Malls draw inspiration from downtown

Today's New York Times covers a phenomenom that has been evident to those of us in the field for many years - the oversaturation of retail square footage and the trend of underutilized malls, or "grayfields". The recession has only made the problem worse. Mall owners and managers are now struggling with many of the same challenges that faced downtowns over the past twenty years...significant vacancies and disinvestment. What these owners are now doing is trying to reposition their mall assets by replicating the mix of uses found in traditional downtowns. [Making over the mall in rough economic times, NYTimes, 2/6/12]

Many owners recognize that shopping habits are changing...and not in their favor. People are shopping on line. When they do finally choose to venture away from their computer screens, they expect something more than simply a retail transaction. The article suggests that Americans today,"rather than going to big, overwhelming malls...prefer places where stores can be entered from the street, featuring restaurants, entertainment and other Main Street mainstays." A representative from Simon Properties, one of the largest mall owners in the nation, reflects on this trend, saying malls today have to “provide a unique set of shopping, dining and entertainment experiences”.

Station Square, a Forest City owned property on
Pittsburgh's South Side is home to a mix
 of tourist oriented retail...and a trade school.

Dying malls that have made the plunge into mixed use are now home to a diverse blend of users, from schools to other civic, religious and cultural institutions. In fact, in one mall, the Galleria in Cleveland, mall owers hide the food court with a curtain and rent the space for events and weddings. Getting creative about filling space is critical to ensuring the long term value of these assets. On a recent visit to Pittsburgh's Station Square, an old school "Festival Marketplace" located within an old train depot, I noted that a significant part of the main retail floor was occupied by the Bradford School, a small school offering associates degrees and diplomas in the health care, design, technology and business fields. The execution of the concept needs a bit of help as the rest of the retail area felt old and lacked excitement, but the mix of uses helped to ensure a steady stream of customers for the food court businesses, if not for the other more tourist oriented businesses.

Downtown is really no different - and our approach to filling spaces needs to be similarly creative. Of course, the greater challenge is the fact that downtowns have multiple owners who are not necessarily on the same page when it comes to vision, and seldom coordinate their actions in the same way a single mall owner can. But the real take away here is that downtown is the model for what many malls strive for these days - and it is up to us to take advantage of the authentic downtown brand that is already ours for the taking!

Traditional Downtown Anchors Die - What Will ReplaceThem?




Original Downtown Sears

 The verdict is in. Sears plans to close 100 to 120 of its Sears and Kmart stores, 81 of which are in small towns. [As Sears Plans Closings, Cities Fight to Keep Stores, Huffington Post]. The traditional downtown anchor is going the way of the dinosaur. So what will take its place?

What we do know is this. Sears is going to force some serious introspection on the part of downtown advocates. This is creative destruction in action. For those unwilling to think outside the box, we will see knee jerk reactions as communities jump into action quickly, expending scarce resources trying to attract similar downtown retail anchors. My prediction is that most of these efforts will end in failure. The communities that succeed will be those that think outside of the box. Downtown anchors are changing rapidly. And we need to recognize that the "new" downtown anchors are the cultural facilities, restaurants, theatres, hospitals, libraries, universities and educational institutions that draw visitors for more than just shopping... 

Reference: Here is another piece I wrote on this..."Redefining the Downtown Anchor": http://tinyurl.com/dwntownanchor

Turning Students into Customers

Do you have a college or university in or near your district? Do your local businesses benefit from student spending? My friend and colleague Anthony Capese, Executive Director of the Albany Central Avenue BID, is taking proactive steps to ensure that students become loyal customers. After holding "nearly 20 focus groups with students", Capese noted that "they simply didn't know, and rarely found a reason to venture off of campus." The challenge of attracting student customers is certainly not unique to his district.

His efforts, however, are a great best practice for BID's. For a few years now, the Central Avenue BID has spearheaded a "SUNY SHOWCASE" event (SUNY = State University of New York) during student orientation that offered RA's (resident advisors) information about downtown retail and service offerings. The idea is that RA's are in the best position to pass this information along to their students. Nearly 200 RA's and student staff participated this past August, taking Aqua Duck Trolley Tours through the District, ending at a afternoon-long party at a local hotel, replete with Foosball tournaments, video games, artists, and giveaways.

For more information on the program, click here for an article written on the CABID blog.

Now is a great time to start putting out feelers to your local schools to see how you can leverage student orientation to your district's benefit.

The Commercial District Advisor heads to Mexico to speak about Latin American BID Formation

Enjoying a cup of coffee...

A few months ago, my colleague David Feehan and I were asked by the Interamerican Development Bank to present our experience as part of a team that played a role in establishing the first Business Improvement District in Latin America. The conference, entitled PPPAmericas, concluded yesterday.

Our work in El Salvador was funded by the IDB, and as we came to understand over the course of the two day conference, BIDs are an entirely new concept for most in the world of public-private partnerships. While most panels discussed the construction of jails and infrastructure, we stood out like a sore thumb, with an interest in...gulp, shopping districts?! But our session was well attended by over 200 practitioners from all over Latin America, and many seemed quite intrigued by what has been accomplished in El Salvador. Jorge Iraheta represented the Corporation Zona Rosa, our client, and described in great detail how they executed the BID concept (known in Spanish as "Distritos de Mejora Comercial") with some creative thinking outside the box...but more about that in a follow up blog entry.

The conference was held in the central Mexican pueblo of Guanajuato. What an amazing city. I recommend ever urban planner (or urban planner wanna be!) visit this place. It is one of ten Mexican pueblos to sport the coveted UNESCO World Heritage Site distinction. I first visited Guanajuato almost 15 years ago. From 1997-98 and then again from 1999-2000, I traveled and lived in over 13 Spanish speaking countries on a Watson fellowship, and then later as a Fulbright scholar, looking at how historic Latin American cities were remaking themselves. At the time, I would sometimes pinch myself as I wandered the streets of an old colonial city exploring hidden nooks and crevices. That was my "job" for almost two years of my life. And to find myself again wandering the same beautiful streets of Guanajuato taking pictures (I do tend to get funny looks when people see me taking pictures of trash cans!) was a real pleasure.
 
Guanajuato is a little piece of heaven that is unlike any other place on earth. There are barely any cars on the few passageways (I hesitate to call them roads) wide enough to accommodate them. That's because the town has an intricate system of underground tunnels that accommodates most automobile traffic. This leaves the town a true pedestrian domain. The streets are also packed with students from the university - which is in the heart of the historic district - lending a vibrancy that always accompanies young people. Street musicians serenade diners at the dozens of outdoor eateries. The Plaza Union, one of the main plazas in town, is filled with neatly trimmed trees that have grown into an imposing and massive green canopy, made even more imposing by the fact that the trees are carved into a neatly shaped box. When you enter the Plaza, you feel as if you are walking into a lush living room with leaves for a ceiling. As you walk the streets, every turn uncovers a surprising vista, a hidden plaza or building to discover. I spent half the day walking around exploring before making my way to the city museum and local market for a few small gifts. I did refresh myself with a stop at a little cafe, where I enjoyed the view of the bright yellow cathedral.
 
If you get lost, there are helpful directional signs to guide you. Although I did find the standard downtown map unnecessarily confusing. When a self - professed map geek has problems reading your maps, there is a problem. But getting lost was, frankly, half the fun. I also realized what an incredible disconnect there is between the world of BIDs and the world of tourism districts. All of the directional signs seemed sponsored by the state or city run tourism council. In the US, this kind of signage can be sponsored and maintained by BID's, freeing critical public resources for other needs. I couldn't help but wonder what kind of resources were committed to upkeep, particularly as I stumbled upon more than a few signs marred by graffiti. But those sights did not affect the overall experience, and the cleanliness of the streets was more a rule than an exception. See for yourself...

Plaza Union's perfectly trimmed trees

 

An intersection in the underground street system

Signage in need of maintenance



The outdoor living room...

Surprising elements at every turn

Directional signage

Outdoor cafe along a typical 'street'

Car traffic is tucked behind the buildings
as it emerges from the underground street network

A downtown map marred by graffiti

 

Award-Winning BID Leadership Training Program Accepting Applications for Second Round



2011 Coro Neighborhood Leadership Participants at
Inaugural Retreat

 I am so pleased to announce that applications for the award-winning 2012 Coro Neighborhood Leadership program are now available on-line.

As the Program Director, I am proud to have had a strong hand in shaping the inaugural curriculum and in leading a truly accomplished cohort of 20 seasoned professionals through the five-month program. What these BID and CDC practitioners discovered was that professional and personal networks can be improved at any stage of professional development, and that key leadership skills (even the best of us need this!) are bred, not born. Becuase this is a field that attracts professionals from a variety of backgrounds - the process of bringing them together to share in dialogue and best practices is valuable not only for what they learned from the program, but perhaps even more so for what they learned from one another. The program also recieved a 2011 Downtown Merit Award by the International Downtown Association (IDA) for excellence in downtown leadership and management.

In announcing year two of the program as part of a comprehensive set of neighborhood retail initiatives, Mayor Bloomberg stated “small businesses are the backbone of our City’s economy and our neighborhood retail corridors are the driving force behind job creation and economic growth". The City's efforts will "provide local neighborhood retail districts with the tools they need to jump-start local economic activity, attract new retailers and reach a whole new range of consumers.” [See Oct. 27, 2011 Press Release]

And for those of you who like video...NY1 did a nice news piece, click here to take a peek:  "Officials Work to Revitalize Lower East Side Businesses"

For all these wonderful accolades, the most significant feedback comes from participants. Blaise Backer, Executive Director of the Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn Partnership, and no stranger to accolades for his work turning Myrtle Avenue around ("Pratt Institute Takes an Interest in Making a Neighborhood Nicer", NYTimes, 2/11/11) offers this testimonial:

"Neighborhood Leadership was a huge benefit to my professional development and has helped me both on and off the job. As the director of a small non-profit, my busy workday rarely provides me the time to reflect on my leadership skills and work habits. This program provided me with a much needed opportunity to pause from work in order to develop my skills, assess my current challenges and develop strategies to overcome them, and to learn from my peers and Coro's excellent facilitators. I highly recommend the program for those working in the field of neighborhood and commercial revitalization."

The Coro Neighborhood Leadership Program is made possible by generous funding from the NYC Department of Small Business Services. Eligible participants include staff at nonprofit organizations that serve commercial districts in New York City and whose work focuses on commercial revitalization activities. A majority of participants selected will serve low to moderate income neighborhoods with a limited number of slots open for participants who do not fall within this category.

Click here for more information on eligibility and to download an application.

Seven Ways Anchor Institutions Can Support Commercial Revitalization, Courtesy of ICIC

Wesleyan University was a major investor at the Inn at Middletown,
which involved the rehab of an old armory building right on Main St.

Local communities often struggle to find resources to advance their commercial revitalization efforts. Engaging property and business owners is obviously a first step, but it can sometimes be easy to overlook other stakeholders in a community. Universities are often seen as partners in this effort, as we have written about on this blog a number of times before [click here for previous posts], but increasingly, health care and cultural institutions are also playing a role in community building. Yet by and large they remain an untapped resource for revitalization.

Anchors are a good example of “sticky capital”, their looming physical presence and investment in built facilities means they are literally anchored in the community. They may be so focused on their primary mission, that they may not even realize the benefits that accrue to them from improvements to the surrounding neighborhood. In some communities, rather than engage in community efforts, they have done just the opposite. They have instead built fences around their properties, concentrated retail and services on-site, effectively isolating themselves. In communities with high crime rates and public safety challenges, this can be seen as the easy way out. I recall a tour of the Ivy City neighborhood in northeast D.C when I worked for LISC. Ivy City is a community with its fair share of public safety challenges. Looming large over the neighborhood was Galludet Univesity, with its tall fences and closed campus. The distinct 'them vs. us' attitude was mentioned again and again by community residents who were frustrated by the lack of meaningful engagement from the university.

Last week, I had the opportunity to hear Mary Leonard, President and CEO of the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City, speak at the City of New York’s Annual Business Improvement District (BID) Conference. ICIC, founded in 1994 by Harvard Business School Professor Michael Porter, has been analyzing the impact of anchor institutions on urban economic development. They have come up with a framework for the role of anchors in community revitalization. While the most obvious contribution that an anchor can make is money, Mary Kay laid out a framework for the role of anchors that goes much further and suggests seven ways in which anchors can participate in community building. With full credit to ICIC, and peppered with my own examples culled from my own experience, I offer this framework to readers interested in a comprehensive set of options for the ways in which local anchor institutions can have a more significant impact on their commercial revitalization efforts. [For a more detailed look at the ICIC framework click here]

1. Core Products or Services – This refers to the contribution that an anchor makes based on their area of expertise. If the anchor is a university, students might be tapped to do research or service. If the anchor is a health organization, they might provide free health screening to area residents. If the anchor is a cultural institution, they can contribute enhanced programming that draws visitors to the district. Vassar College, for instance, runs a field work program that provides students with academic credit and a stipend to intern with local community organizations and government agencies. 
2. Real Estate Developer – Anchor institutions can use their real estate investments to either turn their back on the local community or to build linkages to the district. Pratt University, in Brooklyn, NY recently unveiled a 120,000-square-foot, $54 million six-story building that houses administrative offices, galleries and classrooms right on Myrtle Avenue – a district that has benefitted significantly from Pratt’s active engagement. [For more on the Myrtle Avenue story, click here]. Another good example is Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT. Wesleyan was a lead participant and investor in the building of the Inn at Middletown. The hotel, located in a restored armory on Main Street, was once a blight on the district. Today the building and its guests are a stabilizing force that helps drive retail sales in the district.
3. Purchaser – The purchasing power of anchors can be directed to local businesses and suppliers. Communities can work closely with the anchor to identify local businesses, set up local purchasing goals, and offer incentives to help them to meet these goals.
4. Employer – I was shocked when Mary Kay mentioned that 2/3 of hospital and 1/3 of university employees only need associate degrees. There are clearly untapped opportunities, particular in lower income communities, to establish connections to residents through screening, training and referral. These jobs help stabilize a neighborhood by building wealth among local residents, building buying power for local businesses in the process.
5. Workforce Developer – Anchors can work closely with other community stakeholders, particularly universities, in identifying gaps and training local residents for jobs in the future.
6. Cluster Anchor – Anchors can collaborate with other organizations to incubate new businesses that simultaneously provide needed services and also fill local retail space. Hospitals are an excellent example of this trend. You often see complimentary retail and services in the vicinity of a hospital – and a hospital can help build demand for these services by encouraging patients and staff to patronize these local businesses.
7. Community Infrastructure Builder – There are many ways in which an anchor can help build local infrastructure. For example, ICIC notes that Yale University provides a subsidy for faculty and staff to buy homes in New Haven. While a student at Wesleyan University, In Middletown, Connecticut, I worked closely with the City planning office to apply for a competitive Connecticut Main Street program grant for technical assistance from the National Main Street Center. Our successful application counted on the support of seven organizations that contributed $10,000/year for three years to fund a Main Street program, one of which was the University. This effort eventually led to the formation of a Business Improvement District.

I could hang dozens of wonderful examples onto this framework, and I'm sure our readers could too. It is an excellent starting point that pushes us to think more creatively about how to engage anchor institutions beyond asking for a blank check. These options inevitably result in deeper, more lasting relationships that simultaneously benefit the district and the anchor over time.

University Partners with BID to Improve Brooklyn Commercial District

The partnership forged by the Myrtle Avenue Revitalization Project and Pratt Institute, a university located within the distrct, is one that I often mention when speaking about how partnerships in support of commercial district revitalization can result in a win-win for everyone. A recent NY Times article highlights the example. ["Pratt Institute Takes an Interest in Making a Neighborhood Nicer", NY Times, Feb. 15, 2011]. Pratt Institute has gone from a university that turned its back on the neighborhood to one that has made some serious investment on the corridor, whether it be in the form of leadership on the BID board or major capital investments such as Myrtle Hall (above), a $54 million building that will change the face of the district, adding vitality and most importantly, retail traffic in the form of students, on the Avenue.

New Resource for Town-Gown Issues

I just heard about an interesting new resource for communities trying to build relationships with their local educational institutions. The International Town-Gown Association was recently started by Clemson University and looks to be a good (and hopefully growing!) resource for commercial district practitioners. The site includes information best practicies and information that looks very promising.

University-Community Partnerships Are in Everyone's Interest

We recently attended the Community Preservation Corporation's Hudson Valley Main Street Summit, which featured several great presentations on revitalization efforts in Poughkeepsie, NY and elsewhere that utilize successful university partnerships. In Poughkeepsie, a local nonprofit called Hudson River Housing has leveraged the resources of nearby Vassar College to increase their capacity for commercial district revitalization while also providing an enriching educational experience for Vassar students. Most recently, a geography class at Vassar spent the entire semester working with Hudson River Housing on their Middle Main corridor, conducting a detailed property inventory and producing a library of GIS maps that will aid Hudson River Housing in future projects. This work allowed the Vassar students to view and interact with their surrounding community in a new way, practice their Spanish language skills, and gain experience working with a real-life client. This direct experience cannot be synthesized in the classroom and is immensely beneficial to everyone involved.

In addition to class projects such as this one, Vassar also runs a Field Work program that provides students with academic credit and a stipend to intern with community organizations and government agencies. As many as 500 Vassar students participate in this program in some years, many of them in the city of Poughkeepsie. Vassar also runs a free shuttle through Poughkeepsie that stops at fieldwork sites such as Poughkeepsie Middle School and the Family Partnership Center as well as downtown. According to Jeff Kosmacher, Vassar's Director of Media Relations & Public Affairs, strong community partners are the true foundations of these projects. It just may not be obvious to community organizations, such as commercial district managers, how to find the right person or department at a college to connect with. As an example, Mr. Kosmacher has compiled a list of some of the varied departments at Vassar that participate in community partnerships:

Africana Studies, Biology, Education, Geography, Hispanic Studies, Mathematics, Political Science, Sociology, the Vassar Student Association, Office of Religious and Spiritual Life, Office of Health Education, and the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center (campus museum).

If you are a commercial district manager with a nearby college or university, spend some time reaching out to different departments until you find a good fit. Tailor your efforts to match your corridor: those with ethnic restaurants, for example, are great for trips by language and cultural studies classes. Be sure to follow the academic calendar and be respectful of student timelines if you agree to do a project--it can be very difficult for students to continue a project after the semester ends. Strong community partners have a lot to offer nearby universities, and with a little effort and the right message, you can form long lasting connections that increase your capacity.

Broadening Customer Appeal in Ethnic Commercial Districts

Opening a neighborhood retail store is a common path for immigrant entrepreneurs, and these stores provide needed goods and services for both local and regional immigrant populations. In 2007, the Center for an Urban Future released a report that identified immigrant entrepreneurs as key engines of growth in cities from New York to Los Angeles, where their economic impact can be felt along thriving ethnic commercial districts that feature immigrant-owned restaurants, stores, and professional offices. In New York, vibrant examples of these districts can be seen along 30th Avenue in Astoria (Greek and Eastern European), 74th Street in Jackson Heights (South Asian), and 8th Avenue in Sunset Park (Chinese and Latino).

Some of these commercial districts have developed a popular brand identity around their ethnic retail that allows them to attract a broad range of visitors, while others are less successful in attracting customers of different backgrounds. In some cases, this can be traced to the level of individual business owners, who may need guidance or support to appeal to an expanded customer base. In one such district, a Colombian retail corridor in Elizabeth, NJ is very successful in attracting regional Colombian customers but has not been able to reach the large student population from two nearby colleges. The local merchant association on that corridor is eager to improve this situation and has identified several key steps that businesses should follow to reach a broader audience:

• Ensure that all stores have English-speaking staff, which could be met by hiring bi-lingual students from the nearby colleges. Restaurant menus should be bi-lingual and include images.

• Broaden the merchandise mix. For sit-down restaurants near the college, this means offering more take-out options; for clothing stores, this means carrying some mainstream brands.

• Market your existing merchandise to a broader customer base. Many of the Colombian restaurants specialize in fresh fruit juices and smoothies that could be very popular with college students. A simple A-frame sign to advertise these juices could have a big impact.

• Be open to trying new business models during traditionally slow hours, such as providing a café atmosphere for students looking for a place to study and have coffee between lunch and dinner. Providing free wi-fi can be another useful addition.

• Collaborate to organize events that make students more familiar with Colombian Cuisine--a "Taste-Of" tour of different corridor restaurants that shows how to best eat a tamale and find your favorite Colombian baked good.

While these steps are relatively straightforward, they show one way in which district managers can re-position any commercial corridor to increase sales: Define your niche, determine whether this niche could appeal to unmet markets, and identify barriers and opportunities to reach these markets. These steps can be tried with a few willing businesses and then expanded over time--when one store tries a new approach that produces positive results, others will quickly follow suit. As places with unique retail offerings, ethnic retail corridors are particularly well-positioned to follow this model.

If you are interested in these issues, you may want to attend the upcoming Hudson Valley Main Street Summit on Thursday, June 10th, which will feature our colleague Paul Grygiel of Phillips Preiss Grygiel speaking on a panel, "The Role of Colleges & Universities in Redeveloping Diverse Downtowns." For more information and to register, click here.

University Discount Program Hopes to Stimulate Commercial District

By John Ungar

John Ungar is Executive Director of the Mount Airy Revitalization Corporation. He has worked as a community development practitioner in Philadelphia for over 12 years.

Commercial districts need to capitalize on every competitive advantage in order to survive and thrive. Some districts are fortunate enough to be located near colleges or universities. College students can be an excellent market for several types of businesses. As reported in an earlier post (“Colleges as Partners in the Commercial District Revitalization Effort”), there are several examples of Colleges and Universities playing a major role in revitalizing nearby commercial districts.

Just outside of Philadelphia, Arcadia University is beginning to support the adjacent business district, but it is taking a different approach. Wadsworth Avenue in Philadelphia lies less than a mile away from Arcadia University, which is located in the suburban town of Glenside. Although Arcadia is very close, Arcadia students traditionally have not crossed the city line to venture on to Wadsworth Avenue. This may have been due to poor perception of the area, combined with a lack of knowledge about the businesses located on Wadsworth Avenue. In the past few years, a local nonprofit organization and elected officials have invested a lot of money in major streetscape improvements and storefront improvements along Wadsworth Avenue. This helped create a positive perception of the district among nearby residents. Businesses decided that it was time to capitalize on these improvements, and proactively market the district to Arcadia University students, staff and faculty

The Wadsworth Avenue Business Association, Arcadia University and OARC, the local community development corporation, have formed a partnership called the Wadsworth Arcadia Discounts Unbelievable Program or WADSUP - in an effort to attract both Arcadia students and staff to shop on the Avenue.

The plan is simple. Over 40 participating businesses will display an “Arcadia Students Welcome” in their storefront. These businesses offer discounts to Arcadia students and staff who show their student or staff ID. The partners determined that they would not require presenting special cards or coupons which could complicate the program, and therefore make it less appealing to students and staff. Students and staff always have their ID with them, so they can always take advantage of the discount. The hope is that this will open up a whole new previously untapped market to the business district. A program like this is simple to implement, but clearly needs the cooperation of institutional partners. In this case, Arcadia University was very eager to implement the program, and is marketing it heavily in its own publications, and created the decals. Although this program did not require a significant financial investment from Arcadia University, it still has the potential to be extremely beneficial to both local businesses and the University.