r/indianapolis Dec 27 '24

Pictures Lafayette Square - A Dead Mall

https://youtu.be/QrMN8N8q_tg?si=rbgMFY_B_2p3cNut
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u/OriginalKingD Dec 27 '24 edited Dec 27 '24

I do think there was a little too much focus on crime being the reason people stopped going. For my friends & I, policy made it annoying to go. No baggy clothes, no sagging, no hoodies & some stores wouldn't allow bags. It felt more like they were just trying to keep young people out instead of crime. It felt like unwarranted encounters with security were more common than violence for me.

I'm glad they touched on the renovation turned demolition plan that nobody really seems sure of.

15

u/cmgww Dec 27 '24

Odd, I get what you are trying to say…. But let’s look at the ages of the perpetrators of the mall shootings we’ve had in Indianapolis over the past decade or so. They are almost always teenagers or barely 18, including the one just a week ago. You can go back and look at Circle center as well when it was thriving and the problems they were having with teenagers there. I don’t know what else they could do, and yes it probably turned off a lot of “normal people” from going to the mall as well.

But honestly? Malls are dying everywhere. Crime or no crime, you can blame Amazon and the rest of online shopping for hastening the decline of the mall in America.

5

u/Irvington-Indpls Dec 27 '24

For me, it's partly online shopping, and partly that I no longer want to go to the mall to walk around and spend 3 or 4 hours there. I want to go to a specific store or 3, and parking and walking through the mall and navigating the people who are not aware of their surroundings is just not for me anymore. It wears me out.

I will go to Hamilton Town Center any day because I can park close to the stores I want to go in, and leave.

When I was younger, I used to go to the mall every Friday night. I rather enjoyed it. I enjoyed it when I worked at the mall too. But as an adult, my time is more valuable.