Mayfair Need Only Avoid Unforced Errors

I agree with everyone who says that Mayfair needs to react proactively to Sunday's incident. I have long thought that it is a nonstarter to tell people that they ought not to be concerned with their security when they are concerned. Mayfair cannot let things like that happen and it's going to mean further restrictions on the use of the mall by young people. There is no point in discussing that.

My sense is that those efforts will be successful. Mayfair is not Northridge. It won't make Northridge's mistakes (if for no other reason than Northridge made them) and, more importantly, it doesn't bear the demographic burdens that Northridge came to bear. Northridge was located in an area that became increasingly ill suited for retail development both because of its distance from and inaccessibility to the residents of higher income areas and the problems that came to be posed for safety in the area from large public housing projects in the vicinity. I don't think that Northridge was ever as unsafe as many people thought it was but there is no question that the surrounding area detioriated.

Northridge may have, moreover, contributed to its own problems by moving away from retailers that would be more attractive to the more affluent shoppers to its far west and north, but that may have been a result more than a cause.

Mayfair, on the other hand, is located on the cusp between two relatively affluent suburbs and, most importantly, is easily accessible to the rest of the metropolitan area because it is at the confluence of two major freeways.