-
. Page 10B THE BATTALION
MONDAY, AUGUST 28, 1978
<
.S. Council both
experienced, aware
i
Editor’s note: The following article
briefly outlines the background of
College Station’s city councilmen
and city manager, and summarizes
their individual special concerns
within city government.
City Mayor LARRY BRAVE-
NEC, 40, of College Station, is an
accounting professor at Texas A&M
University. He served two terms
on the city council before becoming
mayor ir^l976.
On the council Bravenec’s major
concerns have included planning a
city civic center, improving the ci
ty’s park system and controlling the
city’s growth.
ment, the city’s tax appraisal review
board.
As a councilman Ringer has shown
special interest in the city’s parking
problems, especially in the North-
gate shopping area. He has also
pushed for improvements in city
zoning.
HOMER ADAMS, 54, has been a
councilman for six years. He owns
Adams Transfer and Storage Co.
Adams’ major concern as a coun
cilman has been the utility contract
problems the city faces and will face
in the future.
Councilwoman ANNE HAZEN,
46, is one of two women on the
council. She works for the city school
system as a school nurse and is in her
second term on the council. Hazen
is also a member of the College
Station Safety Committee and the
League of Women Voters.
While on the council she has
pushed for controlled city growth
and “responsible government.’’
Councilman JAMES H. DOZ
IER, 54, is an associate professor in
the Department of Finance at Texas
A&M and is a practicing attorney in
addition to serving on the council.
Dozier has also served as the Col
lege Station city attorney. His inter
ests include adopting of a better
zoning system, building more and
better bikeways and sidewalks in
critical areas of the city, and operat
ing city government more effi
ciently.
Councilman LARRY RINGER,
39, is a statistics professor and re
searcher at Texas A&M. He is pres
ident of the city’s recreation council.
He is also an active member of the
College Station Board of Adjust-
Councilman GARY HALTER is
an associate professor in political sci
ence at Texas A&M. Within the
political science department he
specializes in city planning, city fi
nance and city law.
Recycling hoom in United States
slows down: throwaway generation
United Press International
WASHINGTON — Some Ameri
cans are losing their reputation as
the throwaway generation. They
earned $45 million last year by recy
cling 6.1 billion aluminum beverage
cans.
To increase both figures, the
aluminum industry has started a na
tionwide 24-hour-a-day toll-free
number people can call to learn the
location of their nearest recycling
center.
More than 2,200 such centers
exist in 49 states, excluding Alaska.
Some areas have mobile vans that
stop periodically at neighborhood
shopping malls.
Most centers are run by
aluminum companies, but some are
operated by local civic and
environmental groups.
Most pay up to 17 cents per
pound — the equivalent of about 23
all-aluminum beverage cans.
Recycling aluminum cans is a par
ticularly big energy saver, says the
Aluminum Association. It takes 95
percent less energy to produce the
metal from used cans than from ore.
The Soft Touch Welcomes
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IILYCFFRANCe
y
Halter’s interests as a councilman
include controlled growth of the
city, with special emphasis on zon
ing problems, and “a well-run city
government in general.”
\\ /tf
Councilwoman PAT BROUGH
TON decided to run for her council
post after she led a successful cam
paign to have the zoning of her
neighborhood changed.
Boughton was born and raised in
College Station. She says she has
the advantage of having the time to
devote to being on the council,
which other people might not. Her
main interest as a member of the
council remains city zoning. She
says she wants to maintain a zoning
policy which respects people as well
as businesses.
City Manager NORTH BAR-
DELL has held his position since
1974. He says his primary goal is to
provide good basic services to the
people of College Station at a rea
sonable cost.
Before becoming city manager
Bardell served on the faculty of
Texas A&M for 20 years. He has a
masters degree in civil engineering
from Texas A&M.
Bardell says that the present
council is a good one because the
council members “are very aware
and are willing to listen to
everyone. ”
MAYOR
LARRY
GRAVENEC
CITY
YAWAG-ER
A/ORTty
'B-ARbELL
arr
tlu
People go to eat, socialize, play pinball
Malls part of American life
ifl!
By FREDERICK M. WINSHIP
United Press International
Major shopping malls are being
built across the nation at the unflag
ging rate of about 30 a year, an ex
tension of the good life for many
Americans but a pox on the land
scape to others.
Some critics view malls, a $200
billion-a-year-plus business, as a
preview of 21st century life, de
humanized by strictly controlled
environments that lack variety, a
sense of place, and most importantly
a feeling of nature and unlimited
space. They rank malls with televi
sion as the greatest transformers of
American lifestyle since World War
II.
There about 19,000 shopping
malls and plazas in the United
States, according to the count of the
International Council of Shopping
Centers. Since the late 1960s, con
struction emphasis has been on cli
mate controlled, enclosed malls and
there are now more than 1,000 of
these, of which 200 are huge re
gional operations each taking up a
million square feet of space and
grossing upward of $100 million an
nually.
THE MALLING OF AMERICA
probably will continue past the sat
uration point. A few malls already
have succumbed to competition and
others — those with 200 stores or
more — probably have reached
their maximum efficiency. But a
trend has surfaced toward smaller,
more specialized malls, better
suited for urban downtowns than
suburban communities.
“Suburban malls obviously have
had a big impact on forcing business
away from cities,” said Arthur H.
Schein of Boston, a leading mall ar
chitect. “But cities are becoming a
viable place to build malls and malls
are moving into the vacuum. It’s de
sirable and there’s a trend. And I
don’t think it’s just to combat the
suburban malls.”
multi-level mall in the shadow of
City hall which has set a record for
urban mall sales since it opened last
August. State Street, one of
Chicago’s main shopping thorough
fares, is currently being mailed for
completion next year.
A 1 million-square-foot enclosed
mall is the most important element
of a $250 million urban renewal pro
gram that is expected to change the
face of downtown Stamford, Conn.
Even so, the majority of the malls
listed for completion by the ICSC in
1979 and 1980 are still located near,
not in, cities, and just off main
highways.
“The only thing that will ever
limit mall building is what can be
accommodated in the term of vehi
cles,” Buckley pointed out. Urban
malls have it over suburban in this
respect, since about 70 per cent of
their customers use public transpor
tation.
Auto traffic engendered by malls
has always resulted in some opposi
tion to their construction from
neighboring landowners, conser
vationists, and environmentalists,
but most malls have gotten built just
the same. One of the reasons is that
malls provide main streets or mar
ket places, not unlike the agoras of
ancient Greece, for suburban areas
that had none.
local police and private security
guards and there seems to be little
trouble. Police in suburban Troy,
Mich., report that shop-lifting, car
theft and other crimes at Somerset
Mall, known as the Fifth Avenue of
the Midwest, are “minimal.” Cus
tomers say they feel safe and hardly
ever venture into downtown De
troit, which has a reputation for
street crime.
Although generally dependant on
customers who live within 15 min
utes driving distance, malls also can
be tourist attractions. Alfred Barr,
general manager of 150-store Lenox
Square on Peachtree Road in Atlan
ta, Ga., claims 40 per cent of the
shoppers are tourists — the highest
percentage in the country.
Yet malls can be a boon to
homeowners. Crestwood, a suburb
of St. Louis, has a strong tax base as
a result of the 1-cent sales tax that
brings in more than $1 million a
year to the city, mostly from the
Crestwood Plaza mall. Thus the
Plaza has raised the value of
Crestwood residences, made excel
lent municipal services possible,
and kept the local tax rate low.
come favorites of the real estate
vestment community.
Success may also be the d pas
greatest threat to Americas
ditional life style, according to
tractors. Can' Winter, city
for Edina, Minn., near M; Mai
SHOPPING IS ONLY one attrac
tion of malls, according to a survey
of visitors to Westroads, which was
built on 40 acres of cornfields near
Omaha,Nebr., 10 years ago. People
go there to eat and socialize, too,
and to play pinball and attend con
certs and art shows sponsored by
the mall. A few malls have chapels
that are popular for weddings.
“You can get anything you want
out here,” said a 19-year-old Omaha
man on the lookout for pretty girls at
Westroads, the biggest mall be
tween Chicago and Denver.
Michael P. Buckley of Hartford,
design developer for The Market,
says it offers “a view of the future. ”
“Downtowns offer the greatest
diversity, the greatest landscape ex
perience, and the street systems al
ready are in place. Downtown is
where the action is today,” Buckley
said.
One of the newest urban projects
is Philadelphia’s Gallery, a 125-store
A cheerleader from Avoca, Iowa,
60 miles away, who came to buy
special shoes and other equipment,
said, “We have no other place to go,
except Des Moines, and that’s
farther. ” A mother said she came
with her children to eat at fast food
stores and “end up eating at two or
three places.”
Malls often are the only place for
suburban youth to meet and occa
sionally to roughhouse, but malls
are generally well policed by both
SOME 50 COMPANIES domi
nate the developing, owning and
managing of America’s malls. Land
acquisition and construction often
involves more than 60 governmental
and environmental agencies and
hundreds of hearings, so that it
takes four or more years to get a
mall out of the planning stage into
actuality. ,
Developers put much effort into
attracting “anchor’ department
stores such as Sears, May Stores, J.
C. Penney, E. J. Korvette, and
Gimbels, which they feel are vital to
success. As John F. Maguire, man
ager of the $100 million-a-year King
of Prussia, Pa., mall said:
“Your major draw is your depart
ment stores on a year-in, year-out
basis. That is what is going to make
you or break you, but you do have to
offer a broad spectrum of big and
ittle shops to be a success.
neapolis, bemoans the traffic«
gestion caused by SouthdaleM Uni
which is increasing its 120 sped: poli
shops to 140 next fall. At thesa the
time he praised Southdalei Spe
providing regional services.
“Malls succeeded becauseti den
approached shopping as an ideii beg;
now they have become too
cessful, in the way the autora!
became too successful,’ said® unti
Pelli who designed shopping!) bait
ters before he became dean ofii
School of Architecture. Malls
great machines. They are sopo»
ful, they overwhelm everyth
else, and there is nothing sti
enough to balance them.”
Managers also are emphatical
upkeep and renovation of shops
surrounding property, to keep
aspect of the mall evergreen f
Weller, manager of Sharps^
Center, Houston, said, “Wji** —
part and everybody does theipi
so no blight is going to happei
Blc
last
toj
St
“As a tenant’s lease is renew-
after a period of time, werel
manding that they remodel, '
ler explained. “If they want toS
in the center and renew theirle* setts
we ll tell them they have toi
model. Most developers are ash ibou
for that nowadays. You’ve just gd
keep up with the competition.
ess f
elop
Success is what the malls are all
about. Most of them are big
moneymakers, failures have been
almost nil, and nearly 90 per cent
are still owned by the original de
velopers. Since most tenants are on
percentage leases (if sales go up, so
does the rent), malls tend to offset
the inflationary factor and have be-
ACTUALLY THE SUNBELl
the one newly urbanized area wit
enclosed shopping malls were pi
of city development almost froffll
beginning. Houston’s magnilici jf e ’
glass Galleria is representative
malls that are the town squares
the new urban frontier.
Statistics indicate that Amerits )ortl
on the average spend more time
malls than they do anywhere
except at home or work. Th
lavish emporiums that often rest' lre ^
ble fortresses adorned with inte# | nt j ,
fountains, contemporary scul
and botanical gardens of print*
fancy seem to be a solid factor
American life and economy, pro'’
ing nearly 5 million jobs
counting for 35 per cent of sli
sales tax revenue.
FARMERS MARKET
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Serving Sandwiches &
Submarines
Po-Boys • Reubens • Meatball Sandwiches
Whatever their future, theidn
the American mall has spread
some 30 foreign countries, andfi
sia is planning to build a supert
near Moscow in time for the I
summer Olympics. Now, it’d
mailing of the world.
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9:00 a.m.-9:00 p.m. Monday-Saturday
12:00 noon-9 p.m. Sundai
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215 S. MAIN