MACON MALL: MACON, GA
Ken Turner's Commentary
Posted September 12, 2010 (user submitted)
Macon.com advises of the November 4, 2008 courthouse sale of the foreclosed Macon Mall. Currently a court-appointed manager, Jones Lang LaSalle of Chicago, operates the 1.4 million square-foot facility. Macon Mall has lost two anchor tenants and has 39 empty spaces. The total number of spaces is presently 200. Opened in 1975 by Colonial Properties, the mall had four anchors- Davidson's, Sears, JC Penney, and Belk-Matthews. The oddest space was an old railway car near Penney's court which was the Grand Central Station restaurant. All anchors except Belk-Matthews had a restaurant. A Food Court was added in 1986. In 1996 two more anchor stores- Parisian and Dillard's- anchored a new wing with a nearby parking garage added to the east side. By then Macon's population demographic became more urban. The Shoppes at River Crossing, an upscale lifestyle center, opened its doors in North Bibb County in the spring of 2008.
Macon Mall was taken over by The Lightstone Group and managed by The Prime Retail Group in 2005. Foreclosure proceedings were initiated in 2007 by the LaSalle Bank National Association, which was a trustee of loans- one of which included the Macon Mall. That year saw Parisian close and in October 2008 Dillard's announced its closure.
People still go to the mall on weekends and the parking lot is still largely full. This will likely change in the near future with a shopping facility opening in once-rural South Bibb County and heavy growth in Houston County near Georgia Highway 96.
Links
http://livemalls.blogspot.com/2008/01/jcpenney-macon-mall-macon-georgia.html - Photos of the JC Penney at Macon Mall
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Yvette MacGregor’s Commentary:
User submitted Jan 2012The Macon Mall's slow death continues as one of the anchor stores remaining is now on the chopping block.
The Sears store in the Macon Mall is on the closing list released recently by Sears/KMart. Personally, I was in this store on Christmas Eve afternoon and it was like a tomb. I can remember back in the 70's thru 90's when I wouldn't even attempt this mall on Black Friday or Christmas Eve or even Dec. 26th as it would be packed.....I even worked one Christmas season in another store within this mall back in the later 1980's and can remember vividly the hectic pace. Sad to see....
Also, the projected demolition of the newer wing of Macon Mall has now been done and it really looks strange. The Dillard's store at the far east end of the complex was left standing, but the wing it was attached to is now gone, along with the parking deck that was attached to the south side of the Dillard's space; so this is now a free-standing building.