Proposals presented Thursday for the redevelopment of Cincinnati Mall would make the property anything but a traditional retail center.
No funding is in place for any of the plans.
“The mall hasn’t done as well as it could even with a bigger name like (Mills Corp.) and (Simon Property Group). It still has struggled,” said Karla Ellsworth, who was appointed general manager in December. “Keeping it retail would be a hard task.”
Ellsworth appeared Thursday before Fairfield and Forest Park city officials to present early plans of mall owner Cincinnati Holding Co. LLC. She was joined by the company’s principal, Alex Demetriades.
Demetriades took ownership of the property last March, paying just under $6 million for the 1.5 million-square-foot center. In 2002, Mills Corp. paid about $52 million for the property. The property has changed hands twice since.
Ellsworth said she’d spent the last six weeks in negotiations with several different national and local groups interested in locating entertainment concepts in the mall. A hockey arena could take nearly half of the old bigg’s store, she said.
A hotel operator could open a 170,000-square-foot Candlewood Suites in space formerly occupied by Steve & Barry’s. That project would require two stories be added to the structure.
A local mountain bike race promoter has proposed plans for the indoor park. And a Fairfield group likes the idea of a museum dedicated to early agriculture.
Ellsworth has also retained a retail broker with Cushman & Wakefield in New York to market vacant retail spaces along the mall’s corridors. Up to 400,000 square feet of the vacant space could remain retail or restaurants or be leased to banks, medical service firms, pharmacies or government agencies. She said the company planned to offer the most aggressive rental rates region-wide to early occupants.
The larger projects would happen as joint ventures.
"We are looking to do this with people who have done this before, who have experience in their industries," she said.
City officials applauded the company’s efforts so far, but agreed at being cautiously optimistic.
“We’ve been through many starts and stops with this facility,” said Paul Brehm, Forest Park’s economic development director. “After a couple years of spinning our wheels, it’s refreshing to have a new group come in.”
Ellsworth stressed that existing tenants in the building remained successful. Babies “R” Us, Burlington Coat Factory, Kohl’s, Danbarry Cinemas and Bass Pro Shops take up about 500,000 square feet and bring in about $110 million in sales a year. Ellsworth said all five tenants have leases that run through at least 2014.
Only Metropolis Night Club has a lease coming due. She’s in negotiations now with owners of the 30,000-square-foot club.
Ellsworth said she’d already contacted Hamilton and Butler counties to attempt to restore public bus service to the site. And Brehm said the company had been working to make past-due bond payments associated with the property’s parking garages, built in 2002 by the Port of Greater Cincinnati Development Authority. The mall’s previous owner had fallen behind on those payments.
Ellsworth will also oversee any future development that could come at the Terrace Plaza hotel at Sixth and Race streets downtown, which Demetriades purchased a year ago. She declined to comment on the company’s plans for that property.
Demetriades said the company’s focus for now is on the mall.
“I love the mall. I love Cincinnati and I think it’s doable,” he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment