Bannister Mall closing for Good at end of may
 

I searched but found no thread.
Bannister Mall closing

Jeez, I thought that dump was closed already. That place was hoppin back in the 80's.

where am I going to shoplift now?

That place opened right before I left KC.

We used to travel to KC when I was a kid every year to see the Royals. I used to go to the Blue Ridge and Bannister malls. I couldn't believe it when I went back to that area a few years ago. But then again, I also can't believe the 80's are now 20 years ago.

Yea, its pretty sad what it became. It was the place to be in the 80's...

I spent countless number of hours there as a teen.

Saw many a movie at Bannister Mall theaters and Bannister Square accross the street..


RIP....

Shit I think all the malls have their destruction set except for oak park mall..

Antioch, slated to be destroyed
Metro, slated to be destroyed
Blue ridge, destroyed
Bannister, slated to be destroyed
Indian something, slated to be destroyed

The ones I know about at least...

Malls as a whole are really losing their popularity. RENT is way too high from what I hear too.

That would be a good location for a stadium as far as highway access. The mall isn't worth a damn.

Man, don't bring up the stadium issue.

The trend accross the country is to move away from enclosed malls.

Most of the new stuff being built are the open air malls.

Apparantly the enlosed malls breed teen hangouts and crime. Basically what happened with Bannister Mall...

The neighborhood has unfortunately deteriorated around the mall and outlying area. While the city of Kansas City is spending all of its resources to revitalize downtown it seems to have just completely forgotten South KC 87th-95th Raytown Road to basically Lydia.

Metro North is next.

Yeah, been dead for years.

That's the mall I always went to as a kid.

Hell yeah. Fun factory was the shit!

I bought my 1st Nikes there in 1983.

Fun Factory. Did that place make those t-shirts that you decorate, and then they spin them?

Bought my first pair of Seringetti sunglasses there in 87. Damn things lasted me 12 years.

I don't remember, but I know what you are talking about. It was an arcade. They had skeeball, too. Jesus, did I blow some cash in that place...

I ****ed your sister in the handicap stall in one of the department store restrooms.

That's what I have heard as well. So, basically, these punk ass kids have made all of us self respecting adults walk from store to store in the heat and cold...I wish I had a cane to wave.

In extreme climate areas there will have to be a backlash where the shopping center might actually hire security instead punish the customers.

In July when it is 100+ or Jan - 10 who wants to park 100 yards away from one store then run back to your car to go to the next?

The Mall used to be a place to escape the weather. If parents and security guards hook up this problem will be licked so we can all go back to the mall...and the food court where everyone in the family can get a meal from a different country.

I can see that. I went to the mall the other day for a little bit and felt like I was interrupting some middle school field trip or something...then I just remembered that parents these days are lazy and the mall is a ****ing daycare to most people...

Bannister closing. There is a shocker.

Clark Griswold "Roll em Up kids"

Its just a cycle fad, open air malls were popular before... Antioch was a open air mall before they enclosed it from what I am told... I am sure in 20 years people are going to get tired of the trend of outdoor malls and want to go back to climate controlled indoor ones...

Already been planing its destruction.. They are suppose to turn it in to Zona Rosa type shopping district.. The plans are to add condo's, a theatre in the park in there also...

I think there are around 20+ stores left in there besides the anchor stores...

Seems like an odd choice given the proximity of ZR, which is about 7 minutes down Barry/152.

From Jan-Aug of '05 I lived in The Ethans with my sig-other. MN was but a long par 5 away, and I still almost never went there. I really liked living in that part of the Northland, though.

Independence Center still seems pretty nice.

It will soon be in Bannister Malls condition, given the element that is starting to be out that way.

They had a chance to get the Bass Pro Shop in the middle of the mall. Bass Pro had all the designs in place. Turn the mall and surrounding area into a nature santuary but they wanted tax increment financing. The city of KC said sorry but we can't afford it. We need the revenue from the project to pay for other stuff in KC. So what happens? Bass Pro goes out to Independence and spends millions. Was anyone really surprised?

Metcalf South is going to be either razed and re-developed, or retrofitted into condos, offices and retail. That place has been on life-support for 25 years, and is located in the heart of Johnson County.

Fun Factory was definitely the shit...

The whole concept of malls is all but obsolete.
Benjamin Plaza has very little shopping to sustain any kind of business let alone a mall. Best Buy is gone. Circuit City is gone. Just For Feet is gone. Walmart is gone. It's insane.

Someone will buy that property up with a couple singles and turn it into something profitable in time though.

I'm more pissed about the KC area possibly chasing Legoland away. That park would be a cash tree for the area.

I grew up in that neighborhood from 87-03 and saw it change so much, it is now such a shithole.

Metcalf South is weird... it's like it has been frozen in time with all of the signs of previous stores still there. It looks like it could just reopen in a weeks notice.

Legoland is going to Lee's Summit

There is alot of money to be made over there once the city starts to drive the criminals further south and further east.

I lived in the area from 1991 - 2001. Used to be a cool neighboorhood. Buit it was getting trashy near the end.

Which is in the KC area.

And the latest news sounds like it's not going to Lee's Summit and that they're not coming to the Midwest at all now. Apparently the State pulled funding and the city of Lee's Summit isn't fully behind the idea anyway.

http://www.lsjournal.com/articles/20...ews/02lego.txt

LS is a small town full of small minded people that don't like change. The new comers like myself and others think they need some frigging retail revenue to take some of the tax burden off us.

It's too bad that Legoland can't go to the Banister Mall site.

Criminals ay?
Priceless...

I drive past the Bannister Mall every day going back and forth to work.

It's been useless as a real mall for several years. Nothing but flea market stuff in ther the past couple years.

BM died for a couple reasons. It started going down hill when people were getting mugged and carjacked in the parking lot. When that happened, people from Grandview and Raytown and from across the state line in JoCo stopped going because of safety concerns.

Then Lee's Summit built a mall on Chipman Road, and JoCo has plenty of shopping south of I-435. That whole area just withered away. Not only the mall, but all the other stuff that was built around the outskirts of the mall too. Now it's a ghost town.

Shame, because all that land used to be part of Benjamin Ranch, where you could go horseback riding and the trails were plentiful and stretched a long way. That land is part of the original Santa Fe Trail, so back when it was a horseback riding ranch, it was cool, because you could ride on the original Santa Fe Trail. Now its all just asphalt and empty strip mall buildings. Even Wal-Mart bailed out, because they flattened the Blue Ridge Mall and built a Wally World on the property. Now all the slime from South KC goes to the Blue Ridge Mall for Beef Jerkey, Doritos, Smirnoff Ice and diapers.

I've heard rumors that the city would like to take over that land, flatten the mall, and build the Wizards a soccer stadium, but nothing concrete has come around on that yet.

Yes it does kind of suck to have to walk or drive from store to store when its hot outside. I live in San Antonio, so i know all about heat. But these open air malls are the hot thing right now. They have built two or three in this area in the past 4 or 5 years and they are huge.

I guess most the kids these days congregate at the 30 Theater multiplex's.

Dayum, you'll find anything here. A Serengetti fan.
I've worn their H2Optix for 8 years, a couple years ago, my mom sat on them in the car and broke them. Found out, they've been bought by Bolle, who actually centered in Lenexa, dropped over there and they gave me a brand new replacement pair.
Great customer service.

It was the place back then, One of my first jobs were at the Bannister. Worked a couple of years selling Electronics at Sears, and was an Ast Mgr at Tape World, f#@king funny cassette tapes were the format of choice back then. Also remember was the first place a saw replica jerseys and hats at Mearle Haron's Fan Fare, dropped lots of cash there over those years.

I dated a girl in high school that worked at that Fan Fare.

Great now they'll be coming to WardParkway...

THEY SHOULD PUT A FOOTBALL FIELD THERE AND HOLD TRAING CAMP THERE!

Yea, its too bad the Bass/Pro deal fell through there. It would have been a nice revitalization for that area.

Why is that?

i am wondering what the deal is with 87th street. on mapquest it is supposed to go through to 71. It has been under construction for like 2 years. I guess they are like "you keep carjacking people so piss on you"

I remember when it opened.

Its too bad the thugs and shitbags ruined that place for everyone else.

I hope that doesnt happen with Independence Center as well..i havent been there in several years since i dont live in KC, but last time i was there i remember seeing quite a few of the "thuggish elements" there.

I was there at Christmas time and it was quite nice. It's basically Oak Park Mall East.

I went there the day I first came home on leave from the Navy after completing A school back in '84. I remember walking around in uniform, hand-in-hand with my girlfriend (the one I really liked, not the one I ended up marrying). That was one of the happiest days of my life. Of course, that was a long time ago, and I don't think I've been back since. Too bad the place went to hell.

Given the amount of criminals that visit the area....maybe the empty building should be turned into a prison.

I had a cousin robbed at gunpoint there by 3 "youths".....got him for a whopping $2 and change....yes...and took the change.

Was this the mall that had that huge arcade downstairs?

NO!!! They shut down Cleopatras Jew-ry (for those of us that watch local KC commercials)...........best commercial rap video EVER!!! Even better than Used Tire City!!!

Disclaimer: Sarcasm at its finest.

I worked at United Artists for a while.

I remember Tape World was just across the way on the top floor.

That theater in there used to be really nice back in the 80's. I remember seeing "Return of the Jedi" there on opening night.

I don't know about that from the way I have read the articles in the paper... Legoland would make a killing, the new business created around it would make money, but the money that Lee Summit would have to fork over each year in free tax and subsidies would kill them... Basically Legoland still would not be taking the tax burden off of the people...

I grew up in the area in the 50's and 60's. We had 60 acres on 87th west of where they built I-435. At one time all of the area was pretty nice. My best freind's folks owned the land where they built Bannister Mall and we used to ride horses and goof around in an old barn that sat about smack dab in the middle of the mall.

Yep, it's really gone down the crapper. Too bad.

This is what happens when landlords get greedy, and there isn't an endless influx of new yuppies to an area. Once it matures, the growth fades or goes in decline, which is followed by death.

Wal mart just had the worst month for same store sales in their History. Could it be that we have seen the end of their ever increasing footprint in the retailing business space?

I think I seen Octopussy there when I was visiting the area one summer.

I heard the deal breaker was the Jones Store Co. Everything was in place, and Jones was going to move to the old Dillards space allowing for demo of their old store, and building the Bass Pro.

Then Jones decided they didn't want to move, and the deal went away.

At least that's what I heard from a friend who managed there for a while.


I miss the Oriental Gift Shop they used to have. A lot of crap, but some interesting stuff as well.

What is your friends story as to why the place when to hell the way it did?

Cross thread reference, just remembered how much I used to love eating at Big Al's in the food court.

We used to go to Metcalf South for our shopping (we lived about 2 hours away). We also visited Oak Park, which only had a few stores at the time. Of course, around here, the malls are doing pretty well. The mall in Columbia was thriving as well.

I lived about a mile from there from, ah, 2000 to 2003.

It was amazing how much (in some ways) my life changed when I moved to Overland Park. I regularly walk at 10 or 11 at night here, and I don't think anything about going to Super Wal-Mart at 2 am.

2 things I would have never done on Bannister road.

Same as everyone else's I suppose. Never asked.

Kids, lack of security, and the neighborhood around it deteriorating would be my guess.

I don't think that rent was an issue, because the Mall itself started downhill when the staple [national, solid] stores were replaced with Mom/Pop stores selling Velvet paintings and Trinkets. Surely those stores weren't MORE able to meet the rent than a Sam Goody or Waldenbooks.
Wards was a big loss, that closed store was a huge sore thumb indicator of decline.
The fire at Best Buy, leading to Circuit City leaving when it didn't have it's symbiotic partner across the way.
Then the restaurants ceased to be a draw.
By that time, between Metcalf developments to the west, Martin City springing to life to the south, and the Lee's Summit development where 470 meets 50, meant that people in many directions got one-shopping a short distance away instead of piecemeal shopping at BM.

I'd call that a valid point. When we lived there, while we were a mile from BM, we did all our shopping 10 or 15 minutes away (IIRC) in Lee's Summit.

I'm optimistic that that entire corridor [from BM to Truman Corners] will rebound by about 5 years after the 71 triangle is completed.

I hope you're right, that area was a spot that I spent alot of the 80's.

In the 80's that was the place to go with the family and shop. Now it's the place for all the thugs to hang out at since idian springs is closed.

Since everyone is (was) talking about Bannister Mall, when did the Blue Ridge Mall close down. My dad was sad to see that being torn down when we went there last May because he spent so much time in there as a kid.

Last time we were there, there was a Movie theater place, my dad said it had many theaters in it. From the outside the windows are pure black looking, it's in that area. Anyone know of the place I am talking about? Everytime we go there and see the outside of that place I am amazed by it. For some reason it looks so cool to me.

Anybody know the name of this place? If I remember right it's next to the Arrowhead.

Are you talking about the old Blue Ridge East movie theater?? I believe the building is still there? Its right accross 40 highway from the Old Blue Ridge mall. It was still there the last time i was up in KC about a year ago...

I have no idea what the name of it is. I just know that it is the coolest movie theater I've ever seen. But that location you gave me does sound right though.

In its day, that was a nice Theater. I saw many, many movies there growing up in the 80's...