NORTHLAND CENTER MALL: SOUTHFIELD (DETROIT), MI
Eric Mackey's Commentary
Posted July 9, 2007(user submitted)
Northland Center Mall is not really dead anymore, but the future success of the
revitalization of Detroit proper will play a major role in Northland's
survival.
Northland Center Mall is a part of history. It was one of the very first shopping centers
ever to open. Northland opened in 1954 as an outdoor mall at the corner of
Northwestern Highway and Greenfield Rd in Southfield, Michigan. It featured 110
stores on two levels clustered around the nations second largest (behind the
Macy's of New York City) department store, which was a 4 level Hudson. When
first built, it cost 30,000,000, but the sales of the Hudson's location more
than paid for the entire center, Topping out at almost 100,000,000 the first
year it was opened. The mall was considered "Detroit's Mall", being less than a
Half mile from Detroit proper.
Northland Center became enclosed in 1974, gaining a JC Penny and Montgomery
Wards as 2 new anchors. Later, 3 more anchors were added: Main Street (later
Kohls), TJ Maxx, and a Target. The Mall became part of the 4 directionally
named and located malls of the Detroit Suburbs. The fortunes of Detroit itself
were not going so well, The 1967 Detroit riots caused many people to flee to the
suburbs, stores and homes all over the city became vacant and later vandalized.
This opened the floodgates for crime. The 1970's and 80's are considered
Detroit's most dangerous decades. The 80's brought on the rise of gangs and
unfortunately, the gangs in Detroit chose Northland as their hangout. Many of
the chain tenants left either for fear or all their business had been scared
away. The Mall began to deteriorate, as it was not being taken care of. The
malls occupancy slumped below 30% and was virtually empty, even on the
weekends. Eventually, regular police patrols were added to both the parking lot
and the interior, and the gangs eventually moved on.
The damage had been done however. Kresge was the first anchor to close in
1984 and was subdivided to add more stores to the malls mix. The malls
management did much to attract tenants back and fix the mall up since then, but
the underperforming Montgomery Ward Closed in 1995 along with the Kohls. The
old MGW space was soon after leased by National Wholesale Liquidators, a local
company similar to Big Lots. The old Kohls space was subdivided to make room for
a Jeeper's! (an indoor amusement park for kids) and a few other stores. The mall
did well at bouncing back, as the interior and exterior received updates;
further increasing the tenant mix and customer base. It did little for the JC
Penny, though, which decided to close the location at Northland in 2000. The TJ
Maxx also closed in 2005, citing a sharp decrease in sales.
Today, the mall does well despite having 2 vacant anchors and being just above
60% occupied. The mall also does have a distinctly 70's and 80's look at some
areas on the exterior and I think it would help if they fixed that. Northland
Center does still boast the largest Macy's store in Michigan (formerly the
Hudsons) which is 500,015 square feet between 4 levels. The mall that started
it all presses on in the shadow of the struggling city of Detroit and its
future success hinges on weather or not Detroit can win the war an become a
viable big city again.
I have 3 pictures :
(Credit for the above pics is give to michiganmalls.org)