This ULI panel says retail space will change from malls to the next generation design

Implications: Now a panel empowered by the U.L.I. has declared the old EMAC dead and the future of retailing to be provided in a planned environment housing not only retail but residents and the total commercial and industrial needs of the community.  Today that seems to mean that individual retail stores will be sited next to parking n a semi freestanding environment such as Scottsdale’s Kierland Commons Plaza where the site plan is grid pattern streets with a central park or some such adaptation. 

Analysis:  No matter what the adaptation, the demographic criteria will be a minimum quarter million paying souls in close proximity.  The more GLA to be added, the more additional souls will be required.   Undoubtedly there will be a new generation of retailers to provide the goods in such an environment.  The shake-out is starting in LRTW and I notice Joseph Banks and some of the men’s haberdashers are starting to flood the e-mail.  I believe you have only to stand at the tenant boards in any good local mall to see who’s going.  I bet at least half of their retail messages are tired and the replacement is being gestated now.  That half should be gone in five to ten years and we’ll be excited by a new set of trendsetters.   The change coming in retail is the message here.  We’ve built a ton of retail space in recent years, but we’ll be replacing a ton more if we can generate personal incomes to continue our consumption patterns even if altered and the capital to finance the construction.  Both of these factors are question marks, in particular it looks like we’ll have finite capital limits as barriers in the near future.