‘Significant’ demolition begins as Northway Mall renovation gets underway

Work crews have begun a partial demolition of the blighted Northway Mall as the Florida-based owner prepares to renovate it under plans that include an O’Reilly Auto Parts, people with knowledge of the project said.

“The improvements are now underway, and we are excited for the opportunity to bring new medical, warehouse, industrial, retail and other uses to the property,” Julie Fanning, marketing director with property owner Benderson Development, said in an email on Monday.

The 30-acre site is located at 3101 Penland Parkway, off the Glenn Highway and Airport Heights Drive in northeast Anchorage.

The mall has largely sat empty for the last four years after it closed early in the pandemic, becoming an eyesore and illegal dumping ground where people discarded waste like old appliances and furniture.

Heavy snow loads last winter added to the woes when a small section of the roof began to collapse above the Planet Fitness gym, likely causing a gas leak that brought out firefighters, a city official said.

The Planet Fitness remains closed today. That leaves Shockwave Trampoline Park, at the site’s end, as the lone business still operating at the once-busy center.

On Friday, an excavator began some of the work for the demolition in the central section of the mall, the former commons area, city officials said. Most other sections of the building will remain standing, city officials said.

The demolition includes the former Planet Fitness and nearby areas where small businesses such as nail salons or eateries once operated, said Brent Carlson, vice president of Watterson Construction, the project’s general contractor.

Toward the west side of the mall, an O’Reilly Auto Parts is set to occupy most of the area where the Carrs Safeway grocery store operated before it closed in 2020, Carlson said.

Don Crafts, architectural permitting reviewer for the city, said the permitting documents show that the O’Reilly location is planned as “37,000 square feet of mercantile occupation.”

Crafts said plans for the teardown cover a “significant” area, about 145,000 square feet, though most of the mall will remain standing, he said.

The demolition will leave three standing sections that will need future work by the landlord to enclose them, he said. The three sections, in total, will provide about 250,000 square feet of space, according to permitting documents, he said.

The three sections would likely support “mercantile or low-hazard storage occupancies,” he said.

Permitting documents show that a “future loading dock” will be built as part of the former mall’s renovation, he said.

Crafts said he did not have additional details of future plans for the former mall, such as what tenants besides O’Reilly Auto Parts are planned.

The building owner may be keeping their options open as it looks for tenants to occupy different portions of the former mall, he said.

Fanning, with the property owner, did not respond to additional questions such as when the mall will begin to reopen. She referred to the site as the Northway Mall, but last year it was being marketed under a new name, North Pointe. Fanning did not respond to an email seeking clarification on the mall’s future name.

The Northway Mall opened in 1980 as Alaska’s oil boom was still fresh.

In 2020, it became a victim of the pandemic-driven malaise and before that, the Alaska recession that ended in 2018. The national trend of growing online sales also hurt the brick-and-mortar businesses.

Longtime anchor tenant Carrs Safeway announced it would close its grocery store in 2020. Days later, several business owners received surprise eviction notices.

The building late that year was sold to Benderson Development, based in University Park, Florida, state and municipal property records show.

The previous owner was Georgia-based Colony Bank.