Crocker Park Snake Oil? Crack-errrrr Park?

[Jim O'Bryan]

I was sitting around this morning thinking about how we had been dragged once again in the the talk of regionalism and what we are missing as a city. We all think Lakewood is a great place to raise a family but those that do not live here are always willing to tell us how bad we have it or come in the night and steal our valuables.

So let me ponder out loud.

If Crocker Park, which I go to, is all that it was cracked up to be why would Developer Bob Stark have to constantly fuel the fire? If Crocker Park was an unbridled success, would there even be time to plot to steal your neighbors jewels? Wouldn't theater companies be beating down doors to get into the fancy strip mall? From everything I have heard it was Bob Stark that popped the question. Will you tun your back on your family for a little augmentation and bling?

It also made me wonder if the entire "Regional Scam" is nothing more than hollow buzzwords, the new "fondue." Would not bob Stark be just as desperate to bring legitimacy to Crocker Park? Wouldn't developers instead of cities become the new leeches and parasites, that come into our hollar and take the little bit of bling we have been able to build over the years.

A quick drive or walk through Legacy Village would show that these glorified open air mall are following the same time line of success of most open air malls in northern climates. Right now 3 empty stores with at least 5 others going out of business moving or closing it's door when then can. Business that are within walking distance of Crocker Park looking to get away from it, as their prices have soared while their business has not. While other stores count the minutes to their leases being fulfilled.

Is creating a mall like taking a hit on the crack pipe. It makes you feel good and powerful for a couple minutes than you have to feed the habit again and again and again. Each little store being like a single crack rock that makes the eyes sparkle and dream for just a second while it is lit, then forgotten as the pipe(mall) and pipe holder(developer/city) is forced to search for another and another.

At the same time we know that these areas, most near exit ramps of freeways allow perfect opportunities for crime and getaways. They also become hotbeds for car theft, muggins, drugs, shoplifting, etc. Do they really add more to a community, or like and over abundance of section 8, tax the communities service groups?

Are malls and even mixed-use-areas really a cure or a cancer?

I am not sure how many of you have been in a crack house. I have been to rescue a friend from the eastside that took up pipe. His wife called because he had not been home in a week, he had forgotten about his family, friends and business, just focusing the next rock. It was very strange and troubling. Like sitting around with vultures whose eyes we always focused on the floor, looking for the crumb another "friend" had dropped. One of the saddest thing I have ever seen in my life.

Random thought on a Satruday morning.


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[Joan Roberts]

No charge for the analysis, but I recommend you take a nice walk on a beautiful Saturday morning on the spectacularly leafy and homey streets of Lakewood, and forget about Crocker Park entirely.

I think the world is divided into three camps. The ones who will ONLY visit a sanitized (better word than "faux") environment like CP, the ones who will actively AVOID such environments, and the ones who see the Crocker Parks and Legacy Villages AND the Lakewoods and Little Italys as part of the grand salad bar of American retail.

Lakewood will never appeal to the first group, so you-know-what 'em. For the second two, we need to be the best we can be. That means clean sidewalks, safe streets, attention to the fact that thugs and boarded-up storefronts are a turn-off to EVERYONE, promotion of the good things (you're doing a heckuva job on that), and, officially or no, encouraging more of what makes sense for a legacy, inner-ring community.

It doesn't mean wearing rose-colored glasses about our frankly tenuous place in the universe, or, God love you, taking things personally.

Enjoy that walk. It's on a morning like this that Lakewood shows its best face of all.

[Jeff Endress]

Oby One

It's a beautiful day in the 'wood. The sun is shining and the birds are singing.

I would suggest that you do the following:

1) Take a walk, just around the block, greeting neighbors as you go;
2) Upon returning, crack open that Emerald Canyon Pale Ale I gave you, pour it into a frosty glass;
3) Go out to your front porch, pull up your favorite lounger;
4) spend 30 minutes breathing deeply, contemplating the canyon.


I promise the demons will be banished, at least temporarily.

Jeff

[Charyn Varkonyi]

For myself, I choose not to spend too much time caring about the neighbors. I worry about tending to my home, taking care of the garden, the weeds, the leaky pipe...

I dont know that there is much to be gained by ruminating about these pseudo-cities. To understand their attraction is, I suppose, worthwhile... but in the end.. I simply dont care about Crocker Park.

I believe that as long as we are the best that we can be, things will sort themselves out.

Maybe its too simplistic, but then there is something to be said for simplicity.

FFT -

~Charyn

[Jim O'Bryan]

OK OK

I took the walk with the wife. I worked on my cars for a little bit. sat back and enjoyed Formula One Qualifying over lunch.

I am working on the paper and it's my favorite issue, cause everyone, and I mean everyone is in it. When I look at the names on this list and think how much everyone has helped in one way or another, it makes me feel great.


peace

[ryan costa]

Let us assume it is positive for Crocker Park to be interested in hosting the type of activities associated with the Beck Center.

How can they accomplish this in a manner consistent with their niche?

I suggest they begin by trying to attract a Chuck E. Cheese. Chuck E. Cheese recruits a menagerie of competent performers, and they work cheap.

[Tim Liston]

Speaking of cheese....

Have you seen Cheesecake Factory's stock price lately?

Check it out here.

Doesn't bode well now does it......

[DougHuntingdon]

doesn't look as bad from this angle

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=CAKE&t=my&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=

are you just jealous that we don't have one in Lakewood?

Doug

[ryan costa]

cheesecake doesn't grow on trees....it grows on factories.

Are they affiliated with the Spaghetti Warehouse?

My favorite cheesecake grows on the legs of cheerleaders over summer vacation.

The Cheesecake Factory was the first restaurant chain to make revenues of over a billion dollars with fewer than 100 restaurants. This was accomplished by using only cheese from the milk of Yaks trained in chinese algebra and given daily lectures in philosophy.

[Bryan Schwegler]

As has been mentioned before, there will always be some people diametrically opposed to something like Crocker Park and other chain stores, there will be those who will only shop there, and some in the middle.

I'm one of the middle people. Unfortunately, there are stores I like to shop at that are just not located in Lakewood. I like Banana Republic, I like Gap, and I like large bookstores. Heck, they're even opening an Apple Store at Crocker Park. I like to eat at the Cheesecake Factory, love the Tiramisu cheesecake.

Lakewood just doesn't offer anything like those places. Now there are of course other Lakewood establishments that I visit often because thre's nothing like them at Crocker Park, Legacy Village, etc.

The key is to learn to live with both, neither is going away.

[Jim O'Bryan]

Bryan

Of course you are right about some of those things. My dislike of places like Crocker Park and Legacy Village is waaaaaaaaay over stated. I often go to Borders at Crocker Park, and I am addicted to the Apple Store at Legacy Village. But I also love the short drive to Crocker and the longer ride to Legacy Village as a great time to get away, think or talk with friends.

The reason I started this thread was more to point out that crime is everywhere and that when people speak of the great reasons for bringing malls to Lakewood they generally leave out things like crime, that malls attract. I am sure the drug busts and the recent kidnapping multiple rape of a woman at Crocker Park was more crimes of oportunity, than Crocker Park's fault. While Bob Stark is looking to bring arts and realism to his town in the field, I doubt that he planned the drug busts and rape.

But again these are crimes of opportunity brought on by the ease one can get on and off the freeway, and the fact that the "town" is mostly patroled by Security Guards.

But I would not be so sure they are not going away. While I shop at apple for everything Apple, if it is more than a couple hundred I prefer MacMall and the savings of no tax, things that are not just Apple, and convience. For the past 5 years internet sales have grown at about 300% a year, this will have a huge impact on these malls. With your favorite cheesecake, and a little planning, you could have a whole one, or and assortment of slices in 12 hours, at nearly the same price, actually less if you figure in time and gas. This is already happening in both Crocker Park and Legacy Village where tenents are looking to get out of their leases that are three times what they are just ten block outside of these "towns."

Also I would not be so sure it will never happen here in Lakewood without many large changes in our footprints. Two plans that have taken much of my thought process lately would see Lakewood rise to exactly what you are speaking of. I believe one could happen in as little as two months if all the problems could be worked out. This would see a fairly large well known store come to Lakewood, and fit themselves into what we have here, ala Legacy Village. I am sure you realize that any Apple store would fit into many spots in Lakewood if like Breadsmith they took two or three storefronts.

The insanity is, Stark and others come to Lakewood to copy the feel, look and footprints of Lakewood, because they see it as a perfect place, and want to replicate it in fields of dreams. But no one in Lakewood can see it or believe it. NO ONE. To me it is a cross between the low self esteem of a beaten woman, and the fact that Clevelanders NEVER go to the top of the Terminal Tower no matter how beautiful the view is. The simple fact it is cheaper to develop than redevelop. Not better, just cheaper.

While Stark prepares to offer "magic beans" for Beck's art cow, just to acquire their land in Lakewood, we all look west and take our eyes off the prize we call Lakewood, and they call their future.

Wake up, coffee is now being served to those that want it.

peace

[Bryan Schwegler]

For the past 5 years internet sales have grown at about 300% a year, this will have a huge impact on these malls. With your favorite cheesecake, and a little planning, you could have a whole one, or and assortment of slices in 12 hours

That's true, and I'm a huge user of internet shopping...heck I even signed up for Amazon Prime if that tells you how much I order online. I think that all of Christmas shopping has been done that way for the last few years at least.

Problem is that Internet shopping will never replace retail brick and mortar for two simple reasons:

1. People like to try on clothes to see look and feel, and that can be said about many products people purchase.
2. Many people like instant gratification. Sure I can order a cheesecake and have the next day (if I pay $15 extra for overnight shipping) but what if I want it NOW?! (boy I sound like someone from Willy Wonka ).

Also I would not be so sure it will never happen here in Lakewood without many large changes in our footprints. Two plans that have taken much of my thought process lately would see Lakewood rise to exactly what you are speaking of. I believe on could happen in as little as two months if all the problems could be worked out. This would see a fairly large well known store come to Lakewood, and fit themselves into what we have here, ala Legacy Village. I am sure you realize that any Apple store would fit into many spots in Lakewood if like Breadsmith they took two or three storefronts.

I completely agree. I would love nothing more than to see Apple open a store here, Banana Republic buy a few storefronts, or Borders to come in a open a multi-story store. I think all could be done tastefully and in an "authentic" town. The biggest issue I see is that for today's retail model to succeed, they would need to be located close together (proximity) to drive enough traffic. Lakewood would need to establish a central retail district, not miles and miles of sporadically populated store fronts.

And of course the bane of any large or super-successful retail outlet in Lakewood is parking.

Solve those problems and I think we have a goldmine. No need to build a fake mixed-use town, it's right here.

[Jim O'Bryan]

And of course the bane of any large or super-successful retail outlet in Lakewood is parking.

Bryan

Let me take these on one at a time with the big one first.

Are you so sure?

Parking is a red herring used to secure lots for land banking.

Let's examine...

What was your last nightmare parking problem in Lakewood?

How many people do you see in the Apple store buying at a time?

The worst parking in Lakewood that I know of is Phoenix Coffee between 8:30am and 10:00am The place is packed with Lakewoodites supporting the award winning blends of one of Lakewood's two Lakewood owned coffee shops.

In one of our fact finding missions(yes unlike what has been suggested in another thread, Observers do like to check facts) we traveled to the big box of all big box stores WalMart at the edge of the promised land from the 60s Great Northern. We had to park 53 spaces down and 43' away from the front door. This is equal to about a block and half in Lakewood. I will agree that one feels "at Walmart" when they hit the driveway, but let's be fair about "convenience."

Now let's look at what we throw away for that parking spot? A bike lane? A friend/neighbor that pays taxes? A pocket park? Can the house tax/income tax EVER be equaled with meter earnings? Or other taxes on the business that got the parking? I would love to see the numbers on this.

The parking lot that was being built between "World Class Baseball Facility" and "World Class Druken Punch Palace" on Edwards and Detroit, would have been a HUGE loss for the city. Two two-family homes in exchange for a lot that cost $135,000 to build and would have taking in "as much as $2,500 a year."

Is driving to the Apple store 9 times out of ten such HELL, that we throw out a neighbor or a tax a loss? Does not the short ride to the land of Tiramisu make the flavor that much better? Does not the short ride home make the taste in the mouth last even longer until you get home and wash/brush it out?

It has always seemed to me that Lakewood reaches for delusional dreams. How many Big Box stores can you fit in a city, and have them all convenient to everyone? In an attempt to do this how many of those walking distance shoppers do we force out that move ninto the "City in the Field of Dreams"?

Statistics would prove you and me to be very selfish dreamers. While we want an Apple store in Lakewood 93% would rather it be a Dell store or Microcenter. While you yearn for a Cheesecake factory, Joan yearns for an Applebees, Ryan wants a Spaghetti Factory with the algebra teaching yaks, and I want to see the next start up restaurant that will become Applebees (let's not forget a Lakewood family started their empire here), and now a Dell, MicoCenter, Apple and we have only started the massive build out of Lakewood.

Where does this get us? In the end lower taxes, maybe, and the chance to be another shopping district in a county of shopping districts all competing for dwindling shopping dollars in a country with gas soaring and incomes falling. Am I wrong or is this race to the bottom not madness?. Retail vs residents always reminds me of the two guys on the desert island in the cartoons. When they look at each other one sees cheesecake, the other see mediocre nachos(sorry Joan). Neither one sees a pack of seeds or the boat to get off the island. Narrow bandwidth thinking. Instant gratification and not one thing more.

What if, if we had a chance to dream, one could design an alternative to the sea of Tiramisu. What if one city, concentrated on being the best place to LIVE instead of just another place to spend. What if one area decided that it would be the best place to raise a family, with parks, schools, safe, clean streets. What if this area could be nestled between lakes, canyons, and easy access freeways. What if this dream city could be convenient, 10 minutes from downtown, 10 minutes from shopping, golf, boating, horse and bike riding. What if we had the chance to make it 10 minutes from the airport and train station, just far enough that the planes are not a HUGE sound problem? What if, and I know I am over reaching, the city had an active nightlife, food, a world class library and an energized group of citizens? As I am overboard already let's throw in brand new schools, and a massive health/exercise facility. What if in this silly little dream we had the arts, 3 recording studios, 7 stages, and call me selfish a newspaper that supported these efforts. Now in an effort to be a total glutton what if i could fit all of this in a walkable footprint of say 6 square miles, and place it in the most live-able area of the country! Would this not be something to behold? Something people would move to be part of? A great place to eat that cheesecake you brought home with you.

But let's be honest what is the chance of that dream every coming true in our lifetime. You and me, we are stuck in Lakewood. Damn!

Low self esteem is a far worse problem in Lakewood than parking will ever be.

Coffee still being served, no need for Koolaid in paradise.


peace



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[Bryan Schwegler]

Jim,
You make some good points and what I'm saying is people shouldn't be surprised that some, like me, would rather drive out to Crocker Park to shop than do so locally. As a matter of fact, I just got home from spending over $400 there today, money I can't spend in Lakewood. Lakewood doesn't have what I want.

I certainly wasn't saying that I wanted to tear people's housing down to build parking lots. I was pointing out that if people are so upset because people like me spend so much of our tax dollars outside of Lakewood, they need to examine what it would take to keep it here.

As for number of people in the Apple Store, I've been there with a good 30 - 40 people at a time. Sure, your'e right, in most parking lots, you'll park the equivalent of a block or more away. Problem is, side streets in Lakewood are already full with cars (I believe there's a thread or two around here complaining about it) and be honest with yourself, if a few hundred more people starting coming here to shop and would actually park a few blocks away, how long do you think it would be before the neighbors would complain about the disruption to their quiet neighborhood?

Problem is there is no solution to this without fundamentally changing the way Lakewood operates. I'm not saying I'm for that, but just that the reality is, 90% of the time, I can't spend my money here and I'm sure I'm not alone. People should not get so upset about it.

Lakewood can be one of the best places to live in from a residential standpoint, but from a retail standpoint, it's lacking. We need to choose what we want. However, if the choice is to be a residential paradise, then there's no point in attacking the "faux" city of Crocker Park and others which provide the retail side of what people like me need.

I get what's good about Lakewood, it's why I live here. But I also accept its shortcomings. We can't have everything, but we can make it the best of both. Lakewood has strong residents and not much popular retail. Crocker Park has alot of retail and no residents. I think both can coexist.

I guess my issue is with those who would paint people like me as the "anti-Lakewood" simply because I choose to shop at stores where Lakewood is either unwilling or unable to have here.

Honestly, I don't want to see a BestBuy, Applebees, or a Cheesecake Factory here. But could there be a few more popular retail places here, sure. I still think my favorite would be the Borders.

[Danielle Masters]

I'm not saying I'm for that, but just that the reality is, 90% of the time, I can't spend my money here and I'm sure I'm not alone.

That does surprises me because we do 75% of our shopping here in Lakewood. On a regular basis about the only thing we do not by in Lakewood is clothing. When we buy big ticket items like furniture we don't even shop in the state. Sure buying in Lakewood isn't always as easy as going into one store and buying everything we need in one quick stop but for me that isn't a big deal. I like smaller stores, I think the customer service tends to be better and to me that is what matters. I know that not everyone thinks like us, but enough do and that's just one of the things I like about Lakewood.