Mall Wars, Round II

General Growth Properties is hating life.  Not as much as Holladay when it ends up as the one responsible for the weed patch that used to be Cottonwood Mall, but it hates life.  It's another business that's been accumulating debt for the last 15 or so years and now finds that the properties it acquired with that debt won't cover it.  Now GGP is threatening to dive into bankruptcy.  Given what's happening with mall tenants, I'd say that's more like a promise.

Look at the list of retailers that have shut down completely in the last year: Mervyn's, Linens 'n Things, Steve & Berry's (Wah.  I bought my casuals there.), KB Toys, The Bombay, Sharper Image, Woolworths (not just a store, an institution), Harold's (another hole blown in Trolley Square).  Add the selective closings such as Office Depot in Gateway and Murray and Sears in American Fork, and you're going beyond dark space to the kind of tomb-like quality that the downtown malls in Ogden and SLC had before they were torn down.  And we're building more.  The bloodbath cometh.