Location: Kansas City Gender: Male Total Likes: 1848 likes
Huh. I guess covid made me a trendsetter.
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The end of Westgate Mall- Madison, WI < on 8/19/2021 5:48 AM > | Reply with Quote
Westgate Mall was Madison's first fully enclosed shopping mall. Opening its doors in 1960, this shopping mall included a cinema and several anchor stores such as JC Penny and Piggly Wiggly.
Part of the mall was demolished in 2012 to make way for a Hy-Vee grocery store, but the rest of the mall continued to to operate as normal. Despite several renovation attempts over the years, business slowly dwindled as more and more storefronts stood empty until the mall closed for good in 2019. The decline of Westgate Mall has been blamed partially on the waning popularity of shopping malls in modern times, and partially on the winding hallways and many turns that gave the mall an almost claustrophobic feel.
I first attempted to explore the mall in early 2020, but was unable to access it at the time. I later returned in May of 2021 after demolition had begun in order to explore it before it was gone. To my knowledge, I was the last person to ever explore Westgate Mall.
One section of the building had apparently been used as a dance studio, and all of the walls had been covered in heartfelt messages the students wrote on the day it closed.
And with that, yet another one of Madison's few abandoned buildings meets it's end. Such is life in this city, I suppose.
Location: STL, MO Gender: Neither Total Likes: 19 likes
always open to learning my wrongs from my rights
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Re: The end of Westgate Mall- Madison, WI < Reply # 5 on 8/25/2021 3:03 PM > | Reply with Quote
Such beautifully haunting pictures, I cant imagine the feeling of being the last person to explore a location. It must be heartbreaking but riveting at the same time.
Re: The end of Westgate Mall- Madison, WI < Reply # 6 on 9/4/2021 3:57 AM > | Reply with Quote
holy shit lol i remember doing this like two years ago when the last tenant was there and just hoped up and over a barricade haha. place went to hell fast it looks like.
Strange places with Max Power and Free4All, also Eric and Myles