The Maine Mall is an enclosed

shopping mall A shopping mall (or simply mall) is a North American term for a large indoor shopping center, usually anchored by department stores. The term "mall" originally meant a pedestrian promenade with shops along it (that is, the term was used to refe ...

South Portland, Maine South Portland is a city in Cumberland County, Maine, United States, and is the fourth-largest city in the state, incorporated in 1898. At the 2020 census, the city population was 26,498. Known for its working waterfront, South Portland is sit ...

, United States. Owned and managed by

Brookfield Properties Brookfield Properties is a North American subsidiary of commercial real estate company Brookfield Property Partners, which itself is a subsidiary of alternative asset management company Brookfield Asset Management. It is responsible for the pro ...

, it is the largest shopping mall in the state of

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...

, and the second-largest in northern

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

, behind

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

’s

The Mall at Rockingham Park The Mall at Rockingham Park is the largest shopping mall in the state of New Hampshire, with of floor space. The mall is located in the town of Salem, about north of Boston. The mall is adjacent to Interstate 93 and the former Rockingham Park r ...

. Its

anchor store In retail, an "anchor tenant", sometimes called an "anchor store", "draw tenant", or "key tenant", is a considerably larger tenant in a shopping mall, often a department store or retail chain. They are typically located at the ends of malls. Wit ...

s are

Best Buy Best Buy Co. Inc. is an American multinational consumer electronics retailer headquartered in Richfield, Minnesota. Originally founded by Richard M. Schulze and James Wheeler in 1966 as an audio specialty store called Sound of Music, it was rebra ...

JCPenney Penney OpCo LLC, doing business as JCPenney and often abbreviated JCP, is a midscale American department store chain operating 667 stores across 49 U.S. states and Puerto Rico. Departments inside JCPenney stores include Mens, Womens, Boys, Gir ...

Jordan's Furniture Jordan's Furniture is an American furniture retailer in New England. There are currently seven retail locations—three in Massachusetts ( Avon, Natick, and Reading) and four in other New England states ( Nashua, New Hampshire; New Haven, Connecti ...

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

, and

Round One Entertainment , stylized as ROUND1, is a Japan-based amusement store chain. In Japan, the amusement centers offer bowling alleys, arcade games, karaoke, and billiards. They also have a larger variation of Round One known as SpoCha, abbreviated for Sports Chal ...

with two vacant anchors last occupied by

Forever 21 Forever 21 is a multinational fast fashion retailer headquartered in Los Angeles, California, United States. Originally founded as the store Fashion 21 in Highland Park, Los Angeles in 1984,Forever 21History & Facts, n.d. Retrieved 27 April 2014 ...

and

Sears Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began a ...

History

In 1969,

Jordan Marsh Jordan Marsh (officially Jordan Marsh & Company) was an American department store chain that was headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, and operated throughout New England. It was founded by Eben Dyer Jordan and Benjamin L. Marsh in 1841. The o ...

opened a freestanding store which was the first Jordan Marsh in the state of Maine. In 1971, the indoor shopping mall and

were added. Porteous, a

department store A department store is a retail establishment offering a wide range of consumer goods in different areas of the store, each area ("department") specializing in a product category. In modern major cities, the department store made a dramatic app ...

chain based in

Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropol ...

, opened in 1983 as part of a major mall expansion which doubled the size of the mall. This expansion also added

as well as the state's first

Filene's Filene's (formally William Filene & Sons Co.) was an American department store chain; it was founded by William Filene in 1881. The success of the original full-line store in Boston, Massachusetts, was supplemented by the foundation of its off-p ...

. In 1994, the mall underwent a $6.5 million renovation that added a

food court A food court (in Asia-Pacific also called food hall or hawker centre) is generally an indoor plaza or common area within a facility that is contiguous with the counters of multiple food vendors and provides a common area for self-serve dinner. I ...

as well as

Lechmere Lechmere ( "leech-meer") was a Massachusetts-based chain of retail stores that closed in 1997. At the time of its closing, it had 27 stores, including 20 in New England. The chain offered electronics, appliances, and various household goods. It a ...

and a larger Dream Machine, a video game and pinball machine arcade. Porteous closed in 1996, and was replaced with a two-level structure containing a Filene's Home Store on the lower level and

Sports Authority Sports Authority, Inc. (formerly The Sports Authority) was an American sports retailer. At its peak, Sports Authority operated 463 stores in 45 States and Puerto Rico. The company's website was on the GSI Commerce platform and supported the reta ...

on the upper level, made accessible by the only mall escalators in Maine, excluding department stores. Jordan Marsh was acquired by

Federated Department Stores Macy's, Inc. (originally Federated Department Stores, Inc.) is an American conglomerate holding company. Upon its establishment, Federated held ownership of the regional department store chains Abraham & Straus, Lazarus, Filene's, and Shillito ...

in 1996; as a result, the mall's Jordan Marsh became

. In 1997,

F. W. Woolworth Company The F. W. Woolworth Company (often referred to as Woolworth's or simply Woolworth) was a retail company and one of the pioneers of the five-and-dime store. It was among the most successful American and international five-and-dime businesses, se ...

and Lechmere both closed; within a year, they were replaced by

Linens 'n Things Linens 'n Things was a Clifton, New Jersey-based big-box retailer specializing in home textiles, housewares, and decorative home accessories. The chain operated 571 stores in 47 U.S. states and six Canadian provinces, and had 7,300 employees as ...

and

, respectively. In 2003, General Growth Properties acquired the mall for $270 million. In 2005, Federated Department Stores acquired the Filene's chain. Due to the presence of an existing Macy's at the mall, both the Filene's and Filene's home store were shuttered in 2006 to prevent overlap. The state's only

Apple Store The Apple Store is a chain of Retail, retail stores owned and operated by Apple Inc. The stores sell various Apple products, including Macintosh, Mac personal computers, iPhone smartphones, iPad tablet computers, Apple Watch smartwatches, Apple ...

opened at the mall in 2008. In October 2019, it moved into a more central location in the building, occupying a space left by

Abercrombie & Fitch Abercrombie & Fitch (A&F) is an American lifestyle retailer that focuses on casual wear. Its headquarters are in New Albany, Ohio. The company operates three other offshoot brands: Abercrombie Kids, Hollister Co., and Gilly Hicks. As of Februar ...

's departure. In late 2008,

and H&M opened in the former Filene's Mens & Home first floor. Sports Authority remained in the former Filene's upper floor. In 2009,

closed due to the liquidation of the chain. On December 12, 2012,

The Bon-Ton Bon-Ton Holdings Inc. is an American online retailer and former department store chain founded in 1898. After rapid expansion in the 1990s and early 2000s, the original company had financial troubles, ultimately filing for bankruptcy in 2018 ...

announced plans to open a store in the former Filene's space, which had been vacant since 2006. The store opened on September 12, 2013. This was Bon-Ton's only store in Maine and joined Sears, Macy's, and JCPenney to become the mall's fourth full-line department store. In August 2016, Sports Authority closed due to bankruptcy. On June 13, 2017, it was announced that Bon-Ton would be closing its store in August 2017. On December 6, 2017, it was announced that

will be opening in the former Sports Authority space in 2018. The mall added

, a Japanese-owned bowling and amusement store chain, in 2018. On May 28, 2019,

announced that it would be opening in the former Filene's/Bon-Ton space; the store opened in 2020, and features a

ropes course A ropes course is a challenging outdoor personal development and team building activity which usually consists of high and/or low elements. Low elements take place on the ground or above the ground. High elements are usually constructed in tr ...

before the main entrance from the mall. On June 26, 2020, it was announced that Sears would be closing 28 stores nationwide, including the store in The Maine Mall. The Sears store subsequently closed on September 13, 2020. Forever 21 also closed in 2020.

Olympia Sports Olympia Sports was a sporting goods Retail company. The company was founded in 1975 in Portland, Maine. Before it went under liquidation, Olympia Sports had 152 locations, mostly across New England, New York, and the Mid-Atlantic. It was headqua ...

closed in 2022, after the company liquidated.

Future

In November 2020, a proposed plan that hoped to transform a surplus of empty parking spaces at the Maine Mall into land for housing and recreation was detailed in the ''Portland Press Herald''. The Maine Mall Transit Oriented District Concept Plan was started by the Greater Portland Council of Governments and funded by a $20,000 federal grant. To make the mall more sustainable and attractive, the plan aims to accomplish three things: to reduce

urban sprawl Urban sprawl (also known as suburban sprawl or urban encroachment) is defined as "the spreading of urban developments (such as houses and shopping centers) on undeveloped land near a city." Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growt ...

, reduce

traffic congestion Traffic congestion is a condition in transport that is characterized by slower speeds, longer trip times, and increased vehicular queueing. Traffic congestion on urban road networks has increased substantially since the 1950s. When traffic de ...

, and increase

public transportation Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typical ...

in the area around the mall. The redevelopment plans for the Maine Mall hope to build on similar projects in the Greater Portland area, such as Rock Row in Westbrook. City organizers are hoping to take advantage of recent

zoning Zoning is a method of urban planning in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into areas called zones, each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for a si ...

changes that allows for housing development near the mall.

Transit-oriented development In urban planning, transit-oriented development (TOD) is a type of urban development that maximizes the amount of residential, business and leisure space within walking distance of public transport. It promotes a symbiotic relationship between ...

is at the center of such plans. The city already has five different bus routes that makes routine stops at the mall. The goal is to incentivize people to walk or use public transportation in the future. The mall would still be the main attraction but will feature a more community-centered shopping experience. Through infill development, people will be able to live, work, go to the doctors, and have recreational activities all within proximity of the mall. The hope is that this will make people want to go to the mall. In the proposed plan, the parking lots at the Maine Mall will be replaced with parking garages that have green spaces on their rooftop. A hotel, convention center, parks, and a baseball field are also a part of the plan.

References

External links

The Maine Mall web site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Maine Mall Shopping malls in Maine Shopping malls established in 1971 Brookfield Properties Buildings and structures in South Portland, Maine Tourist attractions in Cumberland County, Maine Economy of Cumberland County, Maine 1971 establishments in Maine