IN HIS DAY, the Urban Blight Exploration Junkie scored some legendary fixes all over town—the Pink Elephant Center, 24th Street, Stockton Avenue and the old FMC property by the airport, to name just a few.
However, of all his relapses throughout the last few years, nothing compares to the inevitable bender resulting from any survey of what’s left at the Hacienda Gardens Shopping Center near Meridian and Hillsdale. It is perhaps the blight to end all blight, a gross disappointing failure by any definition of those words. If there existed such a concept as “shopping-center euthanasia,” it would apply to Hacienda Gardens. The place is beyond help. Just take it off life support and let it die peacefully. Please.
Some background: Hacienda Gardens first opened for business in 1959 and eventually grew into a popular shopping center with department stores, clothing shops, two bookstores and many mom-and-pop places, all of which thrived as recently at the late ’80s.
Van’s Hobby Store was an awesome place for any inquisitive youngster who enjoyed learning things. Little Professor Bookshop was the definitive neighborhood store tucked away in the corner, with a decent magazine selection and loads of Cliffs Notes no one else had. By 1987, Hacienda Gardens was one of the Top 20 highest-grossing shopping centers in Santa Clara County, with $33 million in retail sales for that year.
After that, everything that could go wrong did. Some tenants went broke, while others simply bailed. Landlord neglect added fuel to the fire, and after phases of attempted renovations and/or extensions, pieces of the center were still left unfinished. Economies tanked, paperwork changed hands, people went bankrupt, loans were defaulted on and foreclosures loomed. It appeared that no one anywhere wanted to deal with the situation anymore.
There was thought to be “mixed-use” development on the way, thus hastening the next round of the suburban condopocalypse. Now, maybe a Walmart or a yogurt shop. Who knows? The recent demise of the Cardinal Lounge, formerly the Red Coach Coffee Shop, was essentially the last straw, regardless of the reason. A celebrated San Jose retro diner specializing in post-2am scarfing, the Cardinal is not replaceable. Those are impossible shoes to fill.
As of right now, Hacienda Gardens features empty pieces of the original complex, splotches of empty parking lots, piles of rubble and newer buildings painted with the same red, orange and olive color scheme one sees on every strip mall from Capitol Expressway to Mountain View.
It’s almost as if the developer went to Home Depot, found the aisle labeled “San Jose Strip Mall Supplies” and bought a few prefab buildings. The entire area is depressing to look at, let alone drive by. No wonder some neighbors are frustrated. Who would want to live near an atrocity like this? How is anyone supposed to muster any sense of civic pride? They flattened the Marie Callender’s, meaning even the comfort-food crowds lose out in this mess. Locals now have to drive all the way to Blossom Hill and Chesbro for that famous lemon meringue pie.
Like any addict, the Urban Blight Exploration Junkie’s path to relapse begins with feelings of hopelessness. He begins to think that if no one else cares about any of this, then why should he? Due to low self-esteem imprinted since childhood, he starts to feel like he’s losing all control of what goes on around him in San Jose.
The structure in his life is falling apart, and no one else in town can possibly know how he feels or what he’s going through. He becomes irritable and overwhelmed with basic everyday inconveniences, avoiding anyone who provides honest feedback on his condition. A drug fix becomes the only perceivable way to make himself feel any better. All of which is even more common during the holiday season.
He then falls “off the wagon” and goes on a bender through any blighted wasteland he can find, only to realize once again how bad it really is out there. And each time, he keeps promising it will be the last time he relapses. It won’t happen again, he says. Alas, with more and more rundown shopping centers and dead retail scattered all over this valley, the triggers for relapse will always be there. For the Urban Blight Exploration Junkie, it seems the struggle will never end.
