The Soul-Sucking Canada Thread

[stevanford1]

You know a mall is dying when these roll into town:


Or even worse:

[MolsonExport]

The mall is hopping with activity when the great canadian chew chew train rolls on in, bringing cavities and wasted change

honeydalemall

[stevanford1]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

The mall is hopping with activity when the great canadian chew chew train rolls on in, bringing cavities and wasted change

honeydalemall

Or even worse:


The place where 17 year olds buy cheap clothes that fall apart in twelve seconds.

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

That Princess Towers is just an abomination. Kill it with fire.
What the hell is a steakhouse casual?

Laval is the armpit of metropolitan Montreal. And also Longueuil.
Milton and Oshawa are the armpits of metropolitan Toronto.
Surrey (and Prince George) is the armpit of Vancouver (and British Columbia).
Is Airdrie the armpit of Calgary?
What about Edmonton?

What is the armpit of Ottawa? of Quebec city? Winnipeg?

Airdrie is the armpit along with Balzac and Cross Iron Mills / New Horizon mall. Cochrane is the taint.

[O-tacular]

The definition of soul sucking:

https://calgaryherald.com/business/l...449986856/amp/

https://youtu.be/WBu0Bmq8lIM

[stevanford1]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

The definition of soul sucking:

https://calgaryherald.com/business/l...449986856/amp/

https://youtu.be/WBu0Bmq8lIM

NHM is incredibly soul sucking. What are those things, cubicles?

[Proof Sheet]

Originally Posted by stevanford1

You know a mall is dying when these roll into town:


Or even worse:

Other clues:
A booth in the middle of the mall selling knock off printer cartridges or refilling your legit cartridges with cartridges they promise will fool the manufacturer.
A booth selling ancestry charts, family crests/heraldic stuff
A booth doing wood burning for your cottage/camp etc with your name and usually a motif of a wolf
A Hickory Farms booth at Christmas time selling salami that has been shrink wrapped for 6 months

[stevanford1]

Originally Posted by Proof Sheet

Other clues:
A booth in the middle of the mall selling knock off printer cartridges or refilling your legit cartridges with cartridges they promise will fool the manufacturer.
A booth selling ancestry charts, family crests/heraldic stuff
A booth doing wood burning for your cottage/camp etc with your name and usually a motif of a wolf
A Hickory Farms booth at Christmas time selling salami that has been shrink wrapped for 6 months

Calendar Stores and other Christmas Crap being permanent features

Bentley Suitcase Stores

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by O-tacular

The definition of soul sucking:

https://calgaryherald.com/business/l...449986856/amp/

https://youtu.be/WBu0Bmq8lIM

It comes as no surprise that this place is in Ball Sack.

[stevanford1]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

It comes as no surprise that this place is in Ball Sack.

I still think that this is worse.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Proof Sheet

Other clues:
A booth in the middle of the mall selling knock off printer cartridges or refilling your legit cartridges with cartridges they promise will fool the manufacturer.
A booth selling ancestry charts, family crests/heraldic stuff
A booth doing wood burning for your cottage/camp etc with your name and usually a motif of a wolf
A Hickory Farms booth at Christmas time selling salami that has been shrink wrapped for 6 months

A stamping pad store, which might also sell paint-by-numbers kits
Cellphone bling/cases occupying formerly prime mall spots
Bentley's, Ardene
Massage chairs
Board Game club
____Resource Centre
Persian rug store (smells vaguely like tumeric)
Sport Clips (Barbershop)
Kidney Care Centre
Northern Reflections

[stevanford1]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

A stamping pad store, which might also sell paint-by-numbers kits
Cellphone bling/cases occupying formerly prime mall spots
Bentley's, Ardene
Massage chairs
Board Game club
____Resource Centre
Persian rug store (smells vaguely like tumeric)
Sport Clips (Barbershop)
Kidney Care Centre
Northern Reflections

Northern Reflections sounds like the name of a cologne that smells like hot garbage!

Service Canada Centres and any other government things are a good sign that a mall has kicked the bucket.

[stevanford1]

Ugly, like the tenant.

Double down on flash frozen Swanson's dinners with Kelsey's and BP

Tacky Soulsuckery.

[MolsonExport]

Man, it is really bad when you have millions to spend on a custom house and you still manage to make it soul sucking. There is no accounting for taste...

[O-tacular]

Originally Posted by stevanford1

I still think that this is worse.

Architecturally speaking absolutely. Cross Iron is the equivalent of Chuck E Cheese architecture whereas the exterior of New Horizon mall is actually quite graceful. When it comes to which mall is actually successful in terms of visitors and having useful and relevant stores there’s no contest though.

Worth noting they are nestled beside each other in Ball Sack.

[Harrison]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

That Princess Towers is just an abomination. Kill it with fire.
What the hell is a steakhouse casual?

Laval is the armpit of metropolitan Montreal. And also Longueuil.
Milton and Oshawa are the armpits of metropolitan Toronto.
Surrey (and Prince George) is the armpit of Vancouver (and British Columbia).
Is Airdrie the armpit of Calgary?
What about Edmonton?

What is the armpit of Ottawa? of Quebec city? Winnipeg?

What about Edmonton? That would be Sherwood Park (this is near the geographic centre of 'The Park').

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Northern Reflections

I was walking with my wife in White Oaks Mall in London a couple years ago. We walked past the Northern Reflections store (the only one in London I think). I commented on how old the people were in there. I said "I remember when it was all teenagers that shopped there". My wife says "yes, and those are them, 35 years later, still shopping there" lol.

I also love the nostalgia I get when I look in the Fairweather store there. Despite the never ending "renovation sale" signs, the place still looks the same as when my mom shopped there when I was 9 years old lol.

[ssiguy]

Frankly, I think some of you guys are getting carried away.

There is such a thing as context. A new office tower may turn out to be a beautiful one but then tell everyone it's going to be a new City Hall and everyone will puke. Look at the Canadian Tire pic. It looks industrial inside and has tons of parking but it is a automotive centre, how exactly do you expect it to look? If they tried to make the inside beautiful everyone would turn around and say it's cheezy.

I know some may hate the London Law Courts but I really like it because it IS a law court. It is suppose to be strong and give an impression of security and stability but if it was a condo I'd toss my lunch. Why should they try to make a law court pedestrian friendly when the reality is that 99% of all people pray they never have to step foot in one?

To me soul sucking doesn't mean every automotive, hardware, or gas station has to try to look bohemian. Most ugly suburban big box stores do look painfully sterile but not all stores can other wise perfectly fit into the urban fabric by nature of the products it sells or services it provides.

[MolsonExport]

soul sucking is mostly about horrible banality, i.e., everything looks exactly the same and there is no sense of place. A visual metastasizing cancer on the landscape. Things are way out of balance. Take London for example. The city keeps permitting developers to build more and more retail (despite traditional bricks-and-mortar sales shrinking by 1% per year, year over year, for 15 years, due to online shopping, and that's before COVID)....what gets built is the same cookie-cutter smartcentres and the same discount hotels with the same architectural plans, so that every highway intersection and commercial road looks exactly the same while older malls and strip plazas are dying on the vine (due to the unhappy combination of never-ending retail buildup on the periphery despite declining retail sales). The city swells much larger than it has to, and half the people are driving 1/3 of their waking hours, with ever larger pickup trucks and vans to fill up their purchases on an ever more distant fringe of retail. This is not economically sustainable. It is terrible for the environment. It is extraordinarily ugly. And it means that 90% of London is really only accessible by vehicle. A city built for cars and prickup trucks, not for people.

Maybe most people don't care. I think it is a terrible state of affairs.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Harrison

What about Edmonton? That would be Sherwood Park (this is near the geographic centre of 'The Park').

I think you nailed it.