TALLAHASSEE, FL (WTXL) - The former Tallahassee Mall is getting some upgrades and the City of Tallahassee's EcoSmart episode gives you an inside peek on what's to come.
Some of the biggest additions include a new entertainment plaza, 20 new restaurants, inner-mall roadways and a food court.
The entertainment plaza will have a music club, roadhouse lounge and an covered amphitheater. The amphitheater will be a multipurpose venue that will be turned into an ice skating rink in the winter.
Connecting this plaza to the rest of the mall is a cobblestone-like roadway. In addition to this outdoor mini-street, the inside of the mall will also have built-in roadways to carry people throughout the mall.
Construction even has accommodated for heavy rainfall as the outdoor roadways are designed to control runoff.
There will also be a new West Entrance to the mall, and already partially completed, the main entrance will be through John Knox Road using a roundabout.
With all this construction, there are still businesses operating. Still open are AMC, Barnes & Noble, Belk and Guitar Center. AMC is currently in renovating its 20 theater screens, while Belk plans to undergo renovations in the summer to be ready for fall.
According to Managing Director Bruce Benton from the episode, they've made it through 50 percent of the project.
While there is a lot of new additions to the mall's revitalization, there still will be kept some old favorites of the building. For example, the main food court area, as well as, high ceilings and windows of the old mall, according to Cynthia Barber, director of Environmental Policy & Energy Resources for the City of Tallahassee.
The construction process is also focusing on reusing material from the old mall, including glass and aluminum parts. Even the new parking lot is made of the crushed asphalt from the old one. They are also keeping the trees from the old mall and planting more.
In addition, the contractors helping build the new Centre of Tallahassee are all locally based.
"For me it's very special to see this place being reborn. With everything they are going to add here, between the new stores and the new retail, and a 6500 seat covered amphitheater, and this Brickyard concept of an almost House-of-Blues-type place, this will be a very special place for Tallahassee to have," says City Commissioner Gil Ziffer.
