I wonder if it's also a case of there being too much of the wrong kinds of retail space.
If there's a retail store within a mile of our house, I'll happily walk to it and do my shopping there. Especially when it's a pleasant day outside, that's an enjoyable way to get out of the house and get a little light exercise.
If the only kind of store left that sells what I need is one of the big box stores, so that going there means having to get in the car and deal with traffic and haul myself halfway across town and, seriously, ugh, that is enough of a chore that I'm already feeling vaguely annoyed just thinking about it. No thanks; I'll happily order online.
And I would rather starve in the woods than drive all the way out to the nearest shopping mall.
All the stores that are walking distance from my house are:
Mobile phone stores (fake resellers)
Fast food/Chinese/pizza
Liquor stores
Gas stations
711
Laundromat
Check Cashing
etc...
None of these are stores I'd want to browse.
The alternative is the mall, which is all brand stores. Basically one big ad space. Shopping there is like running IE with 100 toolbars!
Same issue with some of the big box stores now. All are restructuring to be brand specific. Best Buy? Separated by Brand now. Want to buy a headset? Get ready to go to 6 different places and only see the the brands that paid to be there (just like with Facebook, we're the product, not the customer).
Toys'R'Us did the same thing before its death. It separated by brand. Which wasn't as bad in a toy store. I can see going shopping for Lego or Barbie more likely than going shopping for Corsair or Logitech. But it still feels based on who paid to get the space rather than making it easier for the customer.
What if your house was the shopping mall? When Sears, Macy's, JCPenny, etc all die, there's going to be a lot of shopping malls with big empty spaces. If those spaces were transformed to residential, it'd be trivial to walk to all the little shops currently between the big anchor chains, regardless of climate or season.
There are a few places by me where they've made apartments above a bunch of stores.
I'm in NY, Long Island specifically and they all get converted to Senior or Luxury apartments that cost way more than the average person can afford. But that's getting a bit off topic.
But it would be interesting to have some of those big places converted into cheap apartments. It's like you'd be getting a discount for having ads on your place of residence.
Back in the day there was more variety and more general-audience stores: small bookstores, magazine stands, maybe a mid-high end audio store, small toy store, music/video store, maybe a small pharmacy location.
Today, to put it bluntly, the stores skew heavily toward women-oriented products (clothing, accessories, underwear). Which is fine, and probably inevitable (clothing and whatnot are the kinds of things people prefer not to buy online). But there isn't of as much interest or utility for anyone else.
If there's a retail store within a mile of our house, I'll happily walk to it and do my shopping there. Especially when it's a pleasant day outside, that's an enjoyable way to get out of the house and get a little light exercise.
If the only kind of store left that sells what I need is one of the big box stores, so that going there means having to get in the car and deal with traffic and haul myself halfway across town and, seriously, ugh, that is enough of a chore that I'm already feeling vaguely annoyed just thinking about it. No thanks; I'll happily order online.
And I would rather starve in the woods than drive all the way out to the nearest shopping mall.