Page 12 - BusinessWest May 13, 2024

40 YEARS OF COMMERCIAL DEVELOPMENT
The Landscape Has Changed — in Many Ways
BY GEORGE O’BRIEN
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When Jack Dill, presi- dent of Colebrook Realty Services, arrived in downtown Spring- field in the mid-’70s, it was a different world and a much dif- ferent city.
“The internet and that kind of distribution model is cre- ating real problems for the large, enclosed malls.”
ize and build as an employee of the bank. It, too, had retail and restaurants on two floors.
By 1984, the scene had started to change, with retail experiencing a sharp decline in Baystate West with the opening of the Holy- oke Mall in 1979. Forbes & Wallace was soon demolished to make way for what is still known as Monarch Place, even though the namesake tenant and partner in the project, Monarch Capital Corp., filed for bankruptcy in 1991, and
The still-new mixed-use
complex on Main Street, then
called Baystate West, complete
with a 28-story office tower,
was crammed with retail on
two floors (much of it migrat-
ing from storefronts elsewhere
in the downtown), everything from a Friendly’s to a sporting-goods store to a men’s clothing shop.
It was connected via airwalks to two major department stores, Forbes & Wallace and Stei- ger’s, the latter of which was also connected via airwalk to an even more recent addition to the landscape, the new home of Springfield Institu- tion for Savings, which Dill helped conceptual-
JACK DILL
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12 MAY 13, 2024
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