Pasadena Cheers Mall’s Demolition
It didn’t have the glitz and kaboom of a Las Vegas-style implosion.
But the 200 onlookers in Pasadena on Thursday more than made up for it with their enthusiasm as they watched the city’s white-elephant mall go the way of the urban dinosaur--thanks to the mechanical arm of a huge excavator.
To the sounds of “Also Sprach Zarathustra,” the excavator’s claw tore into the glass entrance of Pasadena Plaza on Green Street between Marengo and Los Robles avenues.
Doves were released overhead as a who’s who of Pasadena watched with glee on the steps of the Civic Auditorium across the street.
All that was missing from the pomp and ceremony were Munchkins declaring: “Ding dong, the mall is dead!”
The city’s only enclosed mall--a coffin-like structure built in 1980--is being replaced with a Mediterranean-style, open-air urban village built by TrizecHahn Development Corp. City officials have called the move an important step in filling the “doughnut hole” between the buzzing night life of Old Pasadena to the west and the theater district to the east.
What particularly irked some folks is that the mall blocked the view of the city’s Italian Renaissance-style Civic Auditorium from its historic Central Library and City Hall to the north.
“It’s a new beginning for Pasadena,” Mayor Bill Bogaard said. “It will give a pedestrian accent to our civic center.”
The thought was seconded by Bogaard’s wife, Claire, who gamely turned to her husband during the destruction ceremony and said: “I haven’t asked for anything since you became mayor. But how about I drive that [excavator]?”
Going along with the playful theme of the day, TrizecHahn President Lee H. Wagman declared, “Make room for a view!” as he gave the order for the excavator to begin. Using a metal girder, it jammed through one of the mall’s three-story glass entrances, smashing it to bits.
Wagman told the crowd that most of the people he spoke to were as enthusiastic about the mall’s demise as about his firm’s plan to replace it with the $135-million Paseo Colorado development.
“How great it is to tear down this building,” he said. “I don’t think it will be missed.”
The proposed development is part of a growing urban movement to abandon the enormous malls of the 1970s and 1980s in favor of pedestrian-friendly streetscapes. Many Americans are turning their backs on struggling regional malls because they view them as monotonous, Wagman said.
“People want the excitement of an open landscape and the urban feel,” he said.
And that is what the Paseo will provide, he added. With European-like promenades, courtyards and terraces, it will be a place to shop, eat, see a movie, go to the gymnasium or even get a massage at the luxury spa, he said.
The around-the-clock pedestrian traffic, Wagman added, will come from the residents of 400 luxury lofts perched atop the boutiques and eateries.
Pasadena officials believe that the development’s 14-screen movie complex, Gelson’s supermarket, offices, sports club and other shops will reshape the civic center.
But the Paseo comes at a price to Pasadena taxpayers. The city kicked in $26 million in bond money to buy out TrizecHahn’s lease on a city-owned garage beneath the mall. Within a few weeks, all that will remain of the old structure will be the garage and a Macy’s store.
Developers say the 560,000-square-foot project will open in the fall of 2001. John A. Williams, chairman of Post Properties, which will build the 400 luxury apartments, said, “You can expect to see something reminiscent of Paris or Madrid.”
