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Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

The November 21st 1976 edition of the Boston Globe spelled out how Robert Brindle was being approached to build a recreational retail facility in Boston.

Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

The next stop on Robert Brindle's quest took him back to New Jersey.  In the December 7th 1976 edition of The Record.  The proposal was to turn an old Ford assembly plant on the Hudson River in Edgewood into an indoor shopping center and amusement park.

Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

Next time it was down to Miami where according to the May 18th 1977 article in the Chicago Tribune.  This time Robert Brindle was being sought by the Omni Hotel to build a park at their Miami location after The World of Sid & Marty Kroft park in Atlanta closed shortly after opening.

Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

With the Miami Omni project going nowhere Robert Brindle started to scale down his plans the next was a $12.5 million amusement park in downtown Jeffersonville, Indiana as laid out in the June 29th 1978 edition of the Courier-Journal.  "Showboat Landing" as it was to be called would have gone all nostalgic for 1800's river life as Jeffersonville is across the Ohio River from Louisville.

Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

This one was left for the voters of Jeffersonville.

Old Chicago Shopping Center & Amusement Park, Bolingbrook Illinois

This article in the August 11th 1978 Courier Journal describes how the park would consist of several buildings including shops and rides.  The rollercoaster would be in a three story building so Jeffersonville wouldn't be getting a huge coaster  but it would be something. 

Like the others this project never got past the planning stage. 

One has to respect Robert Brindle for sticking with his dream and trying to make it work over and over.  As a fan it would would have been nice seeing something like a Village '76 succeeding.  The thing is even though he didn't build another one it was Robert Brindle's idea that eventually bloomed into places like The Mall of America in Minnesota,  the West Edmonton Mall in Calgary, or the American Dream Mall in New Jersey that took his concept of mixing retail with amusement parks, saw the flaws in his thinking, and finally made the concept work.



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Paul B. Drabek