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ANNE LINDBERGThe 16-screen theater will close for three to five months. Who else will come to the Shoppes at Park Place is not known.
PINELLAS PARK - While ParkSide mall comes down and the Shoppes at Park Place rise in its stead, the 16-screen movie theater will have to close temporarily beginning Aug. 1.
The cineplex will be dark three to five months, said mall owner Boulder Venture South LLC, which originally had promised that the theaters would remain open during construction. It's a matter of safety and liability, said John Sabow, Boulder Venture director of development.
"The theater will reopen as soon as possible," Sabow said. "We're hoping for Nov. 1, but the outside date we have on the calendar is Jan. 1."
R/C Theaters Management Corp., owner of the cineplex, did not return messages asking for comment. But Pinellas Park Council member Ed Taylor said he thought the decision to temporarily close the theaters made sense.
"They'd be sitting in the middle of a major excavation site," Taylor said. "I think the only prudent action is to close the theaters."
ParkSide mall closes today. Although Sabow discussed the theaters' future, he declined to name the new mall's anchor or other possible tenants. For months, Pinellas Park has buzzed with rumors that yuppie discounter Target would open a store there.
Target confirmed earlier this month that it was "interested" in the mall at 7200 U.S. 19 N. A spokeswoman reaffirmed that Monday, as did Sabow.
"Target has an interest in the site," he said.
It is unclear when the mall will announce its tenants, but there will be plenty for mall watchers to see in the next few months.
Heavy equipment already has moved onto the site, which has been surrounded by a chain-link fence mostly covered in dark plastic. Asphalt removal has begun on the west side of the property, where the bus transfer station and Montgomery Ward were located.
But the building itself will not come down - via backhoe and such, not explosives - until later in the summer. Boulder Venture plans to hold three auctions beginning in mid to late July to sell off as many parts of the mall as possible.
"There is a lot to salvage out there," Sabow said. "Everything (will be auctioned). Ceiling tiles. Pipe fixtures. . . .We'll be selling the escalators as scrap, the elevators as scrap parts. Just everything you can think of."
Leverock's, which closed its restaurant on the southeast side of the mall on Sunday, is also holding an auction on July 9.
"If you think of the inside of a restaurant, it'll be everything," said Marcia Lambrecht, operations assistant for Gold Coast Restaurants dba Leverock's. "There's things from the original Sunken Gardens; a picture of Babe Ruth shaking Johnny Leverock's hand."
The chain has no plans at this point to come back to the mall in its new incarnation, Lambrecht said. The other seven restaurants are keeping people busy, she said, and most of their attention has focused on reopening the New Port Richey location, which was destroyed last year by fire.
The mall's imminent closing had Pinellas Park officials scurrying to ready Park Station for occupancy. Park Station, 5851 Park Blvd., is a faux train station the city is building to house the Pinellas Park/Mid-County Chamber of Commerce, the Pinellas Park Art and Historical societies, and some city offices.
The station was supposed to be ready in time for the Chamber and Art Society to move out of their temporary home in the mall. But a concrete shortage and other issues delayed completion, leaving the two groups with the possibility of short-term homelessness.
On Monday, city officials unpacked custom-made furniture in Park Station while workers tacked on the last of the crown moulding, painted walls, and installed cabinets as chamber and art society folks packed their belongings at the mall.
City spokesman Tim Caddell said the two groups will be able to move in today, although Park Station will not be complete until late July. It is tentatively scheduled to be opened and dedicated Aug. 23.
The mall opened in the mid-1970s to great fanfare and high hopes, but fell on tough times in the early 1990s. Most anchors had pulled out of Pinellas Square Mall, as it was called then, and lender John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Co. took the property back from its developers. John Hancock poured millions into remodeling the mall, opening a food court, an ice rink and the movie theaters. Although the ice rink, movie theaters, Applebees and JCPenney Outlet store seemed to do well, the rest of the mall never really took off.
Hancock put the 880,000-square-foot property on sale in 2002, and Boulder Venture bought it for $12-million last year. It also bought the Dillards, JCPenney Outlet store, the Leverock's and a wedge-shaped parcel adjacent to the Leverock's and the mall.
Earlier this year, Boulder Venture announced plans to raze the mall. The replacement essentially would turn the mall inside out, with parking on the inside and stores clustered around the outside - similar to the recently revamped Clearwater Mall. Townhouses are planned on the main property and on mall-owned land on the south side of 70th Avenue N.
The Applebees and movie theaters would be the sole remnants of the old mall under plans presented to the city. The Applebees, which will remain open throughout construction, will be unchanged. The theaters will have a jumbotron on the north side of the building facing the parking lot. A new entrance would be on the ground floor of the north side of the theaters.