Quote:
Originally Posted by mersar
Aside from Eau Claire (which is pretty much vacant, and facing future redevelopment... I will let someone else post images/info that do it justice), the closest Calgary has to dead malls is Westbrook Mall. It's close if not fully occupied (I haven't been in there in quite a while, so this is secondhand), but if it weren't for the Walmart and Safeway the few dozen stores inside the mall probably wouldn't be there. Fortunately the site sits right on the future WLRT route, so it may be developed once that goes ahead. Pretty much every other mall is thriving in the boom, and most have either completed expansions in the past few years, or planning new/more expansion in the very near future.
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Westbrook is far from dead. A lot of money has been put into renovations over the last few years. Safeway could use an upgrade on the outside though; the inside was done last year. The Food Court was expanded and Sport Chek moved in from 37th St/Richmond Rd last year. Wal-Mart did their expansion a couple of years back. Yeah there are a couple of empty stores, but those are filled in time. The parking lot though is still a clusterfuck though. They reconfigured the roadways and parking with new curb and gutter last year, but never repaved it.
As for TOD, a couple of residential towers would help to get more activity there. Even before the WLRT comes, it is already well-served by transit.