Metro North Mall- (Kansas City, MO)

Summary:

The Pleasure of Shopping... Metro North Mall was one of the few remaining enclosed malls in the Kansas City area before closing for good in April 2014. Metro North was over 1.3 million square feet, two-story shopping mall and over 125 inline stores in the Kansas City North suburb of Gallatin, Missouri. The mall once housed four anchor stores, and although the inside is closed to the public, Macy's is the only store left that is open. The malls slogan once was  "Come For The Shopping... Stay For The Fun", but it looks like people stopped shopping, and went elsewhere for the fun.

In the beginning:

Metro North Park mall opened in September 1976 with original anchor stores Montgomery Ward, JCPenney, Dillard's, and The Jones Company Store as well as a 6- screen AMC theater. This was the only enclosed mall located north of the Missouri River in the Kansas City metro area and was the second largest mall in the area, where Oak Park Mall in Overland Park, Kansas was the biggest at 1.5 million square feet. The mall contained a beautifully maintained 80s style fountain and water feature with miniature hot air balloons suspended from it that would float up and down.

Decline:

Montgomery Ward closed in 2001 and the rest of its wing died along with it, and ever though its 2015, the signage from the stores opening is still on the store fronts. The Jones Company Store was renamed Macy's in 2006. Dillard's converted from a traditional set-up to a clearance format in 2007, closing off the first floor of the store before closing in late 2008, this is because of a newer store at the lifestyle center, Zona Rosa, in Platte county.

JCPenney then closed in 2008, because the company opened two newer stores that praised more profit than the Metro North store. MC Sports opened a junior anchor store in part of the former Montgomery Ward and closed in March 2009.

A small independent film called "Shoe Store" was filmed in the mall.

Closure:

In April 2014, the current property owner decided that the mall would closed by the middle of the month. Before the closing date, there were only two stores in the mall, and the two-story Macy's.

Whats Next:

Plans for redevelopment began to be created by the city to transform the mall from enclosed to a lifestyle shopping center, but the plans fell through due to the recession and the death of the mall owner. Again, in 2010, plans to demolish most of the remaining mall and replace it with a smaller enclosed mall and mixed use property were created.

By May 2013, plans to raise the mall and replace it with a one floor, two anchor enclosed mall seemed to be the best answer due to the demand of a new mall in the Northland area. This would include replacing the current Macy's Store with a newer one, and roughly 900,000 square feet of new retail space and a completion date of fall 2015.

Here are pictures of the mall from July 2014, most of the mall was fenced in, and the local Ford dealer looks to be using the vacant lots to store overflow inventory.

Montgomery Ward... was the best " Brand Name Savings Store":

For a company that closed in 2001, over 14 years ago!, its great to see the name still carry's some weight, as it still is intact and on the store as if business never ended. This by far has to be the best part of the mall, the old Montgomery Ward signs and Electric Avenue logo.

The city of Kansas City has seen a drastic decline of malls of the last decade or so with the loss of Bannister Mall, the Antioch Center, and most recently Metro North Mall. If anyone has any questions, comments, stories, or pictures, feel free to post below.

Thank you for reading.