Downtown Kalamazoo

1. Write a short evaluation of Downtown Kalamazoo's business area using specific examples from Friday's observations.

Downtown Kalamazoo had a wide variety of businesses that a attracted a pretty wide range of people. The Kalamazoo Mall Plaza is a perfect example. From yoga studios, hair salons, or jewelry store, the Kalamazoo Mall Plaza had a wide selection. Although there was a lot of variety throughout the plaza, one thing that the plaza lacked significantly were shoppers. Once we entered the plaza, the atmosphere was very vacant.

2. Give at least three recommendations to improve the downtown.

• Store displays- Some stores lacked the ability to display their name clearly; or just didn't have a name displayed outside

• One way streets- One way streets can turn out to be a hassle when finding parking, confusing for some people which could possibly affect people to shop downtown

• More recognizable businesses- A way downtown could significantly improve is by adding more recognizable stores to bring in more people. Once people are familiar with those types of stores, they will be more inclined to "shop around"
  

3. Select a brief passage from the article Robert Gibbs ("What Main Street Can Learn from the Mall" by Steven Lagerfield) or the reading on public spaces (from City by William Whyte) and relate it to Kalamazoo's downtown. Use specific observations from Kalamazoo to illustrate the point.

What Main Street Can Learn from the Mall
By: Steven Lagerfield

"The mall is a machine for shopping. In contrast, the pieces of the downtown shopping machine lie about unassembled, and in all likelihood they will never be put together in the way that they can be in a mall, with its single corporate owner. Main Street will always retain a certain redeeming randomness. But if it does not learn the ways of the shopping mall, it will not retain much economic vitality. People who care about cities, Gibbs says, should be outraged that mom-and-pop shoe-store owners renting space in a mall or a strip center enjoy the benefits of the latest thinking in retailing, while those who open for business downtown get virtually no help at all."

Although the stores that are often found downtown are not necessarily well known, they obtain a "mystery" element that may draw a shopper into the store. It is pretty obvious that the downtown atmosphere in Kalamazoo doesn't compare to the typical "mall" atmosphere. It can be said that Kalamazoo offers a lot, yet it doesn't have as many shoppers as an average mall would.