Malls that buckled due to e-commerce or suffered during the pandemic are being given new life by the very entity that precipitated their decline — Amazon…Over the last several months, the retail giant has gone on a shopping spree of its own, buying up disused malls across the country and turning them into distribution centers.
Between 2016 and 2019, Amazon converted around 25 shopping malls … “The reality is that the cash flow at these lower-quality malls is declining rapidly,” said Vince Tibone, lead retail and industrial analyst at the real estate analytics firm Green Street. “You have to decide, ‘Do I want to do something myself to invest a lot of money to transform this dead retail into thriving retail or put up offices?’ Selling a dead mall as land is a more attractive option.”
Poisonally, I think the GOUSA is facing a tough economic forecast … for individual cities and towns that don’t figure out what to do with dead malls. Online shopping and the pandemic have pushed lots of diminishing-margin businesses to the wall. My wife and I still shop groceries, week by week, over a range including several stores. A couple of heavies like Walmart or Target, smaller stores like Sprouts or Trader Joe’s. That’s what fits the budget of a couple of retirees.
Eideard 
Goodbye, Knoxville Center Mall: Crews begin demolition for Amazon https://www.knoxnews.com/story/money/2021/04/08/knoxville-center-mall-aka-east-towne-demolition-begins-amazon/7137772002/ The 961,000-square-foot Knoxville Center Mall closed its doors on Jan. 31, 2020, after more than 35 years in operation.
Mall vacancy rate hits all-time high : Stores sit vacant as retail sector claws back from pandemic https://therealdeal.com/national/2021/04/08/mall-vacancy-rate-hits-all-time-high/
Mall department stores were struggling. The pandemic has pushed them to the edge of extinction. https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/04/16/half-countrys-remaining-mall-based-department-stores-are-expected-shutter-by-2025/
Department stores, once a middle-class mainstay of convenience and indulgence, had been spiraling downward long before the pandemic turbocharged online shopping and helped tip a number of big-name retailers into bankruptcy. Nearly 200 department stores have disappeared in the past year alone, and another 800 — or about half the country’s remaining mall-based locations — are expected to shutter by the end of 2025, according to commercial real estate firm Green Street.
Those closures, analysts say, will have a cascading effect on American shopping malls, which already are battling record-high vacancy rates and precipitous drops in foot traffic, as well as on the commercial real estate market and the broader economy.
(New Mexico): The Española City Council agreed Sept. 14 to rent part of the National Guard Armory to Amazon for a facility not described in the contract.
The contract states Amazon will have the right to work on the premises 24 hours a day, every day of the week, until the agreement ends Jan. 31, 2027. http://www.riograndesun.com/news/city/council-approves-amazons-use-of-nat-guard-building/article_488c8d40-1bea-11ec-a974-238db49aa883.html
“On Black Friday, a group of unions and grassroots organizations, known as the Make Amazon Pay Coalition, will stage coordinated protests and strikes in at least 20 countries to demand Amazon pay workers a living wage, respect their right to join unions, pay its fair share of taxes, and commit to meaningful environmental sustainability.” https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7vebb/amazon-will-face-black-friday-strikes-and-protests-in-20-countries
‘Pollution everywhere’: how one-click shopping is creating Amazon warehouse towns https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/dec/11/how-one-click-shopping-is-creating-amazon-warehouse-towns-were-disposable-humans
When Amazon Expands, These Communities Pay the Price (Consumer Reports) https://www.consumerreports.org/corporate-accountability/when-amazon-expands-these-communities-pay-the-price-a2554249208/
Amazon opens most of its warehouses in neighborhoods with a disproportionately high number of people of color and low-income residents, a CR investigation found
“Amazon.com Inc has amassed a vast amount of sensitive personal information on its customers. Internal documents reveal how a former aide to Joe Biden helped the tech giant build a lobbying juggernaut that has gutted legislation in two dozen states seeking to give consumers more control over their data.” https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/amazon-privacy-lobbying/
Photo caption: “An Amazon Echo Dot device, with Alexa voice-assistant technology, pictured inside a home. Amazon employees sometimes review the recordings made by such devices to assess and improve the technology.”
Worker killed in Amazon warehouse collapse wasn’t allowed to leave when the tornado approached, girlfriend says https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-worker-not-allowed-leave-facility-as-tornado-approached-girlfriend-2021-12
Larry Virden, who started working for Amazon five months ago, was among the six employees who died in the destruction, which saw a giant wall and the roof above it collapse.
The 1.1 million-square-foot facility opened in July 2020 and employed about 190 individuals, Amazon said. On site, orders were prepared for last-mile delivery to customers by Amazon’s delivery service partners and Amazon Flex drivers.
https://nypost.com/2021/12/12/amazon-worker-texted-girlfriend-he-wasnt-allowed-to-leave-warehouse/
The federal Occupational Health and Safety Administration said Monday it has opened an investigation into the collapse of an Amazon warehouse in Edwardsville, Illinois after it was struck by a tornado on Friday, leaving six people dead and another hospitalized.
OSHA inspectors, who have been at the site since Saturday, will look into whether workplace safety rules were followed and will have six months to complete the investigation, said spokesperson Scott Allen. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/osha-opens-investigation-after-amazon-warehouse-collapses-during-tornado-killing-6