The city of San Francisco is losing another business. They’ve already lost hotel owners, a Whole Foods, and Nordstrom. Now they’re losing a Cinemark movie theater.
The FOX Business Network reports:
San Francisco loses another large downtown business as city’s troubles mountCinemark Holdings, Inc. is shuttering its downtown San Francisco theater, becoming the latest major firm to high-tail it out of the troubled California city.”Cinemark can confirm it has decided to permanently close the Century San Francisco Centre 9 and XD theater shortly before the conclusion of its lease term following a comprehensive review of local business conditions,” a spokesperson for the company told FOX Business in a statement.The theater is located in the Westfield San Francisco Centre, whose owner, shopping center giant Westfield, announced Monday it would be handing the property back to a bank due to “the challenging operating conditions in downtown San Francisco.”The mall remains operational amid the search for a new buyer, but Westfield said prior to Cinemark’s announcement the property would only be 55% leased when Nordstrom packs up from the location at the end of August as part of the high-end retailer’s recent decision to close both its downtown San Francisco locations due to the “dynamics” of the area.
Here’s a video report from ABC News in San Francisco.
The San Francisco Standard points out some of the problems in the area:
The area surrounding the shopping center has been increasingly troubled. Cinemark theaters are accessible via a set of elevators in the Westfield mall where human waste has been found regularly, according to mall employees.In the San Francisco Centre, nearly half of the storefronts and eateries that were open in 2020 have since closed.The news is yet another major blow to San Francisco’s Union Square shopping district overall. The imminent Cinemark closure news adds a 24th major shutdown in the area since the start of the pandemic, including the recent announcement that Old Navy will close its longtime Market Street location on July 1.
What is the city going to do to stop this doom loop?
Featured image via YouTube.
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