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Commercial Bay Shopping Centre is a shopping centre in the
Auckland CBD The Auckland Central Business District (CBD), or Auckland city centre, is the geographical and economic heart of the Auckland metropolitan area. It is the area in which Auckland was established in 1840, by William Hobson. It is New Zealand's lea ...
,
Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...
, New Zealand. It is situated at 11–19 Customs Street West between Lower Albert Street and the
Britomart Transport Centre Britomart Transport Centre, also known as Britomart railway station, is the public transport hub in the Auckland Central Business District, central business district of Auckland and the northern terminus of the North Island Main Trunk railway ...
. The centre was known as Downtown Shopping Centre, formerly Westfield Downtown, as a smaller shopping centre with 12,417 m2 gross lettable area In late 2012, it was sold by Westfield to Precinct Properties Holdings New Zealand Limited, formerly AMP NZ Office Limited (ANZO). The building closed on 28 May 2016 after 41 years, and by 23 November had been demolished. A high-rise and new mall building was built on the site, with the future
City Rail Link The City Rail Link (CRL) is a rail project currently under construction in Auckland, New Zealand. The project consists of a 3.5 km long double-track rail tunnel underneath Auckland's city centre, between Britomart Transport Centre and M ...
tunnels going through the foundations of the building. The development is named "Commercial Bay", referring to the area's previous name in the 1900s. The first shop of the new Commercial Bay development, an H&M store, was opened in August 2018. Following multiple delays, the main shopping mall of the new Commercial Bay development was completed in June 2020.


History

The original mall (opened 30 April 1975) had approximately 80 stores on three floors, with the three major stores being
The Warehouse The Warehouse Group (TWG) was founded by Stephen Tindall in 1982, and is the largest retail group operating in New Zealand. It is a corporate group that consists of The Warehouse, Warehouse Stationery, Torpedo7, Noel Leeming, 1-day and TheMark ...
, Warehouse Stationery and Postie Plus.Westfield Downtown
(from 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; ...
corporate homepage. Retrieved 15 August 2007.)
It was one of the few Westfield Group malls that did not provide a supermarket, but was also the only proper mall in the entire CBD area. In later years it was also known for being covered almost completely by huge exterior
billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...
s, which repeatedly drew the ire of Council officers. In 2005, the centre had retail sales of NZ$56.9 million, and 5.8 million customer visits per year. These were mostly CBD workers, tourists and the growing inner-city population. However, the centre had been called Westfield's most underperforming shopping centre in New Zealand. Lying in the middle of a much more densely built up CBD and being considered underdeveloped with only three storeys above ground, various other plans for the site were mooted during its latter years. The centre was valued at NZ$79.1 million (2009 data). In 2008, Westfield received approval via non-notified resource consent for a 41-storey office skyscraper (including a 2 level retail podium) on the site. The permission came under fire, as it was granted without protection requirements for a future rail tunnel from
Britomart Transport Centre Britomart Transport Centre, also known as Britomart railway station, is the public transport hub in the Auckland Central Business District, central business district of Auckland and the northern terminus of the North Island Main Trunk railway ...
, which would have to pass under the building. However, in October 2008,
ONTRACK KiwiRail Holdings Limited is a New Zealand state-owned enterprise responsible for rail operations in New Zealand, and operates inter-island ferries. Trading as KiwiRail and headquartered in Wellington, New Zealand, KiwiRail is the largest rail ...
noted that it had reached an agreement in principle with the owners of Westfield Downtown to allow the tunnel route to be threaded through the future foundations. The Downtown Shopping Centre closed on 28 May 2016 after 41 years and by 23 November had been demolished. It is being replaced with a 36-storey skyscraper which will include a new shopping centre that includes a supermarket, bars, restaurants and food outlets in the lower levels.
Auckland Council Auckland Council ( mi, Te Kaunihera o Tāmaki Makaurau) is the local government council for the Auckland Region in New Zealand. It is a territorial authority that has the responsibilities, duties and powers of a regional council and so is ...
and proprietors Precinct Properties struck a deal to include tunnels for the
City Rail Link The City Rail Link (CRL) is a rail project currently under construction in Auckland, New Zealand. The project consists of a 3.5 km long double-track rail tunnel underneath Auckland's city centre, between Britomart Transport Centre and M ...
directly underneath the premises.


See also

*
List of shopping centres in New Zealand The following is a list of shopping centres in New Zealand. For comparison, the largest mall in Canada, the West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada has a retail space of 350,000 m2. The largest in the United States of America is the 230 ...


References


External links


Downtown Shopping Centre
{{WestfieldNewZealand Buildings and structures in Auckland Shopping centres in the Auckland Region 1970s architecture in New Zealand Shopping malls established in 1975 Shopping malls disestablished in 2016 Auckland CBD Auckland waterfront