The once-thriving Manhattan business district is now a virtual wasteland littered with empty storefronts (曼哈頓精華區鬧空城,成為傻多塵封的記憶)— with locals blaming spiking crime and the Big Apple’s disastrous post-pandemic retail real estate market.
“Big Box” retailers — including Lowes, Bed Bath & Beyond and Staples — have fled in the last few years, leaving one of the city’s shopping meccas peppered with vacant retail space."
"Which neighborhoods have it the worst? Neighborhoods hit the hardest are in Lower and Midtown Manhattan, and downtown Brooklyn business areas, where the vacancy rates are highest. These are also the areas that received the most COVID-19 grants and loans, according to the City Council.
Broadway in SoHo, for example, once bustling with trendy boutiques and cafes, is not the luxury shopper’s paradise it was just a few years ago. Where a clothing store once was has given way to an illegal cannabis shop — a dangerous retail trend that is spiking despite the city’s and state’s attempts to stop it. "