“the spread of electronic commerce for everything from music to groceries is part of the increase in empty store fronts on shopping streets, leaving a series of Citi branches, ATT outlets, and Starbucks that repeat at regular intervals, like scenery in a Hanna-Barbera cartoon. Even when the current recession ends, it’s hard to imagine vibrant re-population of most of the empty commercial spaces, and it’s easy to imagine scenarios in which commercial districts suffer more: consolidation among pharmacy chains, an uptick in electronic banking, the end of our love affair with frozen yogurt, any of these could keep many street level spaces empty, whatever happens to the larger economy.”
The plague of empty commercial spaces in Indianapolis is a testament to our cavalier attitude towards our seemingly endless local geography. It is sickening to see every empty retail spot that isn’t sitting empty be filled by the banking industry that itself is waning and due to be replaced. All the while, new structures and strip malls pop-up a block away, because it was that block that caused those businesses to fail.
