I drove past Ridgeland Avenue and South Boulevard the other day and noticed the Oak Park Food Pantry was gone, pulled out perhaps in the middle of the night, leaving another empty storefront in a thickening catalog of commercial void.
Meanwhile, further west on South Boulevard, past the empty former Val's halla, past the JIC sewing machine building they just tore down, there's a new tattoo parlor.
But it's OK. These are tattoo artistes, so it's upscale. Never fear. We now have a tattoo parlor located next to one of Oak Park's most venerable diversity institutions, the Housing Center.
The contrast is striking.
Just around the corner, through the Metra overpass, Bill Sullivan has opened a real estate/legal office, filling one of the more prominent storefronts on the Marion Street mall. Bill's a terrific guy and community pillar. His business is an excellent addition to the downtown Oak Park mix, but should it be taking up a prominent ground-floor storefront? Seems to me that should be reserved for retail.
And it would be reserved for retail if anyone were in charge, but no one seems to be. That is to say, no one seems to be in charge of actively and aggressively recruiting interesting retail to our village. Hence we have Lane Bryant going into the new RSC building on Lake Street. The developer arranged it not because he was looking out for our best interests but because he reportedly has some longstanding connection with someone connected with Lane Bryant. In other words, he did it because it served his interests, not Oak Park.
Supposedly, Whiteco, which remains more myth than reality, will bring us Trader Joe's-which may no longer exist as a corporate entity by the time anyone gets around to breaking ground. I'm not holding my breath. In fact, I'm guessing the odds are just as good they'll give up on the idea.
But that's OK. Maybe a larger version of the Oak Park Food Pantry will fill the space instead.
You remember the Ridgeland and South development debacle, right? The neighbors organized and resisted the first proposal. A second proposal from a new developer promised more space for retail, the idea being to attract something really interesting that would benefit the immediate neighborhood. Starbucks was one name mentioned. Instead, the best the developer could do was sign up a glorified White Hen, and that didn't last very long.
The formula is supposed to work like this: Developers build high-end, aesthetically-pleasing, mixed-use structures around the village, which bring in upscale residents who will patronize the vibrant, diversified retail that fills the ground floor storefronts, drawn by Oak Park's promising demographics.
In case you haven't noticed, the formula ain't working.
One reason it isn't working is the village has done a lousy job of recruiting new business. Oak Park Development Corporation used to fill that role once upon an epoch, but they don't much anymore. They may facilitate a few businesses moving here once they express interest, but they aren't aggressively finding them. Village hall isn't either. In fact, when Carl Swenson bailed out, the development department more or less dissolved, and it still hasn't redefined itself in any clear fashion. I'm hopeful the new village manager, Tom Barwin, will eventually sort that out, but it's probably going to take awhile.
Meanwhile, as far as I know, no one connected with the village is visiting Bucktown or Evanston or La Grange or any other likely locale to see what interesting shops those business districts been able to attract and actually ask them if they would be interested in opening a branch in Oak Park.
Why isn't that happening?
Why isn't anyone contacting successful boutiques all the way up to large national chains to make a pitch to them? Maybe Oak Park isn't on their radar. Maybe they have a distorted view of who we are. Is anyone attempting to "sell" what makes us attractive? Shouldn't that be someone's full-time job?
We do it on the tourism front.
Why not for retail?
