Shopping Centers meet my needs. Junk is not a moral judgement here, it is just an observation. Many people cannot afford single family homes, they choose not to live in apartments, so for a small investment, they purchase mobile homes. Most of today's built form is no more or less junk than the mobile home. Gone are what Aldo Rossi calls urban artifacts, by which he means buildings that a city adopt, cherish, form, and reform as their uses are updated.
Urban artifacts are unique to old cultures that have been around for a long time.
Our towns are largely constructed of short-term use houses, stores, offices, schools, and other buildings that are not designed for longevity. And it's a good thing, too, because if they were, our grandchildren's grandchildren would have an awful lot of ugly around. Building something lasting, as in the olden days, is typically cost-prohibitive. Building anything that won't ever change is a daunting task. Timelessness is out, demountable is in.