We should have a dedicated thread, in where each of us can list the area, or areas that we personally know what Halls have sold, are for sale, and which ones have been consolidated.
I am sure there are enough of us on this board to represent most states, and cities in America, and Canada and England. Any other countries would just be gravy. Then by everyone contributing what they know about the Hall sale/merging in their areas, we would have a nice "chart" to be able to see the decline.
I for one, can say that the Hall i grew up in, in one of the boroughs of NYC, i might add, has indeed merged with another Hall. This happened about a year ago. Go back 35 years ago, and the Hall was bursting at the seams, so much so that the congregation SPLIT into 2 FULL congregations.
NOW, fast forward 35 years later and those 2 same congregations have merged BACK together to form 1 Hall. Its attendance of both congregations recombined again, now equals LESS than what 1 of the 2 Halls was after they split all those years ago.
The fact that these 2 congregations, in a VERY populated city as NYC, where the populations are INCREASING, had to merge back into 1 congregation is very telling. There used to be 2 full, of 12 brothers EACH, Elders bodies. Now after BOTH congs merging, the dont even make up barely a full Elders body. Its a joke. The attendance is VERY down, and they are dropping like flies.
Again, we should all list what we know of our areas, and former areas, and maybe make a chart, and REALLY see what Halls are selling and being disbanded, and i guarantee it will be VERY telling indeed.