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Shopping Centers Today -> May 2002
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IS MALL OF AMERICA ABOUT TO GET COMPANY?
By Debra Hazel
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| Pyramid’s attractions will include a replica of the Erie Canal, an aquarium and a 500,000-square-foot indoor sports field. |
Nearly 10 years after the 4.2 million-square-foot Mall of America’s debut, the Bloomington, Minn., megamall may finally be seeing some competition, at least in scale. Construction is set to begin this spring on DestiNY USA, the expansion of Syracuse, N.Y.’s Carousel Center mall into a 5 million-square-foot retail and entertainment complex.
Carousel Center will become DestiNY USA at its scheduled opening in the summer of 2004. The name reflects the goal of making the project a major travel and tourism destination, according to its developer, Pyramid Cos., Syracuse.
The project will resemble a resort, said Mike Lorenz, a Pyramid spokesman, with hotels, restaurants and hotels balancing the retail offerings. It will feature a saltwater aquarium, a 500,000-square-foot indoor sports field, a 65-acre park and a replica of the Erie Canal, as well as 4,000 hotel rooms.
It also will house a 50,000-square-foot International Tourism/Exposition Center promoting upstate New York’s attractions, part of a tourism initiative to be funded through sales taxes generated by the expansion.
While many in the shopping center industry believe Mall of America helped create a tourist market, that market already exists for DestiNY USA, Lorenz said.
“We’re located centrally in an existing tourism location that we’re rebranding as DestiNY,” he said. Area attractions include the Finger Lakes and other activities along the Onondaga lakefront.
Essentially, the 1.6 million-square-foot Carousel Center will become one anchor for the complex. Opened in October 1990, Carousel is anchored by The Bon-Ton, Hoyts Cinema 19, J.C. Penney, Kaufmann’s and Lord & Taylor. The new complex will feature more than 400 retailers, restaurants and activities.
If a complex even remotely approaching Mall of America’s scale is to be built, Syracuse may be one of the best locations, says a fellow upstate developer.
“From an upstate New York perspective, they couldn’t have found a better place to put DestiNY USA,” said Arthur Judelsohn, president of Buffalo, N.Y.-based Berlow Real Estate.
The project sits near the intersection of interstates 81 and 90, with a population of more than 2 million to the east and nearly as many to the west. More than 75 million people live within an eight-hour drive, according to the developer. Pyramid predicts the center will see about 35 million visitors annually, 12 million of them from out of state and 2 million from outside the United States. Mall of America attracts more than 43 million visitors a year, including 2.6 million from outside the area.
Despite Mall of America’s trailblazing, however, development of megacomplexes has clearly not become any easier. The Carousel expansion is being built on the site of a junkyard and leaking oil tanks. Pyramid is being paid $11 million by Sunoco to complete a cleanup.
DestiNY also faces competitive challenges not faced by Mall of America, including casino and entertainment developments on both the U.S. and Canadian sides of nearby Niagara Falls, observers note.
Nevertheless, Pyramid chooses to view all of that as a benefit to the region and to the project.
“Our upstate region will be thriving, and that’s part of the DestiNY story,” Lorenz said. “It really brings the concept to the forefront.”
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