Crossroads Plaza (North Carolina)

Crossroads Plaza is an outdoor shopping center located in Cary, North Carolina, United States. The shopping center was opened in 1992 and has been added onto and renovated several times since then. It contains over 70 stores, including national chains and locally-owned stores.[1]

Originally planned as a $240 million, 1,300,000-square-foot (120,000 m2) regional mall on 237 acres (0.96 km2) of land with anchor stores by top New York-based retailers, the "megamall" was intended to attract more than local customers with a planned opening of fall 1989. Original plans included 250,000-square-foot (23,000 m2) of non-retail space including a corporate park and hotel. The original owner was NCNB (now Bank of America) acting as trustee for the Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio, and the developer was LJ Hooker Corporation, which had embarked on an ill-fated plan to build malls across the United States. The planned development would have increased Cary's tax base by 18%.

LJ Hooker was forced to put its American interests into bankruptcy, and the Crossroads site was purchased by New Market Development. Their drastically changed plan shifted from an enclosed mall at the center of the site to a 640,000-square-foot (59,000 m2) power center with numerous big-box anchors lining the edge of the site. Although the new proposal had half as much retail space, it was very large for an outdoor retail center at the time.

The plaza's original anchors included Toys "R" Us, Uptons department store, Stein Mart, Bookstar, Pet Depot, Marshalls, REI, OfficeMax, Home Quarters Warehouse, and Phar-Mor. Service Merchandise opened after the grand opening.[2]

Several of the original anchors have changed. Bookstar shut after acquisition by Barnes & Noble, and others have gone bankrupt: Home Quarters was replaced with Dick's Sporting Goods and Bed Bath & Beyond, Phar-Mor was replaced by Best Buy, Service Merchandise was replaced by DSW, Inc. and A.C. Moore, and Uptons was replaced with Old Navy.

Anchors

Other anchors were built within the original Crossroads Mall parcel, but opened outside the plaza:

Surrounding shopping area

Since Crossroads was built, several adjacent or nearby shopping centers have been established. These surrounding centers have grocery stores or discount stores as anchors, though they also include competitors of anchors of Crossroads itself. Cary Towne Center is approximately 1-mile (1.6 km) from Crossroads Plaza down Walnut Street.

References

  1. ↑ Crossroads Plaza | 2008
  2. ↑ Byrd, Tom (1994). Around and About Cary (2nd ed.). Ann Arbor, MI: Edwards Brothers. p. 143. OCLC 32207886.

External links

Coordinates: 35°45′40″N 78°44′17″W / 35.760983°N 78.738102°W