Highland Mall Redevelopment Update Thread

[The ATX]

Highland mall official shuts down April 30. Less than 12 stores are still open.

http://impactnews.com/austin-metro/n...ollege-campus/

[Mopacs]

Originally Posted by Hill Country

Highland mall official shuts down April 30. Less than 12 stores are still open.

http://impactnews.com/austin-metro/n...ollege-campus/

Bummer... a piece of my childhood is going with it. I'm nevertheless happy with the redevelopment plans. Certainly better than an abandoned, derelict mall.

[drummer]

Agreed. Same here - we used to go there a lot.

[Digatisdi]

I'd be interested to see, once final figures on the number of residential units come out, how much the Highland project alone would add to the current density of the city.

[corvairkeith]

Originally Posted by Mopacs

Bummer... a piece of my childhood is going with it. I'm nevertheless happy with the redevelopment plans. Certainly better than an abandoned, derelict mall.

I took a walk around in Highland Mall yesterday. I recommend it if you have any memories of the place in better times. This may be your last chance of seeing it somewhat recognizable.

[austlar1]

I have such a hard time figuring out how anybody could be nostalgic about Highland Mall. It was a butt ugly and soul-less standard issue shopping mall. It never had any of the high voltage shopping energy you might have found at a glitzy mall in a bigger city like the Galleria in Houston or NorthPark in Dallas. I guess maybe it was a fun place for bored teenagers to hang out, but I was way beyond that period of my life when I first encountered Highland Mall. The placed depressed me and made me long for slicker environs in a bigger city.

[Syndic]

My friends and I all used to have our parents drop us off there in the 90's and we'd just hang out there for hours; buying CD's, clothes, giant slices of pizza from Cozzoli's (we really never ate anything else). It was the fun thing to do when we were like 12-13 years old. I'm definitely nostalgic about it. I don't really care for "glitzy", austlar1. In fact, I find it kind of disgusting. Highland Mall was the humble, warm, comfortable epicenter of life in north Austin and I'm a north Austin kid deep in my soul.

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by Syndic

My friends and I all used to have our parents drop us off there in the 90's and we'd just hang out there for hours; buying CD's, clothes, giant slices of pizza from Cozzoli's (we really never ate anything else). It was the fun thing to do when we were like 12-13 years old. I'm definitely nostalgic about it. I don't really care for "glitzy", austlar1. In fact, I find it kind of disgusting. Highland Mall was the humble, warm, comfortable epicenter of life in north Austin and I'm a north Austin kid deep in my soul.

I feel your pain, but I do not miss Highland Mall. When I was a kid we still went DOWNTOWN to shop and hang out. This was Fort Worth in the 1950s and early 60s. We usually got there by riding the bus!! Actually, I kind of hate all shopping malls, but I will admit to getting into the spirit of things when I used to live in the vicinity of a few high voltage malls like Tyson's Corner in DC or Lenox Square in Atlanta. They were the equally warm but far less humble epicenters of life in Northern Virginia and Buckhead/Atlanta. I am sure that Dallas and Houston folks of a certain age developed the warm fuzzies for NorthPark or Galleria, and Fort Worth kids from your era probably got all stoked about Hulen Mall or Ridgmar both of which are from the same era as Highland Mall and equally depressing IMHO.

[TXLove]

Highland Mall was the place to be as a teenager. They had this arcade place called the Goldmine, Spencers was cool but as a northsider this was the place to be and hang out as a teenager in the 90's. Northcross had just the ice skating rink and Barton Creek was way too far out. I have some memories at this place, sad to see it go but also looking forward to what it will become. Great pictures Covairkeith

[austlar1]

Here is a link to a strange website that has the skinny on lots of malls (dead or alive) located in Texas and Louisiana. This is the part about Highland Mall. There are many other malls discussed on the links section on the lower right side of this site. http://southernretail.blogspot.com/s...ighland%20Mall

[drummer]

Agreed, I spent many a weekend there as a teenager - but almost as many at Barton Springs. I will say though - looking at those pictures of an empty mall, I kind of expect Arnold Schwarzenegger to bust out of an empty store fighting some terrorist in an early 90s action flick.

[Mopacs]

Originally Posted by corvairkeith

I took a walk around in Highland Mall yesterday. I recommend it if you have any memories of the place in better times. This may be your last chance of seeing it somewhat recognizable.

Great shots! A group of us were there yesterday afternoon as well. I don't suppose the lonely security guard hassled you too? We explained how sentimental the mall was to us and our childhoods (and I'm talking many many years). His response was "NO photographs, NO video recording!" and walked off. Then he left and we resumed

Edit: This mall had great sentimental value to my family and I. I remember seeing the cast of Nickelodeon's "Pinwheel" children's series appear in the old Joske's/Dillard's wing. That was a HUGE deal...at least to me I guess. I don't suppose anyone remembers that show?

[sammyk]

Originally Posted by Mopacs

Great shots! A group of us were there yesterday afternoon as well. I don't suppose the lonely security guard hassled you too? We explained how sentimental the mall was to us and our childhoods (and I'm talking many many years). His response was "NO photographs, NO video recording!" and walked off. Then he left and we resumed

Edit: This mall had great sentimental value to my family and I. I remember seeing the cast of Nickelodeon's "Pinwheel" children's series appear in the old Joske's/Dillard's wing. That was a HUGE deal...at least to me I guess. I don't suppose anyone remembers that show?

I remember that show. Now the theme is stuck in my head.

[The ATX]

This seemed like the main shopping place in Austin until Barton Creek Mall opened. After that Highland seemed to start going down hill.

Are there any up-to-date renderings of the redevelopment plans for this place? From what I recall there were a lot more plans for the site than just an ACC campus at the end of a fantasy light rail line.

[Syndic]

Originally Posted by Hill Country

This seemed like the main shopping place in Austin until Barton Creek Mall opened. After that Highland seemed to start going down hill.

Are there any up-to-date renderings of the redevelopment plans for this place? From what I recall there were a lot more plans for the site than just an ACC campus at the end of a fantasy light rail line.

There's this from a recent Impact News article:



There's also this, which I think is supposed to be the old Dillard's renovated:



I'm really looking forward to this area being reactivated and re-energized. It's in such a key location so it affects everything around it.

[KevinFromTexas]

Originally Posted by Mopacs

Great shots! A group of us were there yesterday afternoon as well. I don't suppose the lonely security guard hassled you too? We explained how sentimental the mall was to us and our childhoods (and I'm talking many many years). His response was "NO photographs, NO video recording!" and walked off. Then he left and we resumed

Edit: This mall had great sentimental value to my family and I. I remember seeing the cast of Nickelodeon's "Pinwheel" children's series appear in the old Joske's/Dillard's wing. That was a HUGE deal...at least to me I guess. I don't suppose anyone remembers that show?

Yeah, I remember that show. That one and Today's Special, which, oddly enough was set in a mall.

I don't have too many memories at Highland Mall since I grew up in South Austin, but I do remember hanging out there with my best friend and brother one afternoon. And I remember getting my Boy Scout knife as a surprise present at Highland Mall. I remember sitting and waiting in the parking lot at night looking at the geodesic cubes lit up. I think the last time we went was maybe 10 years ago. I always thought the mall didn't look too bad. It was at least bright and airy.

[the Genral]

I used to visit all 4. Then mostly Barton Creek. Go shopping, then check out the view of dt. But before BCM, it was Highland. Sort of sad and eerie, those pics. Spencers and x-mas shopping were the main reasons for going. I bought a few puppies from Petland in NCM, even ice skated there a bunch of times. Haven't been to any mall to shop in years, I hate the way they smell, and they all smell the same. Ironically, I now work at the LLM. I get to enjoy mall smell 8 hours a day. I wish they would close it and turn it into an Aggie campus. I can't imagine Highland's fate without ACC. Maybe it could have been leveled and redeveloped into some sort of sports stadium or arena.

[cvalkan]

I skated at Northcross, so I spent many more hours there, but it wasn't much of a mall. I shopped and people watched at Highland Mall. Now I'm all sad. It will pass.

[The ATX]

Here's the Statesman's farewell story with a video. Hopefully the link takes you behind the pay wall:

http://www.mystatesman.com/news/news...3948020.735719

[Novacek]

Someone in my neighborhood facebook group found and posted this flyer from ACC

http://www.scribd.com/doc/263683596/...oject-Brochure