Too much retail on the West Side?
Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2008 8:04 pm
Occasionally I will see someone on the LO Deck post a comment about the Cleveland area having too much retail space for the population to actually support.
I never bothered to look into this "factoid" further, but, at least according to today's Wall Street Journal, Cleveland does indeed have more retail than it can support.
Turns out that Cleveland has DOUBLE the national average of retail space for a major marketing area, and, at least for the near term-future, it is very likely unsupportable, thanks to economic and demographic trends.
The article’s forecast is depressing - one looming problem is that more local retail businesses will likely shutter their doors as the housing crisis issue and its aftermath continues to work itself out....
The article comments that the slowdown in commercial rentals (which is a tax boon to many communities, especially ones light in industry, like Lakewood), are “leaving retail-property owners with rising vacancies and slower leasing rates for new space.â€Â
If you want to read the full article, you unfortunately will have to get a copy of the dead tree version, since the WSJ walls off their online articles to non-subscribers. You can read a good summary of the piece on today's Crain's blog:
http://www.crainscleveland.com/article/ ... wsletter01
After seeing the slow growth of RR's Beachcliff shopping area, and recent vacancies in the Lakewood/RR region (i.e., fitness club River Oaks, also near Beachcliff, will likely close, according to yesterday’s PD), I wonder how similar retail developments that are planned for Lakewood will fare? Is there really too much retail on the West side?
I never bothered to look into this "factoid" further, but, at least according to today's Wall Street Journal, Cleveland does indeed have more retail than it can support.
Turns out that Cleveland has DOUBLE the national average of retail space for a major marketing area, and, at least for the near term-future, it is very likely unsupportable, thanks to economic and demographic trends.
The article’s forecast is depressing - one looming problem is that more local retail businesses will likely shutter their doors as the housing crisis issue and its aftermath continues to work itself out....
The article comments that the slowdown in commercial rentals (which is a tax boon to many communities, especially ones light in industry, like Lakewood), are “leaving retail-property owners with rising vacancies and slower leasing rates for new space.â€Â
If you want to read the full article, you unfortunately will have to get a copy of the dead tree version, since the WSJ walls off their online articles to non-subscribers. You can read a good summary of the piece on today's Crain's blog:
http://www.crainscleveland.com/article/ ... wsletter01
After seeing the slow growth of RR's Beachcliff shopping area, and recent vacancies in the Lakewood/RR region (i.e., fitness club River Oaks, also near Beachcliff, will likely close, according to yesterday’s PD), I wonder how similar retail developments that are planned for Lakewood will fare? Is there really too much retail on the West side?
