Long Beach Plaza

Long Beach Plaza was a two-level 675,716 square foot shopping mall located in Downtown Long Beach, California. It was designed in the 1970s by the Hahn Company and opened in 1982. The eight-block dumbbell-shaped mall was an enclosed structure and included a two-story deck parking structure on both sides. [http://retailtrafficmag.com/development/siteselection/retail_big_city/] The mall was previously anchored by JCPenney, Montgomery Ward and Buffums (which closed in 1991).

Problems with the mall included the fact that mall structure (which included stores that faced inward) had no connection with the rest of the Downtown Long Beach area. Another problem is that shopping malls usually draw customers within a certain distance of the mall, but roughly half of that circle for the Long Beach Plaza was ocean. The closure of the nearby Naval stations in the 1990s also contributed to the slow demise of the mall.

In 1999, the mall was purchased by Developers Diversified Realty (DDR), Coventry Real Estate Partners and Prudential Real Estate as a joint venture. In 2000, the mall was demolished except for the parking structure. DDR eventually rebuilt the area and renamed it Long Beach City Place.

External links

* [http://tfdata.cs.fiu.edu/qGNRzLatqEz33.77167qAzLongqEz-118.19028qAzplace_nameqEzLong+Beach+Plaza+Shopping+Center Aerial view (scroll down to bottom)] accessed 21 August 2006
* [http://www.douglaswilson.com/develop/long_beach.html Interior view]