Midway Mall is a square foot regional shopping mall in

Elyria, Ohio Elyria ( ) is a city in the Greater Cleveland metropolitan statistical area and the county seat of Lorain County, Ohio, Lorain County, Ohio, United States, located at the forks of the Black River (Ohio), Black River in Northeast Ohio 23 miles sou ...

Lorain County Lorain County is a County (United States), county in the northeastern part of the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 312,964. Its county seat is Elyria, Ohio, Elyria. The county was physicall ...

's only enclosed regional mall, it sits on

Ohio State Route 57 State Route 57 (SR 57) is a north–south state highway in northeast Ohio. SR 57 runs from US 30 near Orrville to US 6 in Lorain, a distance of . Route description SR 57 begins at US 30 as a two-lane road near Orr ...

, about 1/8 mile from Interstate 80 (the

Ohio Turnpike The Ohio Turnpike, officially the James W. Shocknessy Ohio Turnpike, is a limited-access toll highway in the U.S. state of Ohio, serving as a primary corridor between Chicago and Pittsburgh. The road runs east–west in the northern section o ...

) and

Interstate 90 Interstate 90 (I-90) is an east–west transcontinental freeway and the longest Interstate Highway in the United States at . It begins in Seattle, Washington, and travels through the Pacific Northwest, Mountain West, Great Plains, Midwest, and ...

. Anchored by

Dunham's Sports Dunham's Sports is an American sporting goods retail chain owned by Dunham's Athleisure Corporation, with stores located in the Midwestern to Southeastern United States. The chain specializes in athletic equipment, clothing, firearms, and other ...

, it is a dead mall with only around 20 stores and services.

History

Midway Mall was originally supposed to open in late August 1966 but was delayed until September 22, 1966. Midway was originally developed by Visconsi Mead Jacob's Company. Original Anchors Higbees opened August 1, 1966, JCPenney opened September 29, 1966, and Sears opening in late 1967. In 1995, Best Buy replaced Woolworth, which closed in 1994. Higbee's became Dillard's after being acquired in 1992. The mall was closed for renovation between 1989 and 1990 and reopening in August 1990 with a new May Company Store and a new food court. The May Company store. became Kaufmann's January 31, 1993. Kaufmann's converted to Macy's on September 9, 2006. The mall was long owned by the Jacobs Group of Cleveland, which sold it as part of a divestment program in 2001 to

The Westfield Group Westfield Group was an Australian shopping centre company that existed from 1960 to 2014, when it split into two independent companies: Scentre Group, which owns and operates the Australian and New Zealand Westfield shopping centre portfolio; ...

, which renamed it Westfield Shoppingtown Midway. In Spring 2006, Westfield announced that the mall did not fulfill their "strategic plan" and sold it in May 2006 to Centro Properties Group, which reverted the name to Midway Mall. Several years later, the mall was managed by The Woodmont Company. Dillard's closed in 2007, Macy's in 2016, and Sears in 2017. In 2018, Johnny K's Power Sports moved into the former Macy's space. The mall is now owned and managed by

Namdar Realty Group Namdar Realty Group is an American shopping mall investment company based in Great Neck, New York. They primarily purchase shopping malls with partner Mason Asset Management. Namdar and Mason are both family owned, and as of 2021, own over 400 p ...

. On February 28, 2019, it was announced that JCPenney would be closing as part of a plan to close 27 stores nationwide. The store closed on July 5, 2019. On January 6, 2020, it was announced that Best Buy would close when its lease ran out. The store closed on March 7, 2020, leaving

and Johnny K's Power Sports as the mall's only anchors. On January 12, 2023, the Lorain County Port Authority voted to buy and develop the mall site.

Anchor Stores

Higbee's Higbee's was a department store founded in 1860 in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1987, Higbee's was sold to the joint partnership of Dillard's department stores and Youngstown-based developer, Edward J. DeBartolo. The stores continued to operate unde ...

(1966-1992) became Dillard's

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 ...

(1966-2019)

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 ...

(1967-2017) Woolworths (1966-1994)

May Company Ohio The May Company Ohio was a chain of department stores that was based in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. History In 1899, David May, the founder of May Department Stores, acquired E. R. Hull & Dutton Co. of Cleveland on Ontario Street, renaming ...

(1990-1993)

Kaufmann's Kaufmann's was a department store that originated in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Summary The store was owned in the early 20th century by Edgar J. Kaufmann, patron of the famous Fallingwater house. In the post-war years, the store became a regio ...

(1993-2006)

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 ...

(2006-2016) Steve & Barry's (2004 to 2008) Dillard's (1992-2007) Johnny K's Powersports (2018-2023)

(2013-2023) Best Buy (1995-2020)

External links

Midway Mall official website

Centro Properties
https://www.midwaymallshopping.com/directory/

References

{{Shopping malls in Ohio Shopping malls in Ohio Elyria, Ohio Shopping malls established in 1965 Buildings and structures in Lorain County, Ohio Tourist attractions in Lorain County, Ohio 1965 establishments in Ohio Namdar Realty Group