Scenario A: Your neighborhood has property that is attracting new stores, offices and restaurants.
Scenario B: Your neighborhood has property that is losing stores, offices and restaurants, leaving behind vacant eyesores.
Indianapolis has several examples of both scenarios. Residents in the second one, however, are struggling to cope with the losses incurred when businesses in their neighborhood depart.
Last month a Kmart store on East Pendleton Pike closed, leaving a once vibrant shopping center completely vacant. Earlier this year, a Big Lots store closed at the Eastwood Shopping Center near the intersection of 38th Street and Post Road, leaving a major void there.
“What we’re seeing is anchor institutions, or major businesses, pulling out of certain areas,” said Marc Lotter, communications director for Mayor Greg Ballard. “Many of the retail establishments that benefited from the traffic of those anchor businesses are down to the point where they may no longer be able to keep their own doors open.”
So, what are city officials and neighborhood groups doing about this problem?
Lotter said one of the goals of city government is to address the actual cause of businesses leaving a specific area.
“We have to first deal with the underlining problem,” Lotter said. “That could be anything from a declining population or crime, to something that has nothing to do with the area, such as concerns about the structure of the building, lease payments, or in the case of retail stores like Kmart, national corporate restructuring.”
The city, Lotter said, can then take measures to upgrade an entire neighborhood, such as demolishing abandoned homes, dealing with crime, and investing in infrastructure like sidewalks and street improvements.
“You have to revitalize the residential components of neighborhoods, especially in our urban core and historic areas,” he said. “You have to draw residents back, and make the neighborhood appealing for new residents. Once you achieve that, you will see a return of retail establishments.”
In other words, if the neighborhood around a vacant retail center is re-developed, then the property becomes valuable again and new business tenants might decide to move in.
Lotter gave the “Eastside Legacy” area on the city’s Near Eastside as an example of this scenario, where successful efforts, largely supported by Super Bowl related initiatives, led to new residential development and improvements by existing home owners who saw their property values increase.
“Now, people are wanting to live there again,” Lotter said. “We see a return of community pride, and a return of retail and jobs, all of which are interrelated.”
Melissa Drew, executive director of the Community Alliance of the Far Eastside (CAFE), said the organization is working actively to address challenges in its area, such as the departure of the Kmart, Big Lots and other retail stores from business centers. Such developments are symptoms of an area that has witnessed decline since the early 1990s, with the closure of the nearby Fort Benjamin Harrison, and a major Chrysler plant on Shadeland Avenue.
“The Far Eastside community has experienced many changes over the last 20 years,” Drew said. “Some of these changes have created great opportunities to the area, while others have threatened the economic stability of both the neighborhoods and businesses.”
Drew added that like other neighborhood groups, CAFE offers direct aid to residents in need, but also connects the unemployed with job training and brings area residents together to develop solutions to various challenges.
“Our goal is to rally citizens in the area, including business owners, to help make the Far Eastside a better place for all,” Drew said. “We are also working to make the area more attractive. To strengthen our neighborhoods, we help low and moderate-income homeowners with repairs, and we refurbish and sell houses to first-time homeowners.”
Lotter said neighborhood groups are essential in working with the city to revitalize neighborhoods abandoned by businesses. For example, when tenants began leaving Lafayette Square Mall on the Westside, neighborhood organizations worked together to come up with a vision of what the mall and its surrounding area should look like.
“They came up with the International Marketplace near the mall, and other features that are helping to transform that area,” Lotter said. “It will take some time, but the fruits are already bearing out and we’re seeing things take off.”
A little investment from outside sources is also helpful in attracting residents and businesses to depressed areas.
Recently, Chicago-based Pangea Properties announced that it is investing over $50 million in distressed apartment buildings in Indianapolis, including a complex located near High School Road, not far from a shopping center on West 38th Street that has lost stores such as Circuit City and Kroger, as well as various restaurants.
“We look forward to providing superior service and quality to our tenants, while also creating job opportunities and contributing to the area’s development,” said Al Goldstein, Pangea’s CEO. “We also believe Indianapolis would be a nice addition to the Midwest market, and it has a large pipeline of distressed properties that could be used to provide quality at affordable prices.”
Lotter noted that many businesses that have closed recently are in the retail industry, which is unpredictable. Because of that, Indianapolis and many other cities have decided to not rely entirely on retail for economic recovery.
Property owners are being encouraged to have different types of establishments, with retail stores alongside places such as business offices, health care related centers, light industrial companies and other enterprises.
“Those are the kinds of projects the city is really looking to get behind, where we talk about multiple uses for a property,” Lotter said. “It tends to bring communities and businesses together, and helps make an area a little more recession proof. You have something that can weather all of the different economic cycles and be strong for the long term.”
