New Shopping Center for Town of Newburgh, The LOOP

FL-Loop

A new 650,000 sq ft shopping center is coming to the Town of Newburgh at the corner of I-87 and I-84, just across the street from the foreclosed Newburgh Mall. It’s called The LOOP-Hudson Valley, and it is being developed by the Wilder Companies who have also done projects in the North East. According to their website, their major tenants are “Field & Stream, Dick’s Sporting Goods, BJ’s Wholesale Club, Michaels, ShopRite, a multi-screen theater, home goods, fitness, lifestyle retailers, and contemporary dining experiences.”

There are a few interesting aspects regarding this project. One of the most striking is the name. Nowhere on their website do they call this shopping center by the municipality it is located in, Newburgh. It’s almost as if they are hiding it. Even the official address of their webpage says, “I-84 & I-87, In the heart of the Hudson Valley, NY, 12550.” Why can’t they say Newburgh as they have done for The LOOP in Garden City Center, Milford, or Settlers Ridge? It is disappointing that they are not interested in uplifting the general image and perception of Newburgh to the international clientele they hope to attract according to a recent TWC article.

The LOOP Newburgh

The article says they also want to give the mall a “Saratoga” feel, and to make it a place where you can bring your kids and walk down the “street”. It sounds like they are trying to recreate the downtown feel like the City of Newburgh, just no actual “street” to walk on. Looking at the map, these stores are vastly divided by large parking lots. The downtown model plans for foot traffic to attract consumers. The LOOP is counting on the 100,000 cars that will pass their site each day and the proposed casino. However, are drivers compelled to pull over and check out a new shopping complex as a pedestrian would be to window shop? With malls closing country-wide, you have to wonder, is this the right way to look for economic development, trying to recreate something that already exists? DeadMalls.com is a website dedicated to documenting this piece of retail history. Why will The LOOP fare much better than the Newburgh Mall? They are essentially the same thing, just that one is outdoors and one is indoors.

Although this project is located in the Town of Newburgh, there will surely be multiplier effects for the City of Newburgh and the rest of the region. What are your thoughts about the economic impact? Is this model sustainable to last another 20-30 years with the rise of online shopping?

-Photos via http://www.wilderco.com

25 Comment

  • So, Shop Rite will be moving from one side of Newburgh to another, Michaels will be moving from another location on 300, the movie theater will be moving from another location on 300, and the other stores in the mess of strip malls squeezed into 1 location all exist in the area. The land should be used for office buildings & healthcare like at the intersection of Rte 9 & I-84. Now more traffic will be concentrated on Route 300 with its mass of traffic lights & more coming. pathetic… It should be more accurately called “The Poop” instead of “The Loop”.

  • Small mom and pop stores is definitely where its at. I can still remember as a child going up and down Broadway with my mother Christmas shopping or hitting the local butcher to get our fresh turkey and ham for the holidays on liberty street. I used to stare in amazement when we went into Sally’s fish market as my mother picked the lobster that she wanted. Local people who live in the community have a vested interested in the community that they live in. I have made a conscious effort to buy local. That includes buying my food from the local farmers Newburghfoodco Wholeshare when I can or when treating myself to a bit to eat Caffe Macchiato or hitting or local boutiques. I have no desire to see another Woodbury Commons wanna be in Newburgh because in the end it is taking away our sense of community. We as a community have to start to invest in our community by supporting our small business.

  • Tearing up our precious wooded areas for putting up yet another mall is wasteful and selfish. There’s plenty of land in the city of Newburgh that can be redeveloped. What’s next? Cronomer hill?

    • Please explain how the woods next to 84 are a precious area? And where in the city of newburgh would they have fit a mall like this without razing 10 city blocks. And if the mall was in the city of newburgh no one would go to it

  • We need economic growth in the area….while I don’t like the idea of tearing down our wooded areas, I do like the possibility of Newburgh being known as more than the worst crime per capita city in New York State. We travel to Poughkeepsie, Middletown, NYC, etc. to do our shopping meanwhile missing out on oppurtunities to help fund our schools through business, offer jobs to the jobless, and have a sense of pride in our community. I do believe in “Mom & Pop” stores and try to shop them whenever possible. But the reality is they are usually family run and offer little oppurtunity for hiring and promoting outside the family. Not everyone can participate in the “american dream” or afford to. With consumers traveling to shop here offers the “Mom & Pop” stores a larger customer base to better support their own families. The specialty shops offered on Broadway are not what is going to be offered in the Marketplace. Commodores, Miriam’s Boutique, Torino’s, Mike’s Meat Market, etc. can only benefit from this influx. Families down on their luck on welfare, unemployment, food stamps, etc. will have a broader chance to earn money for their families and ease the economic hardship of increasing taxes so that the city can afford to do the business of running a city.

    • I agree, but we should learn from the mistakes of what Wallkill and Poughkeepsie did with their sprawl developments. We need economic growth but that doesn’t equal bad planning. This is the result of engineers forcing design and the lack of experience on planning boards. Have you ever been to the Price Chopper Parking Lot? Sometimes I wonder if the town taxes are based on number of parking space and lineal footage of curbs. Then when the plan and architecture are bad, we stick stone walls and old style lamps to give it “curb” appeal. If you design right from the beginning, the plan and the architecture become proud and not something your trying to hide.

  • Very true Alicia…. Keep it local, we don’t any fancy malls, we need to keep our money local.

  • Aside from things that these comments have already brought up, I’d like to know about the name. Every other big shopping center has the name of the location in the title of the project. Why doesn’t the one that is going to be in Newburgh? The LOOP – Hudson Valley? Why not The LOOP – Newburgh?

  • If anyone hasn’t noticed, it’s already all torn down. There is a thin treeline that was blocking the view but now that the leaves are gone it’s nekkid. And the mall was in bankruptcy.

  • Good example of bad planning. All the buzz words and no understanding of how to apply them. To say this lacks vision would be an understatement! This project has had issues holding on to tenants because it’s counter to whats happening with planning in other parts of the country. The term grey fields refers to malls that have gone bankrupt and now are being designed as mixed-use, pedestrian friendly, walk-able projects. Placing a “sidewalk” in the middle of your parking lots to get from one lot to the other does not make this project “walk-able”. Too bad this was an opportunity for Newburgh to do something special. I’m sure the architecture will follow the plan…..regrettable.

  • Your damned if you do and damned if you don’t Newburgh needs economic growth so that people can have jobs and that means that they can spend money on the homes in the city of Newburgh

  • Hey Cassie Mae (hi!), good point. My guess is that “the Hudson Valley” has broadly recognized cachet that “Newburgh ” doesn’t quite have. If they advertise to travelers on 84/87, they might be banking on luring them in with help from the siren song of the region’s well known title.

  • I agree that the planning was poorly done. My comment is more for those that propose keeping our money local. There is no money. The city of Newburgh is in debt and losing more and more money. Taxes were raised and still debt. Slum lords, vacant property owners, properties once beautiful now crumbling and uninhabitable. Families struggling to put food on the table. We need an influx of money into our area. We talk revitalization….Broadway was once a place to come to and shop. Now it’s struggling businesses fighting the stigma that Newburgh has become. And that is exactly what we are fighting. We need to start somewhere.

    • When I made my statement in no way was I saying that all we need are Mom and Pop shops BUT when we look at the cites that are around us (Beacon, Kingston) just to name a few, that are now successful they focus on specialties shops. Yes there is room for some big business but we need to learn for our pass. Newburgh was once booming with big business that chose to leave downtown Newburgh (Sears, JCPenny, etc.) the bottom line and rightfully so big business are in it for the money and not the community. When they see a smarter business choice that will help them make more money they move and then Newburgh is stuck holding the bag. Prime example the once empty Rite Aid that sat on Lake Street empty for a few years. They did not choose to close it down because it was not busy. They chose to close it down because it was a wise business move. Trust me I asked corporate. Look at the river front the business down there are flourishing and they are local business that are not just run by family. I’m just saying there is room for both but there needs to be a balance. Unfortunately many of the present and previous struggles that Newburgh is having is based on poor local government choices (Urban Renewal, lack of following though on grants and overspending and not enough community involvement in selecting their government) just to name a few. I have sat in on numerous council meetings and it saddens me. I have lived in Newburgh all my life and took a leap of faith knowing that when we brought our home that Newburgh was and still is in the process of finding its identity again. We choose to buy in the city after looking at several houses outside of the city. My husband and I came to this,bottom line
      if the community does not get behind its community we have no hope of surviving, because the only ones that truly care about the community are the people who live in it.

  • ‘Seems like the pro LOOPERs have been drinking too much of the corporatism flavored kool-aid offered
    up by .gov and their cohorts, i.e…. ‘Because disposable income and savings are down people are spending more. Net, economic growth as per the gdp.’ http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/pi/2014/xls/pi1014.xls
    Not. AS US consumption accounts for 70% of US gdp, there’s a net draw on the economy (hence the $18tril. debt). As retail jobs pay minimum wages with little or no benefits the consumer is indirectly subsidizing the Corporates and the retail workers, those “down on their luck”, as welfare is a necessity. NY ranks #1 with regards to Corporate welfare through taxpayer funded grants and credits making any tax revenues collected (sales,property etc.) from the corporates a wash. Who is this “we” and what is that they ‘have to buy’ that isn’t offered locally? If the local ptb what to grow their municipalities organically, offer the resident consumer a property tax credit for spending their disposable $s locally. It’ll never happen.
    As per online sales the devil is in the details. Looking back to 2011, the rate of growth in online sales has steadily declined year over year and, more tellingly, the average $ value continues to decline yoy. http://www-01.ibm.com/software/marketing-solutions/benchmark-reports/benchmark-2014-cyber-
    monday.pdf
    http://www-01.ibm.com/software/marketing-solutions/benchmark-reports/benchmark-2012-cyber-
    monday.pdf
    Rock, meet hard place.

  • I don’t think that this project will have any net effect on the area whatsoever, positive or negative. As other people have said, many of the tenants are redundant (Shoprite and Michael’s already exist in Newburgh, and Showtime Cinemas is a stones throw away.) The remaining tenants are pretty bland. There will be some cannibalism of current businesses in the town but nothing else will come of this. It’s not even a “mall” per se, and seems more like the layout of the “thriving” Mid Valley Mall not 10 minutes away.

    On the plus side, nothing here seems to be directly competing with any business in the city. Groceries, sporting goods stores and cinemas left the City of Newburgh decades ago.

  • These comments mostly reflect the majority of comments that were made at the public hearings regarding this project in 2005-6. I attended every one long before I intended to start a business myself. Unfortunately the Town of Newburgh leadership- including its zoning board members- were most likely promised all kinds of “legal” kickbacks: using this law firm, using a certain bank, using some local contractors that are connected/related to politicians/board members, etc. Just like our City Council they had a look of complete disgust or disinterest in the public’s comments. This kind of project was approved because there is no accountability for the people we elect into leadership positions- the people who choose the zoning board members. They all put out a pleasant outlook when they’re running but prove to be derelict public servants out for themselves. The obvious has already been stated: this is a project that is redundant and a perfect example of poor planning. If that is the case the only conclusion is that those who approved this plan have something to gain for themselves and/or their colleagues and/or families. Ironically or coincidentally these kinds of projects purposely attack the center of a functional community: public squares. Meeting places where the citizenry connect and interact. Instead we are forced into our cars driving by all our neighbors, intentionally discouraged from casual discourse. There’s a guy buried in Cedar Hill Cemetery who’s now spinning in his grave out of disappointment.

    • Citizenry by design. Not many people are aware that the ‘City legislated ‘protest zones’ a couple of years back. How noble of them. At a recent Council meeting the city manager dropped a one line comment about a design that is in the works for a ‘community river front’ project, I’ll assume at the former Consolidated Iron site. That was it. There was no elaboration. I’ve hadn’t heard anything since. Perhaps a coliseum 😉
      Anybody???

  • All this project seems like it will do is create empty blight in the area around of this loop project. It looks like 2/3s of things moving to this new location already exist nearby. Why do they think a Michaels or Dicks or any other chain store that every single community has would bring in new money? This project will just be taking money from the already small pool of money to be spent by local people and then sending the profits out of the area. An office park would have been great and would have brought real jobs to the area. 8$ an hour jobs is not what we need. Also besides the big 3 or 4 flagship stores, who wants to bet most of the smaller spaces will remain empty indefinitely??

  • Woodbury Common #2? As a current resident of Newburgh & a former resident of Woodbury I can admit that “The LOOP” is a double-edged sword, but overall I really think it will be a GREAT thing…”if”.

    So…my family moved to Woodbury (The quaint Hamlet of Highland Mills
    to be exact) when I was 8 to be a part of a better school district; I
    formerly lived in Newburgh, as my family had for many generations. My
    mother’s family owned Donahue Funeral Home on Chambers Street. My Great Uncle Martin was even the Congressman for Newburgh in 1968. We had a long line of proud “Newburghers,” but my parents insisted we attend a better school district, so we moved. I was the first of my family to
    graduate from a HS other than NFA. What I can say without a shadow of a
    doubt and anyone who lives in the Monroe-Woodbury would hate to admit
    it, but Monroe-Woodbury owes its continued prosperity (and resources)
    largely to the tax revenue from the Woodbury Common. The Woodbury Commonis a cash cow in retail AND tourism and we all know how we spend money when we’re on vacation.

    The “if” I mention earlier in the success of “The LOOP” in Newburgh, is the target market. See, Newburgh HAS retail, with the Crossroads (Target) Plaza, the Palmerone Plaza (Lowes), and even the Mid-Valley and Newburgh Malls, which attract LOCAL customers. “The LOOP” has potential to draw in tourists: foreign and domestic. This puts NEW money/ OUTSIDE money into our local economy. “If” done right….”The LOOP” won’t become another struggling plaza. “Travel to the Woodbury Common, then LOOP around in Newburgh.” To make this successful it would have to appeal to the same unique market as the Woodbury Common.I know this idea may rub people the wrong way, but let’s face it, there is an AMAZING opportunity knocking at our door and if it’s going to happen it should be done RIGHT. The infrastructure planning and traffic flow would be what could make or break this venture. Woodbury Common has gotten a lot of flak from the local residents for traffic overflow problems.

    • I’m not seeing it. If the Commons contributes so much to Monroe-Woodbury’s prosperity why has the town’s property tax rate (factoring in the EQ) rate gone up each year just like most other municipalities? Fact is, retail $’s have been declining for years, even prior to the ‘recession’. Orange County is just about ready to raise the county sales tax to a full 4% (a 7% increase) because sales tax revenue is ‘flat’. BS, factor real inflation into the equation and the $ value is tanking yoy. You will not see a footnote either, as that would spoil the ‘recovery’ meme. Prosperity is not achieved when consumption exceeds production. If it’s not obvious, look to the $18tril debt…and that’s with a printing press spitting out $$$.

    • Woodbury cannot compare to The Loop. Woodbury has world class designer goods, Loop has a supermarket, BJ’s( which costs $50 to join a year to join), and Field and Stream. We don’t need the traffic,the crime that goes with it or any more $8 an hour jobs.

  • I must have read this different from others . When they mentioned Dicks , Michaels , BJ’s , multiples etc , I took that to mean that those were Wilder’s bigger renters NOT that they were coming to the LOOP . Have had this discussion with people before about the City of Newburgh . It’s DEAD ! You can never recapture the ” Glory Days and it’s not because of the City it self but look at te history . Newburgh , Kingston , Haverstraw , Yonkers were RIVER CITIES . Once the Thruway was built and road transportation took over , river traffic dried up . Oh sure , the River Front is nice but it only helps the owners of the land and businesses NOT the City . Not too many drive down Broadway to get there but use River Road to avoid the City . The City has ( had) beautiful buildings but also had people that took care of their community an not playing basketball at 3am . Had hard workers and not once a month mail box watchers .
    Putting all the eggs in the basket for a casino is insane . Like THAT’S the magic trick to generate jobs and $ What ? Valet parkers and chamber maids ?
    I said this years ago and was told we don’t want the traffic , but the Port Authority of NY is thinking of building a FOURTH airport to relieve passenger congestion in the Metro area . well Stewart doesn’t have the passenger base so get cargo up here . We have a deep river access , 84 and 87 linking the Country and a huge unskilled work force NOT looking for $8 hour jobs that can move containers . We just have to get away from the notion of ” Recapturing the City of the 50’s and 60’s “

  • Worst thing ever. I have lived right down the street from this location my whole life and now we are going to suffocate the town of Newburgh with unnecessary traffic? Unbelievable I am so upset. Who ever approved this is an idiot. There is already a Michaels RIGHT down the road…AND a movie theatre. How about you fix the newburgh mall instead of destroying hundreds of trees to ruin our town. How about I come ruin your home and destroy the town you live in, honestly. I am disgusted.

  • Christmas tree shop needs to be placed here