Dead Mall

The beleaguered Worcester Common Outlets mall has yet another new management group. Will the third team be the charm?

By Chris Kanaracus

On a recent weekday at the Worcester Common Outlets, things are . . . peaceful. That's a charitable way of saying business is dead. Through the public address system, strains of a Wagnerian fugue create a melancholy air. Shopkeepers pace slowly back and forth, arms clasped behind them, eyes full of longing. Only the food court shows any real signs of life, but that all ends by 2 p.m., leaving only a crumpled wrapper from an Au Bon Pain cheese tart and the ghosts of shoppers past.

To say the least, the Worcester Common Outlets has problems. Actually, the building itself is sort of a problem. It's huge, for one thing. At about one million square feet, plus its 4000-car garage, the building dominates central Worcester. Two, it's downtown, which has been a virtual no-man's land after dark for decades, thanks to a paucity of private residents. Three, you have to pay to park (albeit just 99 cents for up to two-and-a-half hours), unless you're lucky enough to score one of the few nearby free spots (which, maddeningly, always seem to be full, no matter the time of day). And either option means a bit of a walk: unless you live or work in the downtown area, going to the Outlets simply isn't a "drop-in" type of affair.

It's all led to plummeting sales, anemic foot traffic, and a fair number of empty storefronts. While you're not likely to see any tumbleweeds rolling down the halls, merchants within the mall are said to be so desperate for somebody, anybody to shop there, they've recently held brainstorming sessions among themselves. One such meeting reportedly yielded the notion that a glass-enclosed pedestrian walkway be built from the Worcester Medical Center directly into the mall.

Yet the fact the Outlets are so big presents another type of problem: although business is certainly down, the mall remains Worcester's largest retail venue. It employs hundreds of people. And it's one of the largest taxpayers in the city, even with the $13 million TIF, or tax-increment financing deal it struck with the city in the early 1990s.

Regardless, and in what seems a local version of the German shadenfreude, or taking delight in the misfortunes of others, for the past few years the mall has taken its share of licks at Worcester's coffee counters, on the radio, and in the press (including the Worcester Phoenix, and, in particular, this writer. See "Shop of Horrors," March 17, 2000). Most recently, Telegram & Gazette writer Dianne Williamson pounded another nail in the coffin with a December column that portrayed the mall as a wasteland-like theater of the damned, mentally ill, and truant.

Yet dreaming up ways to save the Outlets, or the "Galleria," as some still refer to it, is also a time-honored local pastime. Four proposals have come up most often: (1) convert the mall into a casino, (2) place the Voke school there. (3) Turn part of the building into office space. (4) create housing within the building. And in 1999, former city architect Daniel Benoit proposed that part of the building be razed in order to provide clear passage from Main Street to Union Station, creating a more user-

friendly downtown environment.

All good ideas on the surface. But what sometimes seems overlooked is that the city doesn't actually own the place -- the massive CIGNA Investments does. And it's not managed by Tom Hoover or Ray Mariano, either. No, as of April 1, that task falls to multi-national real estate conglomerate Jones Lang LaSalle Inc.

The $22.5 billion, multinational company is taking over for New Jersey-based Chelsea GCA, an enormous retail trust that made a few strides during its 16-month tenure, but apparently not enough to turn things around. Chelsea GCA's communications director Michelle Rothstein declined comment on CIGNA's decision to nix her company. LaSalle execs are similarly tight-lipped about their own plans, citing the newness of the situation. CIGNA isn't talking either.

While changing managers as often as a professional baseball team isn't ideal for any business, let alone a immense shopping mall, one thing is important to note about LaSalle: its background is primarily in real estate, not retail sales. Thus it's likely the company's approach will center on new, non-retail uses for the mall.

It may be the only option for CIGNA, for which the mall has been a long-bleeding wound. Not even a $50 million overhaul (which in 1994 transformed the former Galleria into its current incarnation as a fashion store outlet mall) sparked business for more than a couple of years.

Yet it must be noted that in general, urban malls are a dying breed. While some recent stabs at the concept seem to be working, such as the newish Providence Place Mall, in general most shopping these days is done at suburban palaces like Solomon Pond Mall in Berlin, or at upscale outlet centers such as Wrentham Village.

Upscale is the key word with all three examples, though. Providence Place, in particular, is home to some of the toniest brands around, such as Gucci and Armani. Such names make a mall a destination point for well-heeled shoppers. To be sure, that was the idea with the 1994 re-launch of the Outlets, and it worked for a time, with busloads of tourists flooding the mall on weekends. But then along came Wrentham, Solomon Pond, Providence Place, and an overhaul (including a new Filene's) at the Auburn Mall. With many of the same stores as the Outlets, and even more desirable ones, business in Worcester took a nosedive.

Also, it seemed that out-of-town traffic didn't provide enough cash flow for high-end stores like Mikasa, which closed last year, and Worcester's notoriously budget-conscious population wasn't about to change their buying habits.

The Outlets' woes aren't exclusive. Overall, the mall business has neared critical mass, according to one industry observer. In January, Lewis Gantman, president of the retail giant Kravco, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that the number of new malls opening annually has plummeted, from up to 50 per year during the 1980s and early 1990s, to just four or five most recently. In this light, to expect retail activity to actually grow substantially at the Outlets, or anywhere in the area, for that matter, may be a quixotic hope.

Other factors hobbling the Outlets center around its age and offerings. Built in the early 1970s, the monolithic white structure is not only imposing from the outside, but also suffers from subtle but dated design flaws. With its long, straight hallways, the mall tends to focus shoppers' vision straight ahead, rather than towards shop windows. Also, the mall's scattershot floor plan isolates many of its stores at the end of little-traveled hallways.

Contrast that with newer malls like Solomon Pond and the Natick Mall, which are built in a so-called "deflected view" format. Halls and walkways aren't straight but instead are slightly angled. The facades of upper level stores are closer to railings. The Natick Mall's layout is practically a maze. The resulting effect for the shopper, the theory goes, is a sense of being surrounded by merchandise of some kind at all times, lost in a miasma of material desire.

Mall experts also point to the need for strong "anchor" stores, things that, since the loss of the popular Filene's and Filene's Basement stores, the mall doesn't have. And potential people-magnets like the large Sports Authority franchise are banished to the far reaches of the mall.

Movie theaters are increasingly becoming mall anchors themselves. But with 19 first-run screens already in place elsewhere in Worcester, there might not be room for another megaplex. Not to mention such a thing could hurt the newly opened Bijou Cinema in the mall's basement, which shows independent and classic films.

Perhaps a complete reinvention of the mall as we know it is the only answer. While Jones Lang LaSalle and CIGNA aren't talking, based on history and available facts, we can still make some educated guesses about what they may be planning.

Turn it into a Casino!

We have to admit that not only hasn't this idea been circulating much recently, but also, some of the people that have pushed for it are credibility-challenged.

Take dubious 1999 mayoral candidate George A. Fox III. The sometime locksmith spent most of the campaign season in virtual hiding (he indeed filed election papers, but forgot to pull them in time when he lost interest in the campaign) then was outed in embarassingly detailed and salacious fashion by a Telegram & Gazette Dianne Williamson column, which dished up a number of damaging quotes from a woman who said Fox was stalking her. The column also included a partial rundown of Fox's dubious master plan for the city, which proposed a that monorail system be built from Union Station to the airport, and that the Fashion Outlets "go Vegas" with a casino, to be dubbed "Foxmore." Fox envisioned the tax revenue from a casino could be a sizable boon, and area artists could benefit from selling their works to the casino's owners.

Yet Fox was only picking up where others had gone before. The casino idea had been floated with vigor by then-state representative William J. Glodis in 1993, at a time when the mall was temporarily closed.

There are problems with the casino idea. First, casinos are currently illegal in the Commonwealth, and even efforts by local Indian tribes to build one on their own land, as with Connecticut's Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casinos, have met with heated opposition. One likely reason for the state's unwillingness to accept Indian casinos is that Massachusetts government itself already runs a large, incredibly profitable gambling operation: the Lottery.

While not referring to the Lottery's influence, state Senator Harriette L. Chandler agrees that a casino in Worcester, let alone anywhere in Massachusetts, is unlikely. "I don't think there's a chance in the world that [House Speaker Thomas Finneran] would approve of something like that," said Chandler, after she finished laughing at the question. Finneran is seen by many as perhaps the state's most powerful politician, thanks to his iron grip on leadership in the House. In other words, forget about it.

Voke?

Then there's the notion that Worcester Vocational High School could be moved from its current Wheaton Square location into the mall. City and school officials have been trying to replace the antiquated school for years, most recently at Green Hill Park. That effort is in limbo now, given a successful appeal by the grassroots Green Hill Park Coalition of a wetlands permit given the city.

On WTAG (AM 580)'s Jordan Levy Show late last year, at a time when city officials were nervously awaiting DEP law judge Bonney Cashin's decision on the wetlands appeal, a number of callers suggested that Voke be placed into the mall.

Sure. Why not? After all, according to Hoover himself, buying and preparing a parcel of land for the school could cost upwards of $30 million, the kind of scratch debt-laden and budget-pinched Worcester just doesn't have, unless, say, taxes were raised. That $30 million is the reason for the Green Hill disaster. While the School Building Assistance Act reimburses towns and cities of up to 90 percent of the cost of school construction, it doesn't provide for land acquisition.

Uh, wait a minute. Moving into the mall would require that space be either purchased or leased from CIGNA. Where's the money for that?

Don't worry about the details, according to mayor Raymond Mariano, who also serves as chairman of the School Committee. "Are you serious? There's no way. It's nowhere near big enough," snorts Mariano. "And additionally, you'd need to retrofit substantially."

Well, it was just a thought.

Transform It

It is speculated that in part, the new management team will attempt to shift the focus of the mall towards more "Worcester appropriate" tenants. Chelsea CGA managed to do that somewhat, adding a dollar store and other value-priced operations to the mall's mix. Somewhat lost in the modest wave of hype that surrounded Chelsea's arrival in 1999, though, was the notion that some of the mall's empty footage could be marketed for other uses, such as office space. At the time, it was said the Worcester Business Development Corporation would serve as a consultant.

A call placed to WBDC vice-president Craig Blais for comment on any progress with such uses was not returned by press time.

Worcester development officer Philip J. Niddrie has also said he plans to work closely with LaSalle on new uses for the mall.

Yet the idea of creating office space within the Outlets, while noble, is a little shaky. Ask any downtown commercial property owner: there's simply no shortage of vacant office space in the downtown area. The evidence is right in front of your eyes - directly across from City Hall on Front Street, just a half-block from the mall, is a sterling, street-level space that's been vacant for months. The upper floors of many of the large office buildings on Main Street are also empty. Unless CIGNA is willing to undercut lease rates that many downtown landlords have already slashed, it's hard to see why anyone would be interested in moving to the mall.

And even if they did, simply shuffling the same tenants from one building to another does nothing for the overall picture. What would be crucial, should the mall be converted to office space, would be the arrival of a completely new company to Worcester, something that's happened infrequently as of late, to say the least.

Yet some local business leaders see this as a distinct possibility. A March 10 Sunday Telegram article that discussed some of the same ideas in this piece pumped up the mall's viability as an office space. Among the positive factors cited was the garage, proximity to other downtown institutions and businesses, and the ongoing work by communications firm NEESCom to place fiber optic lines underneath many downtown streets. Currently, the company's labors have entered the mall's basement.

For sure, as the Telegram article pointed out, having high-speed Internet capability increases the value of a building. But that argument is undercut when you consider that most of downtown, not just the mall, is being hot-wired. Again, why would a prospective tenant be more inclined to move into the Outlets?

In lieu of offices, the Outlets could make one hell of a condominium or apartment complex. With its still-impressive glass-dome roof, high ceilings, escalators, and ample parking, the idea seems like a natural. Heck, we'd live there ourselves, especially with those cheese tarts in such close proximity.

It could also could tie into the ongoing rehabilitation of apartments inside nearby 50 Franklin Street. Extrapolating further, the presence of more full-time residents downtown both in the mall and around it could create a self-sustaining environment for a more modest retail operation.

There's certainly no shortage of possibilities when it comes to the Outlets. Any type of transformation, though, will cost money, and it remains to be seen if CIGNA or a buyer is willing to put it into the mall. Until then, it's likely business, or the lack thereof, will remain as usual at the Outlets.

We, sincerely hope we're wrong. While recently, City Hall has formed plans and prompted much discussion about the rebirth of downtown, limited tangible progress has yet been made. To lose something as important as the mall --shadenfreude aside -- would deal downtown a crippling, depressing blow.

Chris Kanaracus can be reached at
ckanaracus[a]phx.com.