While the conversion of old downtown office buildings to residential is getting lots of attention these days, there are several other conversions taking place in Calgary’s inner-city neighbourhoods. Like the redevelopment of Northland Village Mall that is currently underway, or the old Stadium Mall conversion next to the colourful new Calgary Cancer Centre. Yes, both of these old northwest Calgary shopping centres are at the beginning stages of mega makeovers that will convert them into mixed-use (residential, retail, restaurants, recreational and office) villages.

This is not the first time a Calgary mall has added residential development to its mix of uses — North Hill Mall (Calgary’s first mall) added the two Renaissance condo towers next to the Lions Park LRT Station in 2002. And, Concord Pacific Group, current owners of the old Sears building and surrounding parking area (12-acres in total) at North Hill, is working on plans for a major residential oriented development of the site.

Northland Village Mall is now closed, making way for its mega makeover. The mall has struggled for the past 25 years partly due to the fact it has no LRT station, as well as its close proximity to other northwest malls — Brentwood Mall, North Hill Mall and Market Mall (northwest Calgary’s premier regional mall).

In its heyday, the enclosed mall had 500,000 square feet of retail space, encompassing 81 stores including Eaton’s as an anchor. The Eaton’s store closure in 1999 was the beginning of its decline. In 2003, renovations included the addition of Best Buy as an anchor; in 2005 the cinemas were converted into Calgary’s first Designer Depot — the Hudson’s Bay’s first off-price store in Western Canada. But the mall still struggled.

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