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Show We'll miss Christensen's and Radmall's By MARCELLA WALKER Dave Radmall dropped into the office on Monday to tell us that he has decided to close his hardware store next door. It was like a bombshell and everyone sat in stunned silence for a minute before asking him the obvious, "Why?" Pleasant Grove is no different than most other towns in Utah. The downtown area just does not enjoy the business it once did before be-fore there were malls and easy transportation to those malls. In a small town there is not always the variety to choose from that one would want. In Pleasant Grove there are no new car dealers, there are no big appliance stores, there are no big department stores, there are not a lot of restaurants although there are some very good eating places here. . Because it is not hard to get to the mall, people drive to Orem and Orem gets to enjoy the fruits of our tax dollars rather than Pleasant Grove. It is a dilemma and in the way of things, nice stores like Radmall Hardware and Christensen's Department De-partment Store decide not to buck the will of the people any more. A couple of weeks ago when Christensen's announced that they were closing, people couldn't be- p.g. blab few lieve it. Many said they shopped there all the time. Obviously, there were not enough of them who really re-ally did. In an emergency, people are glad to have a Radmall Hardware or a Christensen's Department Store close at hand, but too many times, over the long hall, they go to a larger town to shop and so the little hometown businesses cannot take the financial strain any longer and have to close. Fortunately, up until now, Pleasant Pleas-ant Grove has not had too many empty buildings on Main St. but then, we don't have a real lot of buildings on Main St. to begin with. Actually, just one block on both sides and one block on one side. Intermountain Craft moved over to Center Street recently and that left an empty building to go with the old post office, Elwood's old barber shop, and the building just north of Smith Market. The building between Ted's Barber Shop and the Pool Hall was just sold to a TV repair service. People are venturing opinions and some say that eventually all the business will be on the State Road because that is where all the traffic is. They are probably right. I noticed a couple of years ago when the stretch of 1-15 through theNephiareawascompleted, that Nephi put up a magnificent fight to keep traffic coming through the downtown area. Their efforts probably helped a little, but undoubtedly not enough. I hate to think of our tax dollars going to Orem or American Fork or even Salt Lake City. We need them right here, but you have to admit that malls are convenient because if you cannot find it in one store, especially clothes, you can quickly move on to another. On the other hand, some businesses busi-nesses in small towns just keep on doing things the way they always did and neglect to do the things that are necessary to update or improve their business. Americans spend a lot of money on commodities. But they have a limited amount of time to spend on shopping. They go where it is easy to get to and where it is convenient. I am the same way. I never shop in downtown Salt Lake anymore because it is too hard to get to. There is too much traffic and no convenient parking places. Even driving around and around in a parking terrace to find a parking place is frustrating. It use to be a treat to shop in Salt Lake, but no more. I have always wondered why Salt Lake's downtown businesses complain about no shoppers and going broke when there is absolutely abso-lutely no parking places left and traffic everywhere. Where do all those people go if not to the shops? ZCMI was once going to build a store in American Fork. Then they decided to build the store in the South Towne Center on 10600 South and that was too close to American Fork to build one there. Now they have announced that they are going to build one in the East Bay area of Provo. North Utah County got the shaft again, as I see it. Mayor David Holdawas plan to form an Economic Development Committee to aid present businesses and encourage new ones is a sound one and is coming none too soon, it would appear. Losing Radmall Hardware and Christensen's Department Store is like losing two very good friends. We will miss them. The only trouble is, it is like waiting for the other shoe to drop. Who will be next? Shop at home, you guys! And a big thank you to Radmall Hardware Hard-ware and Christensen's Department Store for the good times. |