It appears that the new owners of the Klamath Mall plan to destroy the current mall (except for Gottschalks) and build a new strip mall! Yep, from what I hear, the 300,000 sq. ft. Klamath Mall that was formally known as the "Shasta Plaza", will be destroyed and a new 161,000 sq. ft. strip mall. The new mall is targeted to open in Summer of 2006.

Being born and raised in Klamath Falls, I fondly remember shopping in the old Shasta Plaza. We had J.C. Penny at one end with Montgomery Wards at the other and Woolworths in the middle. The mall was one of the first places you would hit when you wanted to do some Christmas shopping or have a good meal at the built in restaurant inside Woolworths. The mall was always filled in my youth when the mills where the economy of the area.

For the last decade, the mall has run into many problems with a faulty roof. The owners of the mall did not properly handle the snow buildup on the roof, which collapsed along with a couple main supports of the roof that fractured. For years, the mall remains mostly empty for except for Gottschalks and Radio Shack along with a couple businesses coming and going over the years.

The mall is now being sold to a company in California. First thoughts were that they would actually spend a few dollars and fix the mall, but it seems this is not the plan. The mall as we all know it will be destroyed except of Gottschalks, which will now become the only anchor and be the center of the new strip mall. The new mall (if you wish to call it that) will be a few new buildings attached behind and in front of Gottschalks, running from east to west along Pershing Way between Avalon St. and Austin String. The parking lot will replace the current mall all the way to Sherms Thunderbird.

Yes, I will be sad to see the best walk-in mall we have ever had, turn into yet another strip mall.  However, more than that, I am confused as to why they would take such a drastic step.  I am not a structural engineer, so I do not speak from knowledge as to the extent of damages, but to me, it seems repairing the mall by giving it an entirely new roof  and support structures would be less expensive that demolishing the mall and then building a new smaller mall.  The $1.5 million urban renewal money from the city would go far to that task.

Maybe the real problem is that the mall is too big and they cannot find large enough tenants to take the leases.  This might be why they are reducing the size of the mall to 161,000 sq. ft., which is less than half its current 360,000 sq. ft.  If this is the case, it could be a big mistake.  They may not be able to find a tenant for the large stores at the time, but that does not mean there will not be any come along.  Until that time, they could split large stores (JC Penny and Woolworth) in half and attract smaller tenants.

The business community in this town wants to promote local shopping.  It is hard on many people though, to go in and out of all the parking lots and businesses to shop.  It is much easier when you have many shops that are enclosed into a single location where they can walk from shop to shop without having to go out in the weather or all over town.

I guess my hope to see the old mall come back to life is over and I have to face the fact that this town will no longer have a decent walk-in shopping mall as it once did.  We are in the Wal-Mart, strip mall world now!  To me this also adds yet another nail to the local shopping coffin.