River Oaks West Shopping Center — Local services in Thornton Township

Situated in Calumet City, IL in what was once a thriving Caucausian suburban village of Chicago, IL that slowly became a suburb filled with upstanding & prosperous African-Americans. Since its inception 'WEST RIVER OAKS MALL' as the mall on this side of Torrence Avenue [runs north & south through Calumet City] was originally known has had a multitude of retailer's and food establishments come and go. □■ Now known as 'CALUMET CENTER' shopping mall [the latest of constant property ownership changes] the current retail mix signifies some degree of permanence that I pray will remain in place THIS TIME ! 》After all these years I am frankly tired of the ever-changing scope of available retailers' in this area. TIRED! FRUSTRATED! ANGERED! I have lived long enough to have seen this area go through a slew of changes in stores, restaurants, eateries and discount warehouse/grocer chains for no other reason then the common "RACIAL DEMOGRAPHIC" changes. I have seen good.......Businesses like LEONA'S RESTAURANT now replaced by a restaurant named, TILLYS. Yet the nearby DENNY'S faving Torrance Ave. still stands strong. Retailer's such as the ex-CIRCUIT CITY, OFFICE MAX, VALUE CITY FURNITURE and TARGET exited the mall and left nothing behind but a stark blatant, glaring blightedness. TARGET exited the mall some years back DUE TO HIGH THEFT RATES & a changing diaspora in its customerbase, as per Tom, Targets' Manager back then which was sad and disheartening to hear. And Value City is now located closer to I-94 on 159th Street. Office Depot bought out Office Max and the nearest store is now located in Indianas' N. Lake County. ● Today.......where Circuit City once stood is just a dark, vacant & ugly blight on the mall. The old Target location is equally vacant & ghostly-lighted. A wig & beauty supply emporium is now the ONLY surviving store on this side of the Calumet Center. And the only surviving restaurant is Applebees. Yet, one would think with two major bank branches, Bank of America and Chase Manhattan Bank, one would logically think that this side of River Oaks Mall, correction, 'Calumet Center Mall' would be faring FAR BETTER than it is! So therein lies the absolute confusion and the apothetic status of a community [Calumet City, IL]. ■ On opposite side of the main street named Torrence Ave. still sits 'The River Oaks Mall' whose original layout was comprised of an absolutely beautiful outdoor center plaza with stores like SEARS surrounding the outdoor plaza. Today, that plaza its 'trademark symbol' is loooonnnnggg gone and so is SEARS and department stores like the infamous MARSHALL FIELDS and the once loved CARSON PIRIE SCOTT & CO. Yet JC PENNYS department store is thriving. ●● ON THE PLUS SIDE, new thriving businesses include: SONIC, Panda Express, WHITE CASTLES, BIG LOTS, Marshalls, Petco and Sams Club and others. Store theft rates are at lowest ever per various Managers I've surveyed recently. Per many Manager's the theft rates went up back in 2012-14 which they believe was likely due to an increased influx of bad youthful influences and sudden upsweep of another race moving into the suburban township. In summation, very much unlike the days of its primarily White-based populace, Calumet City has suffered much racial changes and tumultuous retail changes in the last twenty-plus years which I pray will settle down soon. But further south on Torrence where businesses like IHOP, Walmart, Pier One and Old Country Buffet have exited yet another mall in recent decades with Walmart & IHOP relocating to Northern Indiana also the torrential 'Run-for-the-Hills' ploy is still ongoing. Needless, to say, Calumet City must either re-strategize its retail mix or else face more potential blight. I equally believe that Calumet Citys' Mayor should also highly consider revamping & upgrading all if its commercial spaces as well. As it stands now the commercial areas are beginning to...

Play number 1Z small was outside. I've been living out here for about 28 years now. Once upon a time this place was really thriving. But there's only a few places in there that I go now. So the thing is, what gets me is the people who own them all. Who are not American from what I hear? How is mall is past all over an open Uber? And it's called Sting the taxpayers money each time in his past dog a past over or on recess. He didn't make money and he is a gidden. His money back and send song. That's what I don't like. Like I say, it's only a couple of places in there that I will go Dustin NWI don't know what else to say about it. I mean the store that I want to for great. But the mall is self. In general, something has to be done. They have to figure out how to stop this and how to stop the people who purchase this mall Uber and Uber and Uber from collecting money from the taxpayers. Because he didn't make any money and he gives them all. Fake and then he gets even more money. It's a vicious cycle. I don't know how long it has been going on, but something you needs to be done about it with a quicklist. Have...

I don't know what's going on with this mall, but it used to be a great place to go to hang out with your friends and family and go shopping, but now there's hardly any stores in there I'm surprised the mall is still even open and a lot of times you get people who are so ignorant going there that they'll bump into you and just keep walking and not even say I'm sorry excuse me. I'm not a tall guy I'm only 5'7 and I had a couple of kids with me one day and this guy and his group of friends bumped into the little kids who the oldest one at the time was 7 and just knock them over kept walking and I said dude what the hell you're going to knock over a little kid and keep going. The security did nothing about it instead they made us leave to prevent an issue with the people who were causing problems. So we left called the police they came and even they said well there's nothing they could do about it because they don't know what the guys look like and the cameras did not even catch them which was BS because the camera was literally right...