The buildings are usually often old and cheaply constructed and would probably largely need to be gutted which is probably not worth it.
But even if you contemplate just building from scratch, if a mall is dead it's probably because it's located somewhere there isn't a ton of demand. That's certainly the case with the one near me.
Some malls are thriving, but many are dead. In the city I grew up in I can name at least two that are dead or close to dead. On the other hand if you go just outside the city then there are two that are still going strong.
The dying malls are mostly in less affluent and more rural areas where land isn't in especially high demand. That's certainly the case with the one fairly near me.
Unfortunately, locally its a stereotype that they turn every dead mall's anchor store into a movie theater.
Also, locally, most dead malls die when they can no longer afford to maintain the roof, and water is pouring out of the ceiling everywhere until the occupancy permit gets yanked and leases are broken, and flooding is exactly what you don't want for books.
Shopping malls were once quite popular in the U.S. The idea was to provide city-like commerce options to people in small town America. Obviously the Internet (especially Amazon) has made this model obsolete in virtually every way possible. It's inevitable that we'll see more malls closing down over time. I'd love to see some initiative to purchase these malls and appropriate them for other purposes (office spaces, manufacturing, etc). However, it's probably not worth it in the end due to maintenance costs.
As an aside, if you haven't seen Dan Bell's Dead Mall Series you should check it out. The Rolling Acres Mall is probably the most infamous of the dead malls he has filmed and worth a watch if you're interested in urban exploration and urban decay [1].
The failure of your local mall doesn't extend to the concept of "malls are dying". As the article says:
To suggest malls are dead based on failure in failed places would be like suggesting that the manifest shortcomings of Baltimore or Buffalo means urban centers are not doing well. Like cities, not all malls are alike.
Some malls are dying, some are thriving. Antidote is not data. There is one mall I've gone to the theater in a few times in recent memory, and it is swamped, I've almost get run down by shoppers at all times of the day, weekdays and weekends. Parking takes a long time to find. That's the only time I would go to that mall. I'd never shop there. Way too many people, only the theater for me. I've also been to dying malls. I've seen a few of them die over the years and are now dead.
There are so many places where malls are thriving. A few years ago, I used to live in a different city, and at Christmas time I'd have to take a different road to work, because just driving by the mall made my commute twice as long, if not more because of the traffic. On a weekday. Taking the long way was much quicker.
We managed to save our local mall before it completely died, and now it thrives. They turned it mostly inside out, there's still halls inside but all of the popular stores now face outward so you can park right in front of them.
I think you hit the nail on the head and this is really region specific.
There was a mall next to me when I was growing up and it was dingy, just poorly maintained. Then the area became hot, Whole Foods moved in. Then Target. Then a bevy of smaller upscale retailers. Now that dingy mall is unrecognizable and filled to the brim. Not a single vacancy. Not a single open parking spot either.
Malls aren't dying. Some malls are, but that has nothing to do with the mall paradigm and has more to do with the local population. A mall can't get up and move. It's like a tree. It is where it is and it either thrives or dies.
A common theme appears to be either struggling footfall or the fact that what I guess are major US anchor stores (Maceys, Sears, KMart) going through tough times. Once the anchors move out, it becomes difficult to run the mall.
Interestingly, in one video, the Mall was half turned into offices, and it had a thriving food hall which I thought was a great idea to keep it relevant. No other dead malls in the series appear to adapt so they become ghost towns then abandoned and later demolished.
A mall is simply a privately-owned small-town urban core "Main Street". Dead malls are just dead towns, which exist because people move to newer developments when land is cheap. Big box stores still exist.
The big expensive malls are doing fine. I would never buy anything from half the stores because it's too expensive, but I guess somebody is buying.
I go there for the Lego and Apple Stores, and restaurants (Cheesecake factory isn't treeeible)
It's the smaller, lower end malls that are dead. Their anchor stores are either long gone (Sears) or on deaths door (Macy's, JC Penny), food courts are empty.
They look like flea markets inside. Random junk stores, kiosks...
Often because a much better mall was built in the area, or just completion from online shopping. As retail goes online you just don't need as many stores.
Malls take a critical mass of shoppers and stores to keep going. If not enough stores move in they can be stillborn but I assume that's really rare in the US.
The simplified reason old malls are dying is the same reason fast food restaurants remodel, and the ones that don't die.
The experience that the mall provides is the core feature. If that experience is not attractive it has no features.
New malls beat the old mall trends, and the outlet mall format adds a second feature to the mix which extends their viability time before a remodel is required.
The catch 22 is that remodeling something the size of a mall is rarely feasible.
Dying malls get liquidated and repurposed if it's economically viable otherwise they just sit there as a giant husk of "what was" because it hurts no one for them to merely exist.
Ehhh... it really depends on where the mall is located. Back home (podunk Rockford IL) malls are indeed dying. They are dilapidated and/or ghost towns. Ten years ago this was not the case.
Where I currently live (La Jolla CA) the opposite is true. Of course, the malls are filled with stores like Saks, Nordstrom, a Tesla show floor, etc. These places are packed. I know I'm not going to buy a $1200+ jacket online any time soon, so I go to the mall for high end stuff.
One of the local "dead malls" is thriving as a collection of about 3 strip malls surrounding the common parking lot. Each "strip mall" has one or two big box stores and a couple have a line of smaller stores.
Of course, the two story mall itself, with its internal hallways and rows of boutique stores, is gone.
The buildings are usually often old and cheaply constructed and would probably largely need to be gutted which is probably not worth it.
But even if you contemplate just building from scratch, if a mall is dead it's probably because it's located somewhere there isn't a ton of demand. That's certainly the case with the one near me.
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