The business partners are tired of watching other tenants flee the ailing mall. And they are tired of waiting for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the mall's owner, to detail just how and when it will invest the millions needed to revamp the property. So they are packing up their Tabula Rasa and Cabin Fever stores and moving to Trolley Square, a thriving 235,000-square-foot specialty shopping center at 602 E. 500 South near downtown.

While other malls - including ZCMI Center in downtown Salt Lake City and Holladay's Cottonwood Mall - struggle to retain tenants and customers, Trolley is in the enviable position of having little, if anything, to fix, said John Owens, a retail/land broker at Commerce CRG in Salt Lake City. Trolley Square, which has a vacancy rate of about 5 percent, has a bright future simply building on a niche of popular upscale stores and restaurants, he said.

"It is really a unique property that has weathered time and competition pretty darn well," Owens said.

Trolley, built on an old trolley complex used until 1945, became a shopping mall in the early 1970s. The property, which is now owned by Indianapolis-based real estate investment trust Simon Property Group, has faced some tough times over the years.

But not today.

Anchored by Williams-Sonoma, two Pottery Barn stores and Restoration Hardware, the development, which caters to a higher-income, older clientele than other malls, has a number of tenants such as Sharper Image that are not found anywhere else in Utah.

That unique mix of stores draws shoppers like Whitney Petersen of Salt Lake City.

Only Trolley Square has Pottery Barn Kids, a favorite of Petersen, the mother of a 15-month-old boy. On Wednesday the store was filled with parents and children.

"There is a lot of good stuff in here," she said. But not a lot of room to grow. Trolley has little space to expand on its 10 acres, manager Dawn Katter said, although it does plans to add two new restaurants or another anchor tenant.

McAndrew of Tabula Rasa, which carries stationery, writing instruments and other items, and Cabin Fever, a card and gift store, believes they are moving to Trolley at just the right time.

"Trolley has successful restaurants and quality stores that are doing well," McAndrew said.

"We are excited to start over here."