Quote:
Originally Posted by Sun Belt
You're right, I don't understand Chicago like a local would.
How did that strip mall get there in a dense environment? -- My hypothesis is that is was blighted due to the fact that Chicago declined greatly from it's peak. The city had an option to clear the abandoned blight [like what Detroit has had to do] and make way for a new development that clears the blight and brings back tax generating retail that made sense at the time, but now seems short sighted given the influx of development in parts of Chicago.
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The Clybourn Corridor (the biggest Chicago strip mall retail corridor) didn't get developed because of decline, but because of gentrification. All the high earning young households buy stuff too, and so the big box retailers are going where their market lives.
As to "why aren't they building it in an urban format", retailers are loathe to do that unless you're talking somewhere like Manhattan, where they have no choice (and even then, many retailers just say forget it, they're not adjusting, so they avoid Manhattan). Retailers like cookie cutter spaces, and urban-style formats are much more expensive. And urban core Chicago is more car-oriented than many assume, so lots of free parking makes sense.
The corridor seems to be getting better, though. At least the newer stuff has garage parking, and pretends to face the sidewalk.