Les Promenades Gatineau
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| Location | Gatineau, Quebec |
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| Opening date | 1978 |
| Management | Francis Vermette |
| Owner | Oxford Properties Group |
| No. of stores and services | about 140 stores |
| No. of anchor tenants | 4 (Archambault, la Baie, Costco, H&M, Forever 21 & La maison Simons) |
| Total retail floor area | 845,329 square feet (78,533.6 m2) |
| No. of floors | 1 |
| Parking | over 4 000 spaces |
| Website | www.lespromenades.com |
Les Promenades Gatineau is a major shopping centre located in Canada's National Capital Region. It is located in the city of Gatineau near the intersection of Greber and Maloney Boulevards, one of the city's busiest intersections and just off Autoroute 50. It is the city's biggest mall by retail space and clientele.
It is considered to be the second largest shopping centre in the area in terms of retail space trailing only St. Laurent Shopping Centre's 972,000 square feet (90,301.8 m2). The website claims it has about 845,000 square feet (78,503 m2) in total space including its three-story office building in the south side of the complex that houses a dental clinic and federal government offices.[1]
The mall is sprawled out on one single level with several secondary corridors and sections lined up in different directions which makes it difficult to locate smaller boutiques. The shopping centre does have several anchor tenants which includes la Baie, Costco, Laura and Archambault.
It is located in the middle of a major shopping district in the Gatineau sector in which several other strip-malls and big-box stores are lined-up all along Maloney or Greber Boulevards in and around Les Promenades. The Village Greber is located just across Maloney and les Galeries Gatineau which includes Target, The Brick and Best Buy is just across its eastern street.In addition, several small stores and restaurants are located scattered on its northern parking lot.
The Polyvalente Le Carrefour High School is located just across the street from Chemin de La Savane. During the lunch hours, numerous teens from the school cross the street to the mall.
Since its acquisition by Oxford Properties, the mall has begun a major large-scale renovation project with the goal of both reinforcing essential infrastructure of the building as well as raising the profile of the centre. In recent years, the mall as increasingly been known for hosting specialty clothing retail stores not present at malls elsewhere in the region. There was also major modifications being made to the retail floor space in anticipation of the arrival of numerous new tenants as well as the departure of others. Since the commencement of renovations in late 2012 several new stores have been added such as fashion retailers H&M and Forever 21 (which both opened in October 2014), joining the roster alongside existing retailers Garage, Amnesia, Dynamite, Caveau des Jeans, Jack & Jones, Claire-France and The Bay. Laura, one of the previous anchor tenants closed in late 2014, with the remaining space to be occupied by La Maison Simons, which is slated to open in August 2015. In addition, the mall also welcomes the arrival of Starbucks in September 2013 and DavidsTea the following year.
According to various surveys, almost 80% of its shoppers are women and the average age is 38.[1]
History
The mall opened its doors in 1978, becoming a major shopping destination of the former city of Gatineau's.
During the 1990s and early 2000s, the mall did experience some difficulties as several large retail spaces were left vacant frequently as several stores and even anchor tenants closed their doors. In the 1990s, K-Mart, Eaton and Steinberg, which at one point were the mall's three anchor tenants, all closed their doors.
The Kmart location is now occupied by the Laura superstore. It was also, briefly, the Bay's appliance section location.
In the late 1990s, the shopping centre made a major expansion on its eastern end. Previously, the mall ended where the Famous Players cinemas were located. When the renovation process ended, a new anchor tenant was in place: la Baie. Also, a Dollarama, a food court, a new office building, a Christopher International hair salon and an artisan or small merchants (Boulevard des Artisans) zone were added.
Also during the 1990s, the Eaton store on the western end of the shopping centre closed its doors. During the next several years that area was for the most part left vacant except when Laura occupied the area for a small period. However, in March 2006, Costco had relocated its location from the north end of the city to its current location at les Promenades bringing a new life to its western end which was often plagued with numerous vacant spaces for several years. Archambault, a Quebec music franchise store also opened a location in 2005 near Costco and the Buffet Paradis, the mall's Chinese restaurant.
Steinberg also had a supermarket in the mall since his opening, but closed when the company folded in 1992. It was later occupied by Super C and Metro. In 2008, Metro closed and the space remained empty until Urban Planet took it.
Hours of operation
- Monday-Tuesday : 09:30-6:00
- Wednesday to Friday : 09:30-9:00
- Saturday : 09:00-17:00
- Sunday : 10:00-17:00
Transportation
Being at one of the city's busiest intersections and near the city's main highway, it is very easily accessible and parking space is abundant.
The Société de transport de l'Outaouais offers several routes that travel to various areas across the city from the shopping mall. It is considered, outside of the downtown core, the most important transit hub in the city. On average per day, 8 000 shoppers use public transit for shopping .
The STO has a major Park And Ride facility of over 500 parking spaces in proximity the mall. It has also recently rebuilt the transit terminal and built a new client service centre inside the mall. The client service centre has since moved to La Cite Station when the Rapibus Transit Corridor was opened on October 19, 2013. The number of Park and Ride spaces was also significantly reduced. Transit accessibility was greatly improved with the opening of the Rapibus station on the north side of the mall.
Routes that serve the shopping centre include:
- Routes 57, 63 and 67 which serves on La Savane Road
- Rapibus Routes 68, 100, 200, 300, 400, 800 and 810 are serving Les Promenades Rapibus Station on the North side of Maloney Boulevard
- Previous the majority of the Gatineau sector local routes ended at Les Promenades. Since the Rapibus opened, the majority of the local routes are now ending at La Gappe, La Cite and Labrosse stations which transfer to the Rapibus routes which serves on the north side of Maloney .
References
External links
Coordinates: 45°28′33″N 75°41′47″W / 45.47583°N 75.69639°W
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