Congratulations Gaylord

[TC Talks]

New Snowfall Record. Meanwhile, Traverse City received about 1/10th of this amount.

MIDNIGHT OBSERVATION DATA IS IN!
With an additional 6.6" of snow since 7pm, this brings the final daily snowfall total (and thus the final tally for the snowiest calendar day on record for Gaylord) on November 29th, 2024 to 24.8". This annihilates the previous record for the snowiest calendar date, which was 17.0" on March 9th, 1942. Snowfall records for Gaylord date to 1940.

[MWmetalhead]

Ski areas and snowmobilers are thrilled, I'm sure.

Keep that snow bottled up in the northern latitudes please.

My neighborhood only has a dusting on the ground, and that accumulation didn't occur until overnight. Ten miles to my southwest, 1 to 2 inches fell yesterday, mostly in the morning.

[Realist]

Meanwhile, on the sunrise side, we received no snow.

We have a lot of cross country ski trails here on National Forest ground and they’re unused.

[MWmetalhead]

The dusting has increased to a coating here over the past few hours. I don't want any more than that!

[MegaHertz]

Ski areas and snowmobilers are thrilled, I'm sure.

Keep that snow bottled up in the northern latitudes please.

My neighborhood only has a dusting on the ground, and that accumulation didn't occur until overnight. Ten miles to my southwest, 1 to 2 inches fell yesterday, mostly in the morning.

94 south of 59 all the way to 696 at Southfield was horrible this morning. Nine accidents. Even I almost slipped out doing 20mph.

[TC Talks]

Ski areas and snowmobilers are thrilled, I'm sure.

Keep that snow bottled up in the northern latitudes please.

My neighborhood only has a dusting on the ground, and that accumulation didn't occur until overnight. Ten miles to my southwest, 1 to 2 inches fell yesterday, mostly in the morning.

94 south of 59 all the way to 696 at Southfield was horrible this morning. Nine accidents. Even I almost slipped out doing 20mph.

Every year, without fail, we have a pile up of cars on the road between our dying mall and the big box stores on the first day it snows. Every year, the cars have out of state plates.

[MasterB]

I checked out Grand Traverse Mall doesn't look like a dead mall to me seeing the list of stores on its website I checked out.

[MWmetalhead]

Mall foot traffic in the vast majority of cases, even for malls near full occupancy, is a fraction of what it once was.

In Metro Detroit, Somerset (which has a number of high-end exclusive stores found nowhere else in the state), Great Lakes Crossing Outlets, and perhaps Twelve Oaks are the only malls with good foot traffic.

Lakeside Mall in Sterling Heights, which once flourished, is dead and is in the process of being razed. Oakland Mall in Troy is hanging on by a thread (I am amazed the Macy's there is still open; its parking lot often looks like a desert).

Partridge Creek, a lifestyle center in Clinton Township that opened with much fanfare about 16 or 17 years ago, has two massive anchor tenant big boxes that are now empty.

Fairlane Town Center in Dearborn is hanging on by a thread.

Rivertown Crossing in Grandville, a beautiful mall when it opened 25 years ago, is now struggling.

Gen Z isn't as apparel brand obsessed or as materialistic as earlier generations. Hanging out at the mall stopped being "cool" for teenagers a good 15 to 20 years ago.

Adult consumers love the convenience of being able to compare prices & order online. If they wish to buy an item in person, they'll do their research online before leaving the house as opposed to going to multiple stores to browse.

[kager]

GT Mall's anchor Macy's is closing this winter...

https://www.traverseticker.com/news/mac ... all-store/

[bmw]

Lake temperatures are still way, way above average for this time of year.

https://apps.glerl.noaa.gov/coastwatch/ ... 1024_3.dat

Lake Michigan still has an average surface temperature of 50 degrees F, compared to 45 degrees on this date last year (and that was the highest of the 5 years prior). Then sudden cold air over those warm waters, and well....

[TC Talks]

And the hits keep coming...

And Tuesday calls for 7" more.

[ftballfan]

GT Mall's anchor Macy's is closing this winter...

https://www.traverseticker.com/news/mac ... all-store/

Surprisingly the first anchor to close at Grand Traverse Mall AFAIK - GT was only built with three anchors (Hudson's, JCPenney, and Target - the latter two are still there and Sears never made the move from Cherryland).

Mall foot traffic in the vast majority of cases, even for malls near full occupancy, is a fraction of what it once was.

In Metro Detroit, Somerset (which has a number of high-end exclusive stores found nowhere else in the state), Great Lakes Crossing Outlets, and perhaps Twelve Oaks are the only malls with good foot traffic.

Lakeside Mall in Sterling Heights, which once flourished, is dead and is in the process of being razed. Oakland Mall in Troy is hanging on by a thread (I am amazed the Macy's there is still open; its parking lot often looks like a desert).

Partridge Creek, a lifestyle center in Clinton Township that opened with much fanfare about 16 or 17 years ago, has two massive anchor tenant big boxes that are now empty.

Fairlane Town Center in Dearborn is hanging on by a thread.

Rivertown Crossing in Grandville, a beautiful mall when it opened 25 years ago, is now struggling.

Rivertown isn't helped by the big renovations that have gone on at Woodland over the last several years (kicking out Sears for Von Maur, adding Cheesecake Factory, adding Main Event), as well as Tanger Outlets opening a center in Byron Center.

Somerset and Woodland are the only two malls I can think of in Michigan that have no vacant anchor spots - Twelve Oaks has two vacant anchors (formerly Sears and Lord & Taylor)

[MWmetalhead]

Hardly anyone shops at Von Maur unfortunately. That chain seems to have a non-existent marketing strategy. Cheesecake Factory was a good addition.

Tanger Outlets has definitely taken traffic away from Rivertown.

GR tends to jump on retail trends 20 years later than similar sized metro areas located elsewhere. Look how pathetically long it took GR to get Cheesecake Factory and a Whole Foods store. Even the Supercenter version of Walmart was a late arrival! LOL

Two major chains that did arrive in GR on schedule are Target and Sam's Club. I know Target opened its first three stores in the area around 1989 or 1990. Sam's Club arrived in 1991.

Anyone remember Hills? That was a big friggin' deal when they opened in the Grand Rapids area circa 1987. Financial mismanagement at the corporate level coupled with rapid expansion of Target and Walmart into many of Hills' markets caused that chain to exit Michigan and some other states by the early 90s. Their former Eastbrook Mall store became Menards (the first in Michigan, I believe). Their Wyoming store became a Value City Department Store. Their Plainfield store became Handy Andy, a Home Depot knockoff that was based in Indiana.

The only store I can remember arriving in TC before Grand Rapids was Prange's, which later became Younkers.

Cadillac had Walmart for several years before the first Walmart opened in the GR area. (It would take twenty more years for Cadillac to finally receive a Meijer.)

[craigrussell100]

"Cadillac had Walmart for several years before the first Walmart opened in the GR area. (It would take twenty more years for Cadillac to finally receive a Meijer.)"

Close...the Walmart in Cadillac opened in 1995, and the Meijer was in 1999. Walmart hesitantly entered Michigan considering they were going up against the Meijer juggernaut. Now they are everywhere.

[MWmetalhead]

I was WAAAAAAAAY off on the Meijer. Oops.

I did some research, which frankly I should've done before posting earlier, and indeed the Cadillac Meijer opened March 1999.

Wal-Mart in its original format (non-supercenter) opened in Cadillac well before 1995, though. I remember visiting it while vacationing up north with my parents when I was maybe 12 or 13 years of age.

Here is a 1994 article from the Cadillac Evening News:

May 16, 1994

Work has begun on an expansion and renovation at the Cadillac Wal-Mart that will add more than 31,000 square feet of space and several new services — including a McDonald’s restaurant. The store will go from 87,000 to 118,358 square feet, with new additions at the front, back and north side.

Source:
https://www.cadillacnews.com/news/today ... e51da.html

I also vaguely remember Giantway - later shortened to just "Giant" - on the east side of US 131 just north of downtown in Cadillac. What a dump that store was...