Disagree. Quite easy to place metal detectors in key areas where you enter a mall/store. Doubt it would cost much either, tho can't say for sure.
Wow. OK, let's run the numbers, shall we? Just for an example, I chose Alpharetta, GA's
North Point Mall, since A) I'm familiar with it and B) it's about average-size as far as malls go.
For simplicity's sake, let's assume they put the security checkpoints around the outside entrances, rather than every entrance to the interior. (There are fewer of them, so it would be less costly.)
So we have four direct entrances to the mall, plus five two-story department stores. Each department store has at
least two entrances from the outside, so we can assume at least 14 total entrances to the mall (it's probably closer to 25, but for the sake of argument, let's lowball it).
Now, then, how many checkpoints per entrance? I would think at least two to allow for steady traffic, but there's no way that just two detectors would fly around Christmastime.
I found
one company selling walk-through metal detectors for as little as $3,600. That strikes me as a bit too cheap, especially if you want something hardy, but let's run with it. So initial equipment cost would be over $100,000 just to buy the equipment (2 checkpoints * 14 entrances * $3,600). However, this doesn't count upkeep or remodeling the entrances to accomodate security checkpoints.
The real cost, of course, would be staffing them. For each checkpoint, you're going to want at least two
trained security guards. One to run the checkpoint, one to wand people down when people carry their
car keys into the mall.
According to
Salary.com, the average salary around these parts for a security guard is about $30,000, not counting taxes, benefits, and other stuff that an employer would pay--which would bump the total up to about $40,000 in my guesstimation. So 14 checkpoints * 2 checkpoints per entrance * 2 guards per checkpoint * $40,000 per year = $2,240,000. And that's
not including extra guards that would have to be hired around the holidays or other busy times.
That's not inexpensive for
any business, and I remind you that we
lowballed a few of the numbers. Malls tend to have few employees for a reason--they're expensive to operate as it is. Where would this extra money come from? Well, the rents would go up, and the stores (the ones that didn't move out) would have to charge more. Who are they going to charge more? The customers, who are already deciding that they'd rather go to Target than have to go through a security checkpoint for the privilege of
shopping.
I hardly submit that as some perfect solution, but if it helps (and it would) it'd be stupid not to.
No, it wouldn't help, it would just make shopping malls too costly to operate. And again, guy-wanting-to-kill-people would just find some other public space.
