What will 2025 bring in the American suburbs? A second thing I will be watching for involves the fate of shopping malls and retail locations.

While the suburbs are known first for their emphasis on single-family homes, they are also full of commercial activity. Specifically, shopping malls, retailers, and strip malls dot the suburban landscape. Drive down major roadways through the American suburbs and you are likely to see retail activity all over the place.

With the ongoing shift toward online shopping and shopping by delivery, what happens to all of these locations? The shopping mall has been suffering for years. A quintessential suburban feature with acres of free parking, numerous retailers in one location, and a place for teenagers and others to hang out, many malls will not survive. Similarly, big box stores and smaller retailers are also closing.

Suburban communities have been working on this for years. Can the shopping mall become more of an entertainment and restaurant center? Can it survive with apartments and housing added on site? Can they be demolished, rezoned, and be home to thriving new developments? For the big box store, what can fill that space?

In all of these plans and activity, there are some common patterns at work:

1. Suburbs want to replace the revenue malls and retailers produced. This can mean they hold on to ideas of retail or revenue producing uses for a long time.
2. What replaces the retail locations should not significantly drain local services.
3. Redevelopment, even if local actors generally agree on what should be done, can take a while. Some of these malls and retail locations have been there for decades. Their particular location and context may vary but changes can affect local character and experiences.

At the same time, some suburban communities will continue to have thriving malls and retail locations. Will this only be in wealthier communities or in ones with advantageous locations within a region or among ones that provide certain desirable amenities? Even if the number of shopping malls, strip malls, and big box stores declines this year, they are not going away completely anytime soon. But the patterns of where there are may continue to fuel differences between suburbs in regions.