What’s a dying mall to do?

It seems I’m not the only person who likes to consume media about abandoned spaces. It’s not just the eerie aspect of photos of abandoned amusement parks, to me, there’s something poignant and lovely about the decay of formerly bustling spaces. I poke around on web pages with urban explorers’ musty shots of cracked asylum corridors and images of swimming pools in the process of being reclaimed by the forest. I relate to those swimming pools, I suppose.

When I found myself binge-watching a show on Vice that featured abandoned shopping malls, it was perfectly natural that I’d stick there and soak it all in. The U.S. has hundreds of these places, I learned.

I grew up near a “shopping plaza” that slapped on a roof and called itself a “shopping mall,” and I’d bet a couple of sneakers that it’s taken the roof back off and become a “shopping…