Crabtree Valley Mall

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Facts and statistics
Crabtree Valley Mall


Location	Raleigh, North Carolina, USA
Opening date	1972
Owner	Plaza Associates, Inc.^[1]
No. of stores and services	Over 220
No. of anchor tenants	3
Total retail floor area	1,366,110 square feet (126,916 m²)^[2] (GLA)
Parking	Parking deck surrounding 2/3 of the mall
No. of floors	2
Website	www.crabtree-valley-mall.com

Crabtree Valley Mall is a regional mall located in Raleigh, North Carolina. At 1,300,000 square feet (121,000 m²), it is the largest enclosed mall in the Triangle. Crabtree Valley contains over 220 stores and is anchored by Belk, Sears, and Macy's. Higher-end restaurants located in the mall include The Cheesecake Factory, P. F. Chang's China Bistro, and Kanki.

1 History
2 Anchors
- 2.1 Former Anchors
3 Parking
4 Flooding risk
5 External links
6 References

[edit] History

Crabtree Valley Mall opened in 1972 at the intersection ^[3]of US 70/NC 50 (Glenwood Avenue) and the I-440 Beltline. Original anchors were Hudson Belk, Sears, Miller & Rhoads and Thalhimer's. The mall also included G.C. Murphy and Piccadilly Cafeteria.

From the start, the mall pulled shoppers from all over central and eastern North Carolina. Many of them came to the 251,000-square-foot (23,300 m²) Hudson Belk, which is still the largest store in the complex and serves as a Belk flagship. The mall was remodeled in the mid 1980s and added many upscale specialty stores and a food court. It faced remarkably little competition in its market until the 1990s, when Cary Towne Center in nearby Cary doubled in size and spawned a companion mall, Crossroads Plaza.

To combat the threat of an expanded Cary Towne Center stealing business, Crabtree embarked on a major expansion starting in 1992. G.C. Murphy, Miller & Rhoads, and Piccadilly all closed down during this period. Thalhimer's converted to Hecht's, and began planning for a new,larger location at the mall. In 1993 a 40 by 110-foot (34 m) section of the parking deck collapsed just three months after it had been completely rebuilt. ^[4] Sears closed its Crabtree store in 1994 and built a new location adjacent to it that same year. The old Sears became small shop space and connected to a new, larger Hecht's which also opened in 1994.

The final piece of Crabtree's 1990s renaissance was the opening of North Carolina's first and only Lord & Taylor in late 1995 in the former Thalhimers/Hecht's. However, the store was closed in February, 2006 as part of the reorganization of May Department Stores that began in 2003.^[5] A separate Hudson Belk Men's Store filled the upper level of the former Lord & Taylor, and the lower level has been converted to small store space and new entrance. Construction of new outparcels is underway east of Hudson Belk.

[edit] Anchors

Hudson Belk - 320,000 sq ft (30,000 m²).
- Women's,Children's and Home Store - 3 floors, 251,000 sq ft (23,300 m²), opened 1972
- Men's Store - 1 floor, 69,000 sq ft (6,400 m²), on the upper level of the former Lord & Taylor, opened May 2007
Sears - 2 floors, 130,000 sq ft (12,000 m²)., opened 1995, replacing store built on adjacent site opened in 1972.
Macy's - 2 floors, 180,000 sq ft (17,000 m²)., opened 1995 as Hecht's, changed to Macy's in 2006

[edit] Former Anchors

Thalhimer's - Opened 1972, changed to Hecht's in 1992, moved to new location in 1995
Lord & Taylor - Opened 1995, closed 2006

[edit] Parking

Parking at the Crabtree Valley Mall is fairly unusual; there is very little at-grade parking. A multistory parking deck surrounds four-fifths of the mall. The mall's protruding anchor tenants force drivers to take many turns in the parking deck to get to their desired destination. Valet parking is available at the mall's northeast entrance.

[edit] Flooding risk

Crabtree Valley Mall is situated next to Crabtree Creek, a tributary of the Neuse River that begins near Morrisville and winds through Umstead State Park as well as western and north central Raleigh. As the watershed around the mall become increasingly covered with impervious parking lots, the creek floods easily following major storms. Such floods occurred frequently in the mall's early years, but diminished with the construction of large retaining basins upstream of the mall.

Heavy rains caused by the remnants of Tropical Storm Alberto flooded the lower level parking lots of the mall on June 14, 2006, as well as a great deal of the bottom level of anchor store Sears, forcing the mall to close for the day. A similar situation occurred with Hurricane Fran in 1996, when flood waters flowed through the first floor of the mall and caused a few stores to remain closed for nearly two months.