Buffalo Rising Online

I couldn't agree more with Queenseyes. I was downtown walking Main St. a few weeks ago and the thing that really struck me (other than the lack of people) was how long the pedestrian mall is. Its far too long right now. They should add cars to certain sections making it much shorter, but keep the pedestrain mall in a smaller area.

I agree that there are certain sections of the pedestrian mall that would probably be fine with traffic. On the whole though, this belief that putting cars on Main will make Main viable for retail is misguided. Plenty of cities that have cars on their "main street" have little or no retail. The problem is demographics and shifting trends in retail. Malls and retail consolidation killed downtown retail. Those trends started long before the pedestrian mall.

Only cities with enough downtown residents or enough tourists still have it. Bring the people and you'll bring retail. Cars are completely incidental. The pedestrian mall has to be more inviting than it is today. An overwide expanse of concrete with no trees or plants is not inviting to people. Make the mall an asset and not a liability. Have events, nightlife, restaurants and those things will bring the people and vibrancy. Cars will not.

Have you tried walking the 700 Block of Main at Night? It's very creepy. Wild trees that are so low you have to duck your head when passing them, and so out of control they block what little light their is making it so dark and creepy, especially if your walking alone.

Main Street is most upsetting to me. It looks and feels like a real city during the day, M-F, but just like GDC said, if you've ever walked down their at night, it's beyond creepy. I've come home from covering Sabres games, long after fans and pedestrians have left the vicinity, and it is SHAAAAAAADDYYYY. If the city/state doesn't want to start moving a bit more agressively, they might as well sell out and start filming horor films down there.

Main Street is most upsetting to me. It looks and feels like a real city during the day, M-F, but just like GDC said, if you've ever walked down their at night, it's beyond creepy. I've come home from covering Sabres games, long after fans and pedestrians have left the vicinity, and it is SHAAAAAAADDYYYY. If the city/state doesn't want to start moving a bit more agressively, they might as well sell out and start filming horor films down there.

Even on Sunday afternoons, Main Street looks like a scene from 'I Am Legend' with the run down Main Place Mall, Former AM&A's, 500 Block Mess and so on. and not a living Soul in sight.

"Department type stores failed all over WNY BEFORE the start of construction of the pedestrian mall" .... actually when they started building the mall, there were quite a few dept stores downtown.i.e. AM&A's , Hens&Kelley, Berger's , Klienhans.?.

Automobiles may not provide a great direct benefit to businesses on the street, but it will provide a feeling of life which random trollies do not. The point is that you want to be on a street that feels alive, cars, honks and all the negatives that go along with the auto, actually make a street alive, which would be nice for Main Street. Have a street with sidewalks and trollies and sidewalks serving the buildings, traditional city transportation that has proven its muster. Don't make traffic passable on certain sections of the street, then it just continues to be a disjointed mess, restore the street grid as much as possible.

I've never understood what unique benefit was supposed to come from removing cars from Main Street. There's no need to remove cars in order to run trains on the street, as cars and trains share the road other places. And I don't see how it improves the pedestrian experience either, as Main is wide enough to accommodate traffic and broad sidewalks at the same time. It's nuts.

I never understood why Buffalo even considered putting in a Pedestrian Mall while other U.S. Cities were TEARING Thiers up because the whole concept did not work. It killed other downtowns but, Buffalo forgot to do it's famous "STUDIES" for this one.

Main St is an absolute abomination. There is no hope for Buffalo at all.

I believe construction of phase 1 of the mainstreet project is to begin in a week or two

When 1st reading that the re-construction of the 500 block (the one way section) I thought, who cares, that is so minor. However after thinking about this for a bit I realized that this little block changed to two way traffic will make a big difference. I generally don't go down main if I'm going to the 33, because you have to divert to Pearl before you can get there. Basically I think that lots of people avoid this end of Main for the same reason. Once you get past Virginia, you really don't have much option of where you can go. Hopefully this little change will make a big change in the way people drive on Main Street. While I live in the city, and don't need to hit the 33 that often, many others do not. Connecting this end of Main to the Theater district with this one little block could add lots more traffic to Main with all of the suburbanites needing somewhere to park when going to Shea's etc. This increase of traffic can only help any businesses that are there.

Also, Maybe I'm the only one around that thinks this, but I really like the way this area looks. The theater district on Main looks pretty cool. Problem is, lots of people think that Shea's main entrance is the ugly back entrance on Pearl. Seriously, no joke. There are lots of people that drive down the 33, park somewhere on Pearl and walk in / out from there on Pearl and drive home, never seeing the beautiful entrance on Main. God no wonder why the suburbanites thing Buffalo is ugly, they just don't know they are in the wrong spot.

Our hope for the future of Main Street (and downtown) rests solely on attracting corporations to the area. We need to bring in large corporations that hire hundreds and thousands of people. You know the greedy and money hungry predators that many of us hate, we need them! We need another large employer like HSBC in the Main Street corridor, not a small boutique that employees 8 and attracts 30 people from the suburbs. I am not saying that the boutique isn't nice and needed, I am saying that it insufficient in bringing real change to downtown.

Adding a few lofts to attract a few residents is great, but again this isn't going to bring real change to the area. We need to get past the idealism and deal with reality. Buffalo needs a strong highway infrastructure, low cost utilities, and corporate welfare to bring companies to the area. We need to make Buffalo more attractive than Memphis and Nashville, more attractive than Raleigh, NC and Fairfax, VA. We are a long way off from making this happen. These municipalities actively campaign to recruit corporate expansions and relocation in ways that we cannot even fathom. We are worrying about the wrong things here, we are condemning parking lots while we should be working on incorporating them into a master plan for urban renewal. Stop turning up your noses at highways and vacant lots and look to them as true opportunity instead. Stop living the idealistic dream that someday we will all be riding buses and bicycles and understand that people drive cars for a reason. There is safety, security, and flexibility offered by personal vehicles, something that is often lacking in public transportation and bicycles.

What is Buffalo doing to bring in more corporations? not much! What is Buffalo doing to attract military and defense contractors to the area? Not much (as we just lost 2 contracts to Tennessee). What is Buffalo doing to partner with the surrounding suburbs? Not much.

Let's look at it this way. If you were a business owner shopping for a location to expand and build, what would you think of Buffalo? Would you, as a business owner, willing choose to locate resources in Buffalo, given the current conditions? Would you be willing to risk the unionization of employees, the increases to taxes imposed by the state, the unfavorable utility and labor costs? Would you be impressed by your vision of Buffalo as you are driven in from the Airport or from one of the suburbs? What would you think when your guide showed you the HSBC Center and said, this is the best office space that we have in Buffalo? When you realize that your company is going to be almost solely responsible for the economic growth of the area? That attracting talent typically means looking from outside of the area and relocating them to Buffalo.

We can debate pedestrian malls, traffic patterns, and small loft projects, but we really need to evaluate how our perceptions of business and what it means to the area. What are we doing to make Buffalo the most attractive place for business in America. We need to learn to embrace large corporations, love the profits of Exxon and Walmart, and do what we can to bring these companies and their jobs to the area. I know that this isn't the "Elmwood Ideal" but it is reality.

great post ALLFIT. pretty much sum it all up.

Hertel and Elmwood are vibrant retail destinations because of the people that live there. It isn't the cars. People in the neighborhood walk to the stores and bars. Again, the cars are completely incidental. As more people move in and around downtown it will become more viable as a location for retail. I see Chippewa bleeding down to and over Main Street and up to Genesee gateway. Just give it time. The pedestrian mall section of Main St at the Hyatt has the potential to be the place to be downtown. With people moving in and more projects in the plans it is misguided to put cars back now instead of spending the money to make the pedestrian mall an inviting place.

I just got back from Israel. Jerusalem has a rocking pedestrian mall filled with bars and sidewalk cafes. There is no reason that Main at Genesee couldn't be the same.

Below Court Stree maybe cars make sense.... I agree that the mall is certainly too wide, too long, too dated and too sterile.

Hertel and Elmwood are vibrant retail destinations because of the people that live there. It isn't the cars. People in the neighborhood walk to the stores and bars. Again, the cars are completely incidental. As more people move in and around downtown it will become more viable as a location for retail. I see Chippewa bleeding down to and over Main Street and up to Genesee gateway. Just give it time. The pedestrian mall section of Main St at the Hyatt has the potential to be the place to be downtown. With people moving in and more projects in the plans it is misguided to put cars back now instead of spending the money to make the pedestrian mall an inviting place.

I just got back from Israel. Jerusalem has a rocking pedestrian mall filled with bars and sidewalk cafes. There is no reason that Main at Genesee couldn't be the same.

Below Court Stree maybe cars make sense.... I agree that the mall is certainly too wide, too long, too dated and too sterile.

ALLFIT for Mayor. GREAT post, my friend. Sometimes people need to hear the grim reality and stop living in the past. I generally hate it when people post scrolls of commentary, but I'm not gonna lie, that was definitely a well thought out, captivating bit of conversation.

You've got my vote!

All wonderful pie in the sky ideas but retailers follow money. Just saying bring in Nordstrom doesn't mean it is going to happen. Do you really think all Nordstrom is waiting for is an invitiation from Buffalo? If only. AND, when and if they ever do come rest assured they'll be at the Galleria and not downtown.

Indianapolis has done a better job that Buffalo with urban planning to be sure but it is also the state capitol with all the jobs and money that brings. Indiana is basically a one city state. If you do business in Indiana and you need an office there then you are in Indianapolis. In NY it could be NYC, Albany, Rochester, Syracuse or Buffalo...

Finally, Indiana is a much more pro business state then NY. Foreign automakers build plants there because they don't have as big of a problem with unions or needless state bureaucracy. Buffalo is perfect for one of these plants. It has skilled workers, transportation network, water and electricity. Yet Buffalo is never considered for one of these plants because of the stranglehold of unions on the workforce and the legislature.

Just saying Buffalo needs to lure a big company headquartersfrom out of town to downtown isn't going to make it happen. Only a few of those moves take place every year and they certainly aren't coming to Buffalo. The city and the state need to do a better job of cultivating the businesses that are here because luring one in is pretty unlikely.

Think of Dell. That is a company that went from a dorm room business to employing 15,000 people in all types of jobs in Austin. There could be one of those in Buffalo right now and we need to do everything we can to make sure it grows and stays in WNY.

I live and work in the city as well, but let's be serious- no matter how you break it down, downtown Buffalo is an utter failure. All these condos and lofts are cool, but unless you make 150k-plus per year, chances are they are just going to be cool to talk about and glance at from an outsider's perspective. Transit and Niagara Falls Blvd are in essense this region's downtown. Face it.

1. It'd be nice to lure more companies to Buffalo, but that wouldn't do much for Main Street. Downtown is chock full of people during the day, and yet business on Main Street is iffy at best.

2. Retail is a sign of economic strength, not its cause.

3. It's possible to "bring in" retail, but it'd be massively expensive. Look at Bass Pro -- it took a decade of haggling, big subsidies, and the creation of a nearby public attraction to get them onboard. Whatever you think of the wisdom of subsidizing retail, it's clear that this kind of effort can't be repeated again and again.

4. Burlington's mall is nice, but not really comparable to ours. Theirs was built specifically for people, rather than as an afterthought to a train. They also located their state university just up the street from the mall, and they have a waterfront that's easily accessible just down the street.

I don't believe that transposing Transit Road in Clarence, or Niagara Falls Boulevard in Amherst is going to bring life to downtown. I don't believe that Hertel Ave and Elmwood are exactly thriving meccas for local shoppers. The store owners on the city's two main retail strips struggle and suffer. Very few are pulling in profits and personal wealth (the reason that most people go into business) as store owners in other areas of the metro region. You can look down your nose at chain stores as being overly homogenized, anti-American giants that are created for the sole purpose of tromping on the hopes and dreams of the little store owners, but that isn't reality. You can imagine a world of little boutiques where everyone knows your name and has exactly what you need, but that isn't reality either, even when it was a popular 1950s TV image.

Buffalo needs jobs that are created by corporations. We need a heavy retail presence by the waterfront to create a destination that may bring people to the City more than once a year. When it comes to retail on Main Street, I believe that the city may have part of this equation correct. If you look at the three primary destinations for downtown, they are HSBC Arena, Dunn Tire Park, and the Waterfront (soon to be Bass Pro and other retail). By replacing the Aud and the Donovan Building, we create enough space to add retail shopping and chain restaurants that are attractive to the non-Elmwood set. In many cities, Cheescake Factory, PC Changs, Melting Pot, Maggianos Little Italy, McCormick and Schmick, and Kobe are destinations. Imagine the impact to that area of the city if you added a mall destination where the Aud is. Extend the smaller, home grown retail towards the Casino, which will probably be the fourth destination for people.

My point is that instead of focusing on what could have been the Main Place Mall, or outdated buildings along Main Street, we should focus our retail energies on the new waterfront district. Spread out from there. That way the renters of our quaint little loft projects will have a place to bring people if they visit.

As far as the discussions about Chippewa Ave, that strip is limited in purpose at the present time. I imagine that some of the bars that cater to a more mature crowd may move closer to the Arena and waterfront once the opportunity presents itself.

I would like to see the waterfront project fast tracked, and would like to see the City offer incentives for retailers and restaurateurs to relocate their shops to this area. Make it worthwhile for people to come to Saturday Sabres games, or events at the waterfront, make it a multi-functional destination. Imagine the impact that this would have on a business owner who visits downtown if s/he actually saw people, especially on the weekends.

I find it interesting that we all talk about the Baltimore Waterfront, the Cleveland waterfront, changes to Downtown Indianapolis and Columbus, Minneapolis, and Providence, but we fail to mention that these projects are very limited. Travel a few blocks outside of the epicenter for these projects and you will see cities that look a lot like Buffalo. The good thing for these cities is that growth and development is spreading from the epicenter, while we are still stuck on a scatter shot approach. Let's learn something from these cities and work to make one major destination in Downtown Buffalo as our first development priority. Make our attractiveness to corporations our primary economic priority, and focus our funds and resources on developing the areas of the city that stand a chance in surviving on their own (sorry East Side).

I get what you are saying but Indianapolis has 780,000 residents. The metropolitan area has 2,000,000. That is twice the size of Buffalo. The median income is $42,000 and the city is growing. The comparisons to present day Buffalo really aren't there.

I share your frustration that just a paltry few of the Niagara Falls tourists visit Buffalo. It is a missed opportunity. I just don't think that a mall with the same stores they have at home, be it in the city or the suburbs is enough of a draw to bring them down. Even the Rainbow Mall practically at the brink of the falls couldn't do it.

Canalside might have the diversity to do it if there is enough other things to do like a weather museum. I am all for it and there will certainly be national retailers there. That is why it has to be done right. The Skyway needs to go and there has to be a link to the outer harbor. There has to be a mix of activities.

I just think this sort of well we want them so they will come mentality or that they were steered to instead of chose the Galleria is silly. Retailers go where the market is. The word is demographics.

"Why not put a mix of local and national stores in canalside?"

Who is doing the "putting" in this statement? And how are they doing it? National retailers decide for themselves where to locate a new store -- nobody "puts" them anywhere. We know the kind of time, effort and money it's takes to get just one national retailer to locate downtown. That's not the kind of thing that can (or should) be easily repeated.

Again, retail is a sign of economic strength, not its cause. If some fancy chain restaurant located downtown, that might make us appear more affluent, but the result would be profits leaving the area. Better to keep those profits in the hands of locals like Croce, Brinkworth, Goldman, etc. The relative lack of chains is actually a strength of ours, as more of what little money we have stays local.

Canadians are coming to Buffalo to shop because the currencies are at par. Do you think it'll always be that way or that retailers will plan their expansions based on that?

Rainbow Mall was not always empty. When I was a kid it was full. Retailers left the mall because they couldn't make a go of it there (and the fact that Cordish is a crap landlord) and the mall went to crap after that. Let's get the orfder of events straight here.

If you think the NF outlets are high end perhaps you should visit Cabazon in CA or one of the other truly high end and well done outlet malls.

The Walden Galleria is not a high end shopping center. It is an all-encompassing center that has everything from glorified head shops to a few truly high end retailers. High end centers like The Galleria or North Park in Dallas, The Domain in Austin or South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA don't look or feel anythinhg like the Walden Galleria. Why is that? The demographics in Buffalo don't support high end retailers located here.. at least not in large concentrations.

The whole point I am trying to make is that you just can't say "oh that is what we should have" and then expect it to happen. As more people move downtown there will be more retail. This will build upon itself. I am not being negative but in a no growth town this will happen very slowly. Residents first THEN retail.

Moving back the topic of this post fully removing the pedestrian mall is just a waste of time and money that doesn't move things forward. People have tied together in their heads the end of retail on Main and the pedestrian mall. They were contemporary events in time but the relationship was not causal. Find me a Kleinhans, AM&A's, or Hengerers anywhere in Buffalo.... These stores didn't survive the consolodation in their industry. By and large downtown department store retail didn't survive anywhere. The places where it did have the residents and tourists to support it.

Whole Foods will be going to Amherst as part of the Benderson project. That is about the only place the demographics will work for them. I could see Trader Joes somewhere in the city. They have lower overhead and smaller stores. They'd be much more likely to go over somewhere on Elmwood.

Buffalo got Macy's because they bought Federated. Macy's had tried out the Galleria back in the 90's by opening stand alone shops like Charter Club which they closed and then decided against opening a full line store there. At one time the Boulevard was supposed to get Bloomingdales but that fell through.

The Galleria has Sears and Penny's. Nordstrom might co-locate with those stores as they have done some other places but they generally don't do that except out on the west coast. I don't get the whole Nordstrom thing anyway. It is ok...

I hear that Cordish'es new entertainment complex in KC is doing well. Time will tell if it continues to.

Buffalo needs a new convention center and the related spin off business. This would be a logical fit for Canalside. That might drive enough business to get some sort of entertainment complex going. Personally though I'd rather see that money go to some of the great local bars and restaraunts. Abuelos is good but Chef's or Scirris has it all over Olive Garden.

Orlanmon, I agree that Rt 5 is a mistake and I'll add that the Skyway needs to go! I also think that ripping up the mall, in its entirety is a mistake and a waste of money. Shorten it and make what is there more attractive. Opinions, mine, one and all of course! Personally I'd like to see the mall turned into a canal with canal boats and water features in the summer and skating in the winter. Way far fetched I know but think of it like Ottawa meets the San Antonio Riverwalk. I recall that way back there was a plan floated for putting a canal downtown.