Penn-Can mall, this is the deadest of dead right here. It was so dead, I decided to apply for a job at it's Hills store, and it paid off. The Penn-Can mall was constructed in 1975, it was a 2 level mall, with lots of strong anchors, and it had a rather "modular" construction, which means that the anchors could be demolished and reconstructed with the needs of each particular store in mind. It started off life with Sears as it's sole anchor, and LOTS of small stores. Penn-Can was the first enclosed mall on the north side of syracuse, and remained the big dog until the early 90's, when the Carosel Center was constructed (a super-regional that boasts 3 levels of shopping). In 1983, Hills Dept store built onto the north side of the mall. In 1984 the Marketplace Mall built next store.
Marketplace proved to be no threat to Penn-Can, it was a smaller mall, with weak anchors, and never really got off the ground. At some point sears decided to relocate thier store, and the space was filled with Burlington Coat factory, and Office Max. In 1992 a west wing and Caldor was added to the mall, and the whole shopping center was refaced internally. It was designed with an early american theme, which reassured the mall's position as top dog in North Syracuse. With the opening of Carousel Center, mall traffic dropped off sharply, and stores closed with an alarming fury. The mall went from hero to zero by 1996. Wilmorite didn't renew leases, and when the dust settled, the mall was borded up. The Caldor was included in a round of closings of it's central NY stores in 1997. A car dealership moved into this space, and the parkinglot became a pothole haven. In 1998 a funscape movie theater opened next to the Hills store, and in 1999 The Hills store was aquired by Ames.
The mall remained virtually empty, and with the boards up, the inside of the mall decayed. When I was employed at Hills, the mall changed hands, and the new owner of the mall hired a security gaurd to inhibit vandalism. I talked with her, and she showed me around the inside of the mall. The roof had leaked, and water damage was extensive, but the trees were still alive. The seats of the movie theater had been moved onto the second level of the mall, and there were dead rabbits and cats that had become trapped in the mall somehow. It smelled horrible, and there were wires running through the mall going to the different stores that remained opened. All of the store fronts were ones of traditional mall stores (ormond, anderson-little, charney's, lens crafters), which tells me that this mall went from hero to zero in a very short period of time. The mall has been re-boarded up recently, but other than that there hasn't been any changes to it. I recmomend a visit to this piece of retail history.
I visited Penn Can Mall, or what was left of it, on a trip to Syracuse in July of 2004. The mall has been converted into a huge automall called Drivers Village, and everything but the 4 anchor spaces, the center court, and the cinemas, have been demolished, and replaced with auto dealers.
Burlington Coat Factory, Office Max, and the cinemas still remain open. The former Ames space is now a showroom for used cars, but the interior still remains true to its Ames heritage. The Caldor space is still vacant, and the center court was being remodeled. The old clock that used to be in the center court as a "meeting place" for mall shoppers, is now refurbished, and is stll in the same spot, but now it is a meeting place for vehicle shoppers.
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