Agreed BCTed, and important to note that at one time--until the early/mid 1990s, almost every imaginable chain doing retail trade in this country was in the complex. The downward spiral was what I would refer to a "perfect storm" of overbuiding retail capacity in the core, increased competition from other locales in the region, shifting demographics and a protracted recession in the early 1990s which pegged off a number of established chains and drove others to trim lesser-performing stores from their rosters. Remember--downtown's hours have always been lesser compared to the suburbs (even at it's peak, 9pm hours were only T & F and Sundays were always half-open/half-closed--so even a store doing a brisk business downtown would have lower revenues based on reduced hours.

We've discussed this ad nauseum here of course--the simple truth is that reaching a critical mass of residents downtown (as in, people with money who want seersucker shirts and Speery Topsiders) is key to reviving retail--inside and outside the mall. The HCC, Sheraton and office towers are a great place to start--that's built-in clientele--getting more people living locally and shopping downtown is really the keystone. Important to note, many retailers up and left over the years--and corporations do have some "memory"--so there is the added hurdle of convincing someone who already left to invest and come back.

I had an inkling that JS used to use uniform signage, is the Coles sign a leftover?

Also the movie theatre in JS is old and low-rent.

There are tenants that pay the rent certainly, but how high a quality are those tenants really? Higher quality tenants = the ability to charge higher rents.

Again, I'm not attempting to offend or upset anyone, I am just expressing my point of view here.

I walked into that mall as a European tourist, never having been to Hamilton before. First impressions count for a lot. It was a physically off putting experience walking through that mall.

If other out of town visitors have the same feeling that I had, then I can't imagine many people thinking, "I must go to Hamilton to shop there!"

As I walked through, the only two stores I came across that I'd even heard of were Tim Hortons (not really a store) and Roots. Nothing in that mall grabbed me or made me think, "Hey, I'd like to come back here". None of the shops were the sort of shop that I, a thirty-something male of a reasonablely good income level, would really want to shop at. To be honest, the shops felt, beneath me. I would want to shop in better places.

My mum, the shopper demographic of the family (middle aged woman with money, who's hobby is shopping, and has grandchildren to dote on) walked in, deemed the place filthy and walked out.

I went to Eastgate twice and Limeridge once and actually spent money there, because there were stores there that I wanted to shop in. I dread to think how much my mum spent in those malls. I personally would much rather go to either of those malls again than the one downtown and I know that my mum, who is currently in Hamilton again visiting my family, has no intention of shopping anywhere other than Eastgate or Limeridge.

The downtown mall's only redeeming feature was the Farmer's Market, which we all agreed would be great for produce if we lived there, however the rest of the Mall would just be a corridor as far as we would be concerned.

I'm not debating how the mall once was or how it's design was once for it's time. I'm just saying that something major needs to happen to that mall, it's time has passed and people with money to spend have higher shopping standards than it can cater for both in terms of surroundings and content.

To encourage people to see downtown Hamilton as a shopping destination and to spend money in downtown Hamilton, there needs to be a draw. Something modern with vision.

An example from the UK: The Southgate Centre in downtown Bath

I agree...the concept and surrounding amenities are great.
I'm currently on a quest to buy a new pair of pants and shirt (with some b-day money!) so I decided to pop into JS the other day. Other than Le Chateau, there was literally no options. I'm a slim guy so I wear all this 'slim fit' stuff. How that Le Chateau is hanging in there I'll never know. I worry that they might bail unless someone at the top has a thing for downtowns.
They've expanded their Hamilton stores in recent years with Eastgate and Limeridge catching up to the downtown store.
with all the young people downtown and revitalization of downtown neighbourhoods, I don't get how an H&M or Old Navy or American Apparel isn't being courted strongly by YALE.

I emailed H&M last week about opening a full store, including menswear, downtown. They beat around the bush and 'informed' me how to use their website to find the closest men's store to here (Toronto Eaton Centre).
I wrote back and said thanks, but I'm aware of that. My real point was to suggest you guys locate downtown here.
It's like we're not even on the radar.

As for interior design, it is kind of old and worn.
The exterior is what sucks. It's closed off like this mega superblock.
I really think if they could just land a few new tenants.
Let's say Winners, Indigo, H&M, Old Navy and American Apparel (or even just 3 of those).
It would start to transform the mall and the way people (and other businesses) view downtown.
Somehow, we need to get the first couple stores to make the plunge...maybe dirt cheap rents, I don't know.
And staying open past 6 might help too.

I think you're bang on.
Good to hear from a tourist with shopping experience too. I guess we all get used to the dark corridors, but you're right...the place needs a sprucing up.
Even just to start in one section...build a nice two-storey glass Indigo and main entrance at King/James....something to get it kickstarted.

Southgate in Bath looks great.
If only we'd have done that from the start and kept the streets intact.

I choose Bath as an example as the downtown has a lot of heritage buildings and Hamilton has a lot of gorgeous old buildings downtown too.

The theatre is not in too bad a shape at all. It just does not have stadium seating, which I would prefer as well.

the theatre is another drawing card in this place...the only one in the entire lower city for pete's sake.
Apparently the 200,000ish people living in the lower city never need to buy books, or go to movies based on the lack of stores.

I can't believe we haven't gotten an American Apparel yet. They like store front retail so I doubt they woud locate inside Jackson Square or City Centre.

Perhaps Westdale or Locke? Chatham and Locke, HELLO!

How about Gore Park...we need these big players downtown, not on sleepy Locke.

Though they were unsuccessful, AmericanApparel did try to make a go of it in downtown Windsor a couple of years ago--seems to me that if they can be attracted to Windsor they could surely be attracted to Hamilton.

While they do seem to have a preference for streetfront retail, a good number of their recent Canadian locations are opening up in shopping malls. By the way, if you go to their website, they do have a feedback page for suggesting new locations.

I agree. JS is my favourite mall in Hamilton. What I like about it.... it has a cinemas, restaurants, library, gym, offices and the usual stuff.. foodcourt, and stores. I like the layout, the twisty halls are my preferance to the standard two level oval with a couple wings like Limeridge and every other mall in every other city. Plus it is more interesting with the small second level and the water feature at Standard Life and it is close to everything downtown.

My favourite interior designed mall has to be Eatons Centre, look at it from the entrance at JS, it's beautiful!!! three white open levels under a glass atrium, embellished columns with the glass elevator acting as terminating focal point. Too bad the exterior wasn't given as much thought. It is fixable and rumours have been heard about punching out the walls on the ground level but Fercan doesn't want to do it now that he has the City paying rent -- basically no motivation to do anything now. Both these malls remind of the malls in downtown Montreal.

All JS/EC need is some Tier One retailers, i think this is why most people crap all over them.

Before Limeridge's reno, I would've said it was my favourite mall, but it has a crummy bunker for a foodcourt, no cinemas, one sitdown restaurant, no arcade basically all you can do there is shop for jeans and shoes.

London's just opened this summer. It's a cool street location within a strip of bars. Almost as good as College Street. Westdale or Locke are both good locations for Am Apparel. It's mostly a girl store tho, I've been a few times to College St and never buy anything. It's just that they give instant cool factor to a neighbourhood. If only Locke could fiqure out what it wants to be when it grows up.

I would vote 'The Beach' (without the water of course), and that would not include an American Apparel. An Ends yes, American Apparel or it's ilk no.

The Eaton Centre 'Hamilton City Centre' was added on to JS and the old Eatons building around 1989? before JS was built there was just the old Eatons store on that part of James Street, Jackson Square was then built and added onto the old eatons building in the early 70's, fast forward to 89' it was then decided to expand Eatons into the Eaton Centre a supposed Mega Shopping Complex like they had/have in Toronto.. I remember the Big grand opening they had back then, all the hype lasted for about 1-3 years and then stores started to close...I wish that place was never built...and we still had the original Eatons store still, but Eatons went Bankrupt and closed for good around 95'..sad...

I e-mailed Executive Director/Armchair Calibrator Kathy Drewitt, Chair Tim Bullock and Ward 2 Councilor Bob Bratina on Tuesday morning. Haven't had so much as a boilerplate automated response from any of them as yet. So I went back to the BIA’s site. And I was mistaken. In the tradition of this squad, it's been done half-heartedly and with no eye to the bigger picture. Further spelunking revealed the directory. Two clicks to get to it and it's as no-frills, user-unfriendly as you'd imagine. Unimaginative, uninformative and woefully incomplete. But at least they've got a website, which is more than I can say for Jackson Square.

they better have a website considering the amount of money they get from BIA businesses each year.
They might want to change the banner showing a bustling scene by the fountain with Infusions patio full.
Maybe they can show the parking lot at Main and Rebecca.
Or the one at James and Main.
Or the one at.......