There’s been a passionate debate in our little hamlet over the past few years about the influence of so-called “big box” stores on the retail business in quaint little San Luis Obispo, CA. Larger retailers require vastly more square footage than “Mom-and-Pop” stores and so are necessarily located on the outskirts of town. Slow-growthers contend such sprawling commercial development ultimately hurts smaller, locally-owned businesses by drawing shoppers away from the city’s commercial core. The other side says the sales tax revenue generated by these behemoths is vital to the city’s financial health.
Intuitively, the argument about the negative effects of commercial sprawl would appear to have some merit, but let’s look at what’s actually happened over just the past few months: For the most part, downtown SLO continues to bustle with activity. Shoppers, tourists, college kids, sightseers, movie-goers, gawkers, transients and business people all populate the city’s sidewalks, parks, coffee shops, restaurants and retail outlets. There appear to be few vacancies and those that do come up are soon filled.
Meanwhile, out in the malls: Circuit City, Linens and Things, Mervyn’s, Albertson’s and Gottschalks have all gone bust, closing their doors (or soon to do so), putting hundreds of people out of work and taking all that sales tax revenue with them. That’s well over 200,000 square feet of vacant commercial space. At this point, Sears (yes venerable old Sears) is the last remaining “department store” in the city of SLO. So much for the big box experiment, yet another sign of Americans' tendency to do everything to excess.
Intuitively, the argument about the negative effects of commercial sprawl would appear to have some merit, but let’s look at what’s actually happened over just the past few months: For the most part, downtown SLO continues to bustle with activity. Shoppers, tourists, college kids, sightseers, movie-goers, gawkers, transients and business people all populate the city’s sidewalks, parks, coffee shops, restaurants and retail outlets. There appear to be few vacancies and those that do come up are soon filled.
Meanwhile, out in the malls: Circuit City, Linens and Things, Mervyn’s, Albertson’s and Gottschalks have all gone bust, closing their doors (or soon to do so), putting hundreds of people out of work and taking all that sales tax revenue with them. That’s well over 200,000 square feet of vacant commercial space. At this point, Sears (yes venerable old Sears) is the last remaining “department store” in the city of SLO. So much for the big box experiment, yet another sign of Americans' tendency to do everything to excess.
No comments:
Post a Comment