A friend of mine who actually grew up in Albany (I'm a newcomer) pointed out to me one day this spring that this strip mall-- excuse me, "shopping plaza"-- is one of the more uppity strip malls in the area.
Once I gave up trying to understand the the compatibility of "upscale" and "strip mall," I moved on to the sadness of this reality. A "trendy" place for people in the area to visit, complete with local bakeries, restaurants, grocers, and even a non-local Starbucks, was a U-shaped, fifty year-old strip mall whose fancy stores enclosed a massive parking lot.
The buildings themselves are not the problems; walking beneath the awnings is pleasant and comfortable, glancing at fellow shoppers/eaters/wanderers gains you greetings, often from familiar faces.
It's that massive parking lot, that center of the community that we are supposed to overlook, but that seems to swallow your consciousness as you sit in the outdoor seating of these quaint shops. Cars and buses drive by, and by, and by; the parking lots spaces fill and empty, fill and empty, and your lunchtime view becomes awashed with bright sunlight reflecting off car windows (or, more often, a mural of rained upon automobiles).
I complain not to snottily snub cars, but to suggest an alternative. This ample parking space could be minimized; there is office parking behind the U-shaped plaza that never fills, and the massive lot could bear a reduction in size, as well.
If, in place of this parking lot, we tore up the asphalt and re-planted grass and flowers, the Strip Mall-- sorry, Plaza -- would seem much more like a plaza than the car-centric current parking-lot-surrounded-by-shops.
Children, families, college students and the elderly could romp, walk, or play in the new tranquil green space. Those dining in the out-of-doors could look onto this peaceful green environment in the summertime, or onto the pure, silent snow during winter months. Businesses would not suffer from the reduced parking thanks to the aesthetic pleasure the shopping center would now provide.
Buses would still service the Plaza, with enhanced ridership due to the minimal parking. Locals, as well as students at the nearby university would hop on the transit rather than drive themselves, not motivated to deal with the headache of parking.
Now a park and a shopping area, the Plaza could become a real community center, complete with a natural respite from the city like the European plazas of yore. The neighboring mega-mall would suffer from the increased visitation to this locally-run, locally-shopped mall-- which would now be a "mall" in the open-air, communal gathering space sense of the term (think D.C).
If we "paved paradise and put up a parking lot" in the 1950s and 1960s, can't we at least think about re-planting paradise now? Let's start by transitioning to greenspace facilities that already exist.
