Most suburban US malls give me the screaming heebie-jeebies. I go in if I have to, head directly to whatever my destination is, and leave as quickly as possible. I certainly wouldn't seek one out to walk in.
It's not just places like the Meadow Glen mall that bother me; the Burlington mall does too, as did the Glendale Galleria in its heyday. Even the various mall-like components of the Montreal underground have this effect. Oddly, the most notable exception is the Mall of America.
I hear you about tourism and the authentic experience. There are certainly plenty of places where a shopping district has become a tourist attraction, with varied results. The open-air Djemaa al-Fna seemed to have survived when I was last there, even though the adjacent covered souk mostly only catered to tourists. Closer to home, this is the complaint about Harvard Square (which is actually mostly doing OK, in my own opinion). Certainly, the extra traffic helps provide the economic conditions necessary to preserve the character of the place -- just having benevolent landowners, as much of Harvard Square does, is not enough.
Here's a thought for you as a tourist, though: I've had a great time seeking out the places that the locals go on vacation. This is what keeps bringing me back to Culebra. Such places tend to have terrific informal infrastructure that makes it easy to be there, and yet authentic at the same time.
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Date: 2011-01-05 03:52 am (UTC)It's not just places like the Meadow Glen mall that bother me; the Burlington mall does too, as did the Glendale Galleria in its heyday. Even the various mall-like components of the Montreal underground have this effect. Oddly, the most notable exception is the Mall of America.
I hear you about tourism and the authentic experience. There are certainly plenty of places where a shopping district has become a tourist attraction, with varied results. The open-air Djemaa al-Fna seemed to have survived when I was last there, even though the adjacent covered souk mostly only catered to tourists. Closer to home, this is the complaint about Harvard Square (which is actually mostly doing OK, in my own opinion). Certainly, the extra traffic helps provide the economic conditions necessary to preserve the character of the place -- just having benevolent landowners, as much of Harvard Square does, is not enough.
Here's a thought for you as a tourist, though: I've had a great time seeking out the places that the locals go on vacation. This is what keeps bringing me back to Culebra. Such places tend to have terrific informal infrastructure that makes it easy to be there, and yet authentic at the same time.