Death of the Downtown Shopping Experience

I grew up in Rochester, NY, a city about 60 miles from Buffalo, that sits near the banks of Lake Ontario. Winters there were beyond brisk, they were oftentimes filled with 6 foot snow drifts and blistering winds with -20 below zero temperatures. However, I have many fun memories of growing up in blustery Rochester. I remember sledding, ice skating and Christmas shopping with my mother - downtown. With the holidays just around the corner, I have been thinking about my 1970's Christmas shopping experiences more and more. Perhaps my memories are like yours. Back then, in many cities, people didn't do their shopping at large suburban shopping malls. They did their shopping in the heart of the city, downtown. Downtown shopping is definitely a thing of the past in most cities nowadays. Heck, in the 1960's, Petula Clark sung about “Downtown” as a place to escape to where the “neon lights are pretty.” Downtown shopping also figures prominently in the movie “A Christmas Story.” Remember the hilarious scene where Ralphie visits Santa at the downtown Higbee's department store?



I have a montage in my mind of my downtown shopping experiences. I'm not sure exactly when each of these occurred or if they occurred more than once. To an adult, they may not seem like much, but to a little kid, downtown seemed a magical place that I could go to once a year.

I can remember we took the bus, at night (yes, at night), because downtown was not deserted ghost town after 5 p.m. And also because we only had one vehicle at that time. My excitement would rise as we approached downtown. I could see the Xerox building lit up with strategically placed red lights in its windows to make the shape of a giant Christmas tree. I can remember the granite flecks in the sidewalk glittered like diamonds at night when there wasn't much snow on the ground. There were always crowds of people and somewhere in the distance I could hear the bell ringing for the annual Salvation Army Kettle Drive. Then there was Midtown Plaza.

Midtown, opened in 1962, was touted as the first urban indoor shopping mall in the U.S. Midtown was host to Santa and the kid-famous monorail every year. This novelty monorail would go around Midtown Plaza and through the indoor faux snowy mountain, where Santa sat on top (kind of like the one in “A Christmas Story” without the slide). Not a real exciting ride, but the closest thing we Rochester kids had to Disney World!

I remember once, when I felt like I was too old to ride the monorail, my Mom made me take my little brother on it. Being in junior high at the time, I was so self conscious that a class mate would see me riding the monorail. Midtown Plaza had some beautiful fountains filled with coins. I was always fascinated by the way the fountain water danced and the lights changed color.

Mom would take us shopping with her at the two main stores – Sibley's and McCurdys (neither of which still exist). Sometimes Mom would would buy us Spanish peanuts at one of the stores that offered a variety of roasted nuts and chocolates to finish our trip. Sometimes, she would just give us a coin to throw into the fountain. Either way, to a little kid of the 70's these were different experiences that the ordinary daily grind of school and homework. These times obviously made an impression on me, that's why I remember them.

Nowadays, I do my Christmas shopping at various strip plazas close to my home. Or sometimes we go to the local mall. I live in Florida now, so winters are quite mild here by comparison. Our downtown here is not a safe place to be after dark. There is a mall, of sorts, but it doesn't have either the stores, nor the overall shopping experience for my kids to make a special trip downtown, day or night. There is no central place where anyone in this city congregates for Christmas shopping. Just the so called 'urban sprawl' of strip plazas and suburban malls. Shopping downtown seems to be a thing of the past, something only available anymore in the New Yorks, the San Franciscos and other bigger cities. I was saddened to learn that my hometown of Rochester has also fallen victim to the urban sprawl. Midtown Plaza, which had opened in 1962, was closed in 2007 and demolished in 2008. No one went there anymore for any type of shopping. The two large anchor stores of Sibley's and McCurdy's were bought out. I saw on a forum posting somewhere that Midtown was referred to as the “ghetto mall.” How sad. No more generations of kids will experience the urban shopping adventure. The monorail is said to be in storage. Somewhere.