilized real estate, underbuilt or emerging neighborhoods-ripe for future morphological alterations and untapped economic opportunities. Capitalizing on the potential to improve underutilized land, public willingness to create a sense of place in the suburbs, and the market demand for lifestyle centers and urban housing, developers have created a new product type that recreates the main street feel of a city--in short "Mallville." These mixed-use products have the potential to achieve returns and product differentiation for developers and property owners in an increasingly competitive retail sector, while simultaneously providing municipalities with social benefit. The point of this thesis is not to prognosticate the demise of the shopping mall like some industry critics contend and the website http://dcadmalls.com has made famous, because in reality well-situated, properly managed malls are still very viable and among the strongest performing asset classes in the real estate universe. Instead, this thesis explores the introduction of mixed-use and the development of town centers in suburbia and the incipient evolution of a new product types within the shopping center universe. Embracing innovative new uses such as hotels, museums, city halls and amphitheaters, urban style housing, open space, streetscape, these projects seek to craft new town centers for homogeneous suburban and low-density urban communities, instilling a "sense of place" where, hitherto, none had existed. The mixed-use