Welcome to The Dark Side of White Flint, an ongoing series about the not-so-wonnerful, wonnerful, wonnerful side of urbanizing the suburbs of Montgomery County.
Banana Republic and H&M - two high-profile holdouts at dying White Flint Mall - have finally closed. Shocking, right?
Wow, as the blogger chronicling the demise of White Flint Mall for nearly a year, I suddenly have a lot of deep-pocketed company. The puzzling move by the Washington Post to suddenly acknowledge the end in December seemed to open the floodgates. Since then, just about every moneyed local media site has published the exact same sort of "postapocalyptic" White Flint Mall photo galleries I have been bringing you since last spring.
Now even a national website is trying to get in on the act, directing folks to a one-off post on a travel blog. That post focuses on supposedly shocking and fresh photos of the abandoned "food court" at White Flint (actually called, "The Eatery," not "the food court"). Just one problem: I posted photos of this same food court last August. Last August! August 3, 2013, to be exact. And, well, the food court was actually abandoned at that time already.
Give credit where credit is due. Just Google "dark side of white flint" to see the ongoing reporting. My articles were easily found in Google by anyone who was as overwhelmed by nostalgia as the Johnny-come-latelies claim to be.
Not a single news outlet ever linked to my White Flint Mall articles or photo galleries. One problem is, my news and photos came with inconvenient analysis and context that did not flatter Montgomery County elected officials, planners and the mall's ownership, who are all choosing to urbanize a suburban commercial area.
What's astonishing is that, after those in line to make a buck (one way or another) got their way in White Flint, the same media who were looking the other way now want to fill their pockets with gold, generated by click-bait and knockoff photo galleries. Sad.
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| Banana Republic at White Flint Mall |
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| H&M at White Flint Mall |
"Give credit where credit is due. Just Google "dark side of white flint" to see the ongoing reporting. My articles were easily found in Google by anyone who was as overwhelmed by nostalgia as the Johnny-come-latelies claim to be."
ReplyDeleteThat's right. Without Robert Dyer, no one would have known that White Flint Mall is mostly empty.
5:08, If they'd been relying on outlets like the Post and Gazette, no they would not have known. The mass headlines over the last 60 days announcing that "White Flint Mall is closing!" speak for themselves. The Phase 1 demolition was completely ignored by the press. I haven't seen demolition photos anywhere but here on this blog. Can you show me a Post photo gallery of the demolition last year?
DeleteRobert was the only journalist reporting on the White Flint's long goodbye for quite awhile actually. You may want to go back and read his reporting.
ReplyDeleteA lot of people didn't know stuff had closed until they got to the mall since Lerner was quiet about shuttering the mall.