Hey Everyone!...Would you all do me a favor and check out my buddy Jack Thomas video on this place!....And give him a follow and a subscribe, Thanks!...Ace ruclips.net/video/1CIsH57S7wQ/видео.html
King Chuck yeah it’s pretty bad, it used to be a really beautiful mall. But unfortunately when another mall we have here opened, business died FAST. The only things it’s useful for now is the regal cinemas, which will be closed very soon because the owners owe so much money on it and I believe it’s being foreclosed.
I'm of the notion (conspiracy theory?) that Moonbeam is a money laundering front. They run all of their malls as separate LLCs and when a mall has any sort of issue, the declare bankruptcy of that LLC. But they move money around from property to property. They're slumlords at best, and embezzlers at worst.
Agreed. It wouldn't shock me at all if Eddie Lamprey had one of his tentacles wriggling around in various properties out this way too. Like Martin Shkreli ("Pharma Bro") and Slick Eddie the owners of Moonbeam need to go to federal prison and become Bubba's cellies.
Great Northern is owned by yet another “Winner”. He guy has defaulted on other malls in the past. Dynasty was a big “Win” for Syracuse aright, so much that it killed Great Northern, Shopping Town and Great Lakes Malls! Idiots that voted that thing thru
I keep hearing that Fucillo wants to do something with Great Northern, but I’ve been hearing that rumor for years. I used to work at the Claire’s in that mall, I had to leave because it was so dead. That mall is closest to my hometown and I really hope something can be done to bring it back to life, it’s so heartbreaking walking around that mall now.
Foot Locker, The Children's Place, and Victoria's Secret just moved out of there. Kay's is closing in the summer. The Toys R' Us was turned into an RV dealership.
I think Moonbeam knows exactly what they're doing. They have an extensive portfolio of properties. They have no intention of saving dying malls. They buy them cheap then when the time is right sell to a developer who will raze the place and replace.
Some mall history: On August 28, 1990, shoppingtown mall was hit by a microburst (unconfirmed tornado) during a severe thunder storm which removed a portion of the roof and totally destroyed three stores. One of them was a great locally owned 2 floor bookstore, the economy bookstore. I loved that store as a child snd teenager. The remodel of the mall occured following that big storm which left the mall a mess. The grand reopening of the mall occured in mid August 1991. While it is possible that addis and dey's (orginal anchor of the former Macy's) were planning to build the new store prior to the storm the work did not begin until fall of 1990. Addis and dey's very publicly announced in early 1990 that they would not have a location at carousel mall, but instead invest in a long standing location. Originally Addis & co and Dey Brothers were two seperate stores each having locations in shoppingtown. The orginal dey brothers location was the closed sears. Thank you for doing this video. Shoppingtown is so nesr and dear to my heart. It was one of my gramma and mom's favorite mall. I remember when this mall was still a plaza and became enclosed. I enjoyed seeing the phots from the late '70's early '80's. So many memories!
Did you see that the DeadMalls.com youtube just released a video on this mall? I know several RUclipsrs who have this place in their backlog to edit as well.
The way this mall's going it needs just about a once a month update, I'm suprised no local you tubers( except for rumored the series) really picked up on it.
The only thing I remember about that mall was the children’s play area and the old fun junction because those used to be my favorite places there as a kid because I hated shopping lol
If I had a dime every time a dead mall owner said they have a plan to revitalize a mall. I be rich ! And the few that do, still goes dead soon after. P.S. I went to Moonbeam web site one of its "Executive team" went to Moscow State University ? LMAO
Another great vid, Anthony. You are definitely one of the top dead mall RUclipsrs around. I visited Shoppingtown about 6 or 7 years ago (well before I even knew there was such a dead mall community) and even back then it was a terminal case. The whole Syracuse area was so over-malled, it's no surprise. Destiny USA (yeah, it is a stupid name...) was only a nail in Shoppingtown's coffin. Thanks for the update!
Destiny has always been updating itself and getting better and better while shopping town hasn't changed at all in the past 10 years except for every store but about 3 leaving. The only reason anybody still goes into the mall at this point is because it has a good movie theater, but without that I can't see anybody ever coming to it.
Did karate in shoppingtown mall for over 10 years w Rande Lawrence. Used to played laser tag at fun junction a lot of the time afterwards as well. Its crazy how much of my childhood is wrapped up in this now dead mall!
@@BrianPacini I'm 14, and I wanna stay the hell out of politics, but thanks for the offer. By the way, out of all of the comment sections you could have linked that, you linked it to some teenage girl's comment about the cinema being the mall's life support. Could you have at least found a conspiracy theory to post that on? You could have gone somewhere else.
I remember back in the early to mid 2010s, I used to go here a lot because my sister was working at the hair salon there. It's so depressing to see a mall that left a giant footprint in your life die so fast. In 2013, when I went there the most, there were still about a hundred stores open. In the past year, the number has shrunk from fifty two to seven tenents. I am so sorry that Destiny got the best fron this mall just like every other mall in the area. Rest in peace
Remember Fayetteville mall? I used to love that place when I was growing up in the 80's and 90's. Such great memories. It doesn't even exist anymore. : (
Approximately one year after this video was released, ShoppingTown Mall closed along with all other malls in New York state in an effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. They did not reopen in July, and probably never will open again - most likely Moonbeam decided to let this mall die as a retail operation rather than invest in what it would take to get things open again. With all remaining tenants given 30 day eviction notices in late Sept., ShoppingTown Mall has effectively ceased to exist as a retail operation, and due to Moonbeam's bankruptcy it's unlikely anyone will be able to step in to save it. The wrecking balls can't be long in coming for this place, which is a very sad fate for it to meet. :(
Born and raised in Syracuse, seeing the decline and doom of this mall was heartbreaking. It used to be the spot to go to. Should turn it into apartments or some thing
Hello. I am a Syracuse local and I just wanted to say that moonbeam lost to the town of Dewitt in court. Moonbeam has a certain amount of time to pay the taxes on the mall and if not the town of Dewitt gets ownership of the mall. The town wants to auction off the mall to someone who can turn it around. Most locals want to save the mall because Carousel “Destiny” is way to busy. Also what most people don’t know is that in the back area “where a lot of the offices were” is a dental claims clean up company that employs a decent amount of people.
I think a nice addition to the videos would be a "YOU ARE HERE" indicator on a picture of the mall map in the corner of the video, showing where the footage is being taken throughout the entire video. Does that make sense?
Speaking of which... Here's a photographic of the same exact mall back when it first opened all-the-way back in 1954, if you are curious about it: image.syracuse.com/home/syr-media/width960/img/vintage/photo/2018/02/07/shoppingtown1jpg-bc15694d6a1b973b.jpg As you can probably see; this was originally a stirp-mall!
This was the mall we use to go to. It was still booming in 2010 and 2011. This was when we spent the most time here. It was packed full of ppl. 2015, the food court was still up. 2018, only thing open was SEARS. It was a fast decline.
So into RetroWave music already thanks to the first videos I had seen of dead malls in the past and now your bumper music inspires yet another track that I just bought. Couple this music with your awesome coverage and yet another video that I enjoyed thoroughly, Anthony! Thanks for all you do... will consider becoming a Patreon supporter if I can financially do so. :D
i’m 15 now, as a little kid at the age(s) of 8-10 i always used to go here with my mom to go shopping, eat, anything. Now sometimes we go there just to go to the movies. Everybody goes to Destiny USA now, truly one of the best malls. Sad to see Shopping town basically dead
As someone who lives less than 20 minutes away from this place, it has gone downhill. I really think it started with the pet store. There used to be a pet store with dogs that the owners of the store ended up abusing. After that the mall has gone downhill. When I was little I really remember going occasionally for Clare’s and whatnot. I would always play in the play area and then get a cookie, popcorn, and absolutely love it. And now that I’m older here’s about the other times that I remember going: •I went to Clare’s to try to find a replacement for a necklace. That shit closed and I left. •Some friends invited me to a movie (they had a Studio Gibli movie year thing) and I decided to go. We got there early so we explored a bit and found that a bunch of the store gates were unlocked. Chilled out in there for a second and jumped the gate and hung out in the old play area. Sad to know that some of the old buildings had been removed in the play area itself.(13:16) very easily jumpable gate. Went down the up escalator and left to my place. •Occasionally in this time I went skating at the skating center with an old friend. (shop with the red windows at 5:59) her brother who was about 5 at the time I think needed to use the bathroom, so we ran him into this kids bathroom area. The place smelled of something out of a weed basement and it was littered with mold everywhere. Little kid toys in the corner and a bucket collecting water from the ceiling in the middle of it. Definitely to drag in little kids. Someone left bags in there. Went skating, saw some people, quite a few were in there actually! Stopped our little skating adventure and headed home. But before then I showed my friend that I could still fit in the little kid riding things. (16:22) Brickz for Kidz was still up and running in the building. (4:04) •Went to another movie with the same friends. Walked in to find out that Fun Junction had closed and I legit wanted to cry. That place was my childhood and I made so many friends and memories there. They had the best cheap laser tag y’all have no idea! It was a nice movie though and we won some ducks out of the claw machine before leaving. I swear that building makes more money from claw machines than anything else in the damn building. •Came back again with my friend to go skating again. We took a quick home video of the entire building, re-took a VERY old photo of me standing in the same place, and it was very surreal. We took the back entrance, very scary. (15:20) I always wonder if the poster for the company on the little stand still exists. If I ever end up going back (which I probably won’t) I’m taking the poster. •Last time I went was to go skating. It was very,, weird. We went into the building just me and her and there was the old guy following us the entire time, staring at us through the window and all that creepy shit. The really nice girl who rung us up said to be safe and gave us a free pass to the rink. We skated for about 17~ish minutes before deciding that this was too sketchy and heading home. Nobody else was in the building. Although the guy followed us when we took some false turns, we tricked him and ran. Never went back after that. The lady said that he owned something in the building and that he had been trying to talk to kids for the better half of a week. Youch. All in all, lots of memories. If you ever need any more info please pm me here on on Instagram @Neonn_Neo! I’ll be very happy answering any questions you might have!
Holy shit!!!! I remember that goddamn pet store! The staff were so rude and I felt so bad for all the animals. Even though I was a little kid, I sensed something was going on there.
I'm from SYR -- about a fifteen-minute drive from Shoppingtown, actually -- and the mall used to be a great place to go for shopping, movies, and goofing off in general. Carousel/Destiny fills the economic hole that Shoppingtown's demise has left, but to see the old mall standing and rotting leaves plenty to the imagination about how one could better use that space. When retail started pulling out of Shoppingtown, community spaces and local businesses started moving in, and that made the mall seem like a place that could thrive. That skate park was always busy, and places like Fun Junction and the karaoke Spot always had families and kids hanging out. Plus, the movie theater still does well today, even if it's not as big or as fancy as the one at Destiny. Shoppingtown could transition into something beneficial to the suburban residents of Syracuse. It doesn't deserve to remain just another dead mall.
Not surprised that this mall is dead being that Syracuse has Destiny USA and Syracuse is not big enough to support note than that massive mall. Honestly Destiny even shows signs of some struggle. Also you blame moon beam or whatever for the mall but honestly wilmorite clearly doesn't plan things too well either.
Just found your channel. As a local, I can answer what you were wondering around the 9:30 mark. Carousel Center (Now called Destiny USA- agree, dumb name) opened in October 1990 and became an immediate threat to Shoppingtown and the other malls in the area. Carousel Center was like nothing seen before in the Syracuse area - a mall with two floors and a basement level, with tiled flooring, glass ceilings in various parts to allow light to come through. The new Carousel mall housed a food court (a novelty for the area malls) and a carousel that had local historic ties. Shoppingtown, which had enjoyed it's prime location and loyal customers for many years, undoubtedly felt the pressure to compete. The original Shoppingtown still had that ugly 70's look that was so common up through the 80's, which was status quo for the time. In a last ditch effort to compete with Carousel Center, a massive "facelift" was given to the mall, including the tiled flooring and sky-light ceiling, to mimic Carousel Center's appeal. Additionally, a massive expansive wing was put on to house a food court and (you guessed it...) a carousel! Again, to mimic the allure of Carousel Center. Shoppingtown was able to hold their own for a little while with their faithful clientele who thought Carousel Center was simply too big and too crowded. However, time has not been kind to Shoppingtown, and with the loss of Sears, JC Penny's, and a few other anchors, it has gone the way of all dead malls now. Hope that helps.
LOVE Michael Oakley. You and me appear to be on the same page in regards to music. We should hang out. lol Hey, thanks for taking me to the Mall. Keep up the great work!! :)
Seems like Moonbeam is at their finest, its a wonder people havent gone after them before now, they are an epitamy of a company that needs to be shut down.
Lmao, this place is like a half hour drive from my house! The cinema is still open, I remember seeing Mockingjay Part II there because it wasn't playing anywhere else (it had been out for a long time). Shit, do I have some half-decent memories of that place.
Great tour! Don't hold back from talking over your vids, love the commentary. People can just mute and throw some vaporwave on, or leave an immature comment if they want to. But don't let them affect you. Nice that you got into tgi's! This mall has a lot of similar elements to my hometown mall which now even with revitalization, and decent traffic shows some early decay in the far ends of some wings. F moonbeam.
There goes another piece of my childhood memories, which is pretty sad. Still, the place is a place of buisness and for whatever reason, that part failed. It'd be interesting to know a bit more about why it failed, but considering so many of the indoor malls are dying across the country, I think the biggest culprit is how people now shop, and there's not much to be done about that. I now live in MD and two such mall have also DIED and need to be knocked down. Usually what happens is just what happened to another local mall there, the Fayetteville Mall. I also loved that mall as a kid and remember going there for as long as I had memories. It got knocked down and a "town center" got put back in its place and it's doing well now. I suspect that something like this will befall Shoppingtown, which is sad for my memories of the place, but probably a LOT more economically workable. Besides, if I want to re-visit that feeliing, there is a meal near where I now live called the Columbia Mall (in Columbia MD of course) that is a DEAD RINGER for shoppingtown in its day...the place is always crowded, has better stores and shoppingtown ever did, and has an IMAX 3D theater attached to it...still, I will really miss the TOTALLY GUY barber shop that my dad used to take me to in Shoppingtown, that place was an institution. An old school barber shop run by guys for guys....
I’m a life resident of Syracuse and to see a piece of my childhood dead is heartbreaking. I remember when my mom and I would catch the bus on James Street and go to Shoppingtown Mall on Saturdays.
Hope Moonbeam get caught out, hopefully someone can step in and buy back the malls from them. In the UK it's a similar story buy not malls, mostly industrial business parks
Another terrific video. Sad the only real life in that mall is the fountain. And to see 80 percent or more of 52 stores to shut leaving 7 (less with the community theatre closing :( ) Thank you Moonbeam for letting a property that can be fixed up and revived DIE. Selfish money grabbling blank. Glad you got to check the insides of the stores and the TGI Fridays which looks like every other TGI Fridays I've been in. They are closing a bunch of locations. Seems the Retail Apocolypse is also hitting the restaurant sector. Also I have zero issue with supporting your adventures through Patreon. Easy way to set up my monthly donation and done. #ProudPatreon Think this will be your best year yet in filming these important places.
Wow... Im from Syracuse. Its amazing to see how much malls have died. And in 2020 Destiny is falling a little bit too. I went here just because of you. Thank you for coming to this wonderful city!
Well everybody right it is now closing. The latest update for shopping town is Rite Aid will be closing due to the company wall greens wanting to shut them down. Don’t know The fate of the mall no probably kick everybody out who is left and she was down for a good locking the doors forever. Well if you want to keep up-to-date on chopping down download 9 WSYR news Channel online to your phone from your App Store and you’ll be able to keep up to date on stopping out and you’ll be able to ask for your stories team if you don’t live in the area what’s up with your Stories theme and they will give you an answer
The security there is ass. Was kicked out like a year ago for walking into the mall at 9pm. Apparently if you’re not physically in the movie theater you don’t belong on their property. No wonder it’s dying.
Wow. I left Syracuse in 1987, and haven't been back much since. In the 80s, much of what you see in this video was new, full of life. I even worked in a small furniture store on the first floor! They would send me to a weird "old" part of the mall where they had storage, I would sometimes assemble small pieces of furniture. From that storage area, I could hear the video games from the arcade - and one day I went exploring. The storage area I had access to was just walled off 8 feet high and the ceiling was 10 or prob 13 feet so I climbed over the wall and found myself in an abandoned TV news studio! I think it was WSYR but don't remember. From the studio I found a hallway that connected to an abandoned movie theater. I never ventured beyond that, not sure what else I would have found. Very surreal seeing this video!!
Lived in Eastwood (Syracuse) for 6 years, used to volunteer at the Dewitt Library in the mall...watched the mall slowly die from 2009 till I moved back to northeastern NY state in 2015. Think its death was exasperated by the building up of the Carousel Mall---now called something else.
Ahhhhhhh I was just there days ago, !!! WHAT A SAD SHIT SHOW !!! IT WAS like a horror movie on Lifetime, im moving to Vermont and stopped at this exit to sleep for the night and stumbled up Dewitt first and then I thought, hey I'll go inside and check this possible dead mall out because im a dork like that , and I did and it was like a long funeral for a cat and I thought i was going to be carried away by bed bugs , next thing i recall im at the Hampton in Syracuse, and to see this pop up was a mind fuck , GREAT TIMING ! damn it was a sad place , really sad
Thank you for posting this, I went here when I was younger and I could barely remember now that it's closed. It's cool to see what it looked like when I used to hangout in the play area.
Brings back great memories. Place to get away , generally warm in winter and during hot summer days was place cool off and meet up with family and friends. Were special times there. Looked overall gleaming floors and sun shining through. Thank you for sharing. I use visit there ever since i was 10 in 1975. makes sad it wasnt able be utilized in other ways
OMG, I lived in Syracuse from 85 to 92. The place was dying then. I used to shop here. Just heard Great Norther Mall to the North of Shoppingtown just closed due to failure to pay its utility bills. Before I left we used to joke that we would all be serving each other hamburgers for a job. What do you do when there are not even retail jobs around to pay for that hamburger?
I grew up at this mall. My father worked here, as part of the company that owned and operated this mall (And Penn-Can Mall & Fairmount Faire). I have a bunch of memories of this place, and an extensive amount of info about it.
I remember this mall before they expanded and added a wing and a carousel. Sad to see this pace slowly decline over the decades, Whats even sadder is there was another mall just a few miles away in Fayettville that went through the same thing but that was able to be redeveloped into a town center and is now thriving. With the possible renumbering of the nearby highway into a mainline interstate this property should be in the best location to re-brand itself, Just wish the owners would get their heads out of their a** and do something about it.
My father was production manager at wnys tv for 30 years . Yes remember sitting on the hill ( before Edwards, and JC Penny’s were there) watching the fire .
This is pretty cool, I haven’t been here for a long time so this video takes me way back Update(June 1 2022): dang they finally closed this old place down. Never saw that coming in a million years definitely not ahaha
Shopping Town and most other malls died because Syracuse is a small retail area, but had several major malls and small retail areas. We were stuffing ourselves with commercial areas and not enough to balance.
So sad to see this mall die. I remember going there as a child every week for karate class. Always had to run up to gertrude hawk for a chocolate covered frozen banana. Oh and the laser tag days and fun junction
Seeing this mall the way it is makes me so sad. I used to work at Destiny USA (I agree, stupid name) and seeing the difference between the two is heartbreaking. I feel like Great Northern Mall in Clay NY is going through something similar. That mall is closest to my hometown and it looks like a ghost town, when it used to be so full of life. ): hopefully something can be done to bring these malls back to life and bring the communities back together. Great video btw!
I was in there a handful of months ago just checking it out and I took a photo and I hear from above me from the food court “you can’t take photos in here” and I look up and it’s a mall security guard and I look at him and go are you serious,no one and nothing is in here
I was there for a martial arts seminar a year or two ago and I was shocked to see no businesses in the food court. (I had brought my own lunch anyway.) Not a good reason to see something from your region on RUclips.
I wonder what the inside of the Rite Aid looks like. The store has to be very old school. Does anyone know if any other videos have the inside of the store documented?
i have lived in this area for 13 years and i grew up with this mall and carousel... it's been so sad to see it die over these past several years for no good reason. even though it's easy to say the destiny expansion to carousel was what killed it, i always suspected it was more down to predatory owners not giving a damn and letting the place literally rot. so thank you, now i know i'm right! i think the store closing that personally hurt the most was this laser tag place called the Fun Junction where my brother and i had many birthday parties, you can see the weird bronze-painted wall things in this video that were actually little windows into the laser tag area. when that place closed, i knew there was no saving shoppingtown :( also, thank you for shouting out open hand theater, they are a great local organization and i went to their summer camp many times. luckily they are still around, just based in a new building.
Fun Junction and the movie theater to hell. There was one movie theater in shoppingtown that had a long staircase you had to go down to watch a movie. It was creepy at night
There was a library in the basement this mall was weird lol but I loved going there because it wasn't as busy as Carousel center at the time. Wow memoriea
52 stores to 7! Oh WOW! I grew up on the southwest side of Syracuse and Shoppingtown and Carousel Center filled our family's shopping mall void after Camillus Mall closed. I went there a lot in high school and early college before I moved away to Pittsburgh (very close to CIII, I'm so sad to hear it's closing). I recently moved back and visited Shoppingtown a few months ago, and WOW! Pretty much like your video here. So desolate and empty. It was very eerie and sad to be in that mall and not to be able to walk into a single open anchor store. That fact really broke my heart along with the completely empty food court. I remember eating Pavone's there with my mom. I really, really hope that if the town of DeWitt acquires it, that they'll be able to successfully convert it into a community space. It's nice to know that's there's some local theaters and local stores in there.
Кино
Hey Everyone!...Would you all do me a favor and check out my buddy Jack Thomas video on this place!....And give him a follow and a subscribe, Thanks!...Ace
ruclips.net/video/1CIsH57S7wQ/видео.html
Done.
Nothing like a dying mall with old mall walkers just slowly walking around buying nothing just getting in the way of the customers that are there.
Whenever you see mall banners hanging from the ceiling that say “ fun, fashion, dining.” You know it’s moonbeam company.
And they advertise 3 things most Moonbeam malls *don't* have.
there isint any of that there anymore
@@BrianPacini can you explain why it’s racist?
So sad. This mall was so much fun in the 90s!
I worked at the Claire’s for 5 1/2 years. Seeing the decline was really depressing.
Wow, even the GNC closed! This mall REALLY IS DYING!
King Chuck yeah it’s pretty bad, it used to be a really beautiful mall. But unfortunately when another mall we have here opened, business died FAST. The only things it’s useful for now is the regal cinemas, which will be closed very soon because the owners owe so much money on it and I believe it’s being foreclosed.
It’s apparently dead now - Remaining store owners were given 30 days to move out...
...About 30 days ago.
52 to 7 stores! Yikes! Moonbeam sounds profoundly suspect. Irresponsible to let their properties decline into disrepair and eyesore.
I'm of the notion (conspiracy theory?) that Moonbeam is a money laundering front. They run all of their malls as separate LLCs and when a mall has any sort of issue, the declare bankruptcy of that LLC. But they move money around from property to property. They're slumlords at best, and embezzlers at worst.
that company is terrible
www.localsyr.com/news/local-news/a-cut-above-for-44-years-shoppingtown-barber-shop-moving-on-to-new-location/1881775136 now 6 after Friday
Brian Pacini stop
Moonbeam are the Eddie Lampert of mall owners.
Agreed. It wouldn't shock me at all if Eddie Lamprey had one of his tentacles wriggling around in various properties out this way too. Like Martin Shkreli ("Pharma Bro") and Slick Eddie the owners of Moonbeam need to go to federal prison and become Bubba's cellies.
YES !!!!!!
They buy them for tax write offs just show big business get it to good with tax evasion
Doesnt Moonbeam own the Century 3 as well?
Maybe moonbeam’s new slogan should be “When a mall’s day’s in the sun are over, it comes to die in the moonbeam”
yes good one
Love the more talkative videos, hearing the history behind these places is just as important as seeing them. Great job with the videos
Do Great Northern Mall again if you are in the area. I’ve been hearing more and more stores closing in that mall just recently
I used to work at the JCP at Great Northern.
Great Northern is owned by yet another “Winner”. He guy has defaulted on other malls in the past. Dynasty was a big “Win” for Syracuse aright, so much that it killed Great Northern, Shopping Town and Great Lakes Malls! Idiots that voted that thing thru
I keep hearing that Fucillo wants to do something with Great Northern, but I’ve been hearing that rumor for years. I used to work at the Claire’s in that mall, I had to leave because it was so dead. That mall is closest to my hometown and I really hope something can be done to bring it back to life, it’s so heartbreaking walking around that mall now.
Foot Locker, The Children's Place, and Victoria's Secret just moved out of there. Kay's is closing in the summer. The Toys R' Us was turned into an RV dealership.
The friendly’s at Great Northern Mall has closed as of 9AM this morning
I think Moonbeam knows exactly what they're doing. They have an extensive portfolio of properties. They have no intention of saving dying malls. They buy them cheap then when the time is right sell to a developer who will raze the place and replace.
I agree with you
Some mall history:
On August 28, 1990, shoppingtown mall was hit by a microburst (unconfirmed tornado) during a severe thunder storm which removed a portion of the roof and totally destroyed three stores. One of them was a great locally owned 2 floor bookstore, the economy bookstore. I loved that store as a child snd teenager. The remodel of the mall occured following that big storm which left the mall a mess. The grand reopening of the mall occured in mid August 1991. While it is possible that addis and dey's (orginal anchor of the former Macy's) were planning to build the new store prior to the storm the work did not begin until fall of 1990. Addis and dey's very publicly announced in early 1990 that they would not have a location at carousel mall, but instead invest in a long standing location. Originally Addis & co and Dey Brothers were two seperate stores each having locations in shoppingtown. The orginal dey brothers location was the closed sears.
Thank you for doing this video. Shoppingtown is so nesr and dear to my heart. It was one of my gramma and mom's favorite mall. I remember when this mall was still a plaza and became enclosed. I enjoyed seeing the phots from the late '70's early '80's. So many memories!
According to my dad, his uncle owned the property before it was developed. After he sold it for $60,000 (in the 1950's?), it was resold for a million.
I live here and not kidding said three days ago they should do a dead mall series at shoppingtown
Did you see that the DeadMalls.com youtube just released a video on this mall? I know several RUclipsrs who have this place in their backlog to edit as well.
ruclips.net/video/1CIsH57S7wQ/видео.html
The way this mall's going it needs just about a once a month update, I'm suprised no local you tubers( except for rumored the series) really picked up on it.
The only thing I remember about that mall was the children’s play area and the old fun junction because those used to be my favorite places there as a kid because I hated shopping lol
Finally someone does a mall in my area! Great job as always!
Any ppl from cuse here?
If I had a dime every time a dead mall owner said they have a plan to revitalize a mall. I be rich ! And the few that do, still goes dead soon after. P.S. I went to Moonbeam web site one of its "Executive team" went to Moscow State University ? LMAO
Am surprised escalators were still on, Liked
Go ahead and go after Moonbeam - a company like that does not deserve to exist, and their officers should be in jail.
How does a company like moonbeam make $$ buying malls and letting them go under??
probably tax write offs
There's rumors that Moonbeam is a front for Amazon to turn malls into distribution centers by killing the mall
Another great vid, Anthony. You are definitely one of the top dead mall RUclipsrs around. I visited Shoppingtown about 6 or 7 years ago (well before I even knew there was such a dead mall community) and even back then it was a terminal case. The whole Syracuse area was so over-malled, it's no surprise. Destiny USA (yeah, it is a stupid name...) was only a nail in Shoppingtown's coffin. Thanks for the update!
Destiny has always been updating itself and getting better and better while shopping town hasn't changed at all in the past 10 years except for every store but about 3 leaving. The only reason anybody still goes into the mall at this point is because it has a good movie theater, but without that I can't see anybody ever coming to it.
Did karate in shoppingtown mall for over 10 years w Rande Lawrence. Used to played laser tag at fun junction a lot of the time afterwards as well. Its crazy how much of my childhood is wrapped up in this now dead mall!
Remember growing up going there it was such a fun mall to go to I wished it wasn’t so abandoned now just because of destiny USA 😞😢
our governor probably has something to do with it .
That's sad to hear, moonbeam sucks so bad. I hate how they just let these great property's go to waste. Thanks for another great video.
I live near Shoppingtown and the cinema is literally the only thing keeping it alive.
Lake of Crystalclan I live in Nedrow. I grew up going here. If I could I’d buy it
@@BrianPacini I'm 14, and I wanna stay the hell out of politics, but thanks for the offer. By the way, out of all of the comment sections you could have linked that, you linked it to some teenage girl's comment about the cinema being the mall's life support. Could you have at least found a conspiracy theory to post that on? You could have gone somewhere else.
I remember back in the early to mid 2010s, I used to go here a lot because my sister was working at the hair salon there. It's so depressing to see a mall that left a giant footprint in your life die so fast. In 2013, when I went there the most, there were still about a hundred stores open. In the past year, the number has shrunk from fifty two to seven tenents. I am so sorry that Destiny got the best fron this mall just like every other mall in the area. Rest in peace
Remember Fayetteville mall? I used to love that place when I was growing up in the 80's and 90's. Such great memories. It doesn't even exist anymore. : (
Approximately one year after this video was released, ShoppingTown Mall closed along with all other malls in New York state in an effort to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. They did not reopen in July, and probably never will open again - most likely Moonbeam decided to let this mall die as a retail operation rather than invest in what it would take to get things open again. With all remaining tenants given 30 day eviction notices in late Sept., ShoppingTown Mall has effectively ceased to exist as a retail operation, and due to Moonbeam's bankruptcy it's unlikely anyone will be able to step in to save it. The wrecking balls can't be long in coming for this place, which is a very sad fate for it to meet. :(
Born and raised in Syracuse, seeing the decline and doom of this mall was heartbreaking. It used to be the spot to go to. Should turn it into apartments or some thing
I am surprise that's Escalator is still working
Hoping you got to visit ALL the dead Syracuse area malls!!!
Hello. I am a Syracuse local and I just wanted to say that moonbeam lost to the town of Dewitt in court. Moonbeam has a certain amount of time to pay the taxes on the mall and if not the town of Dewitt gets ownership of the mall. The town wants to auction off the mall to someone who can turn it around. Most locals want to save the mall because Carousel “Destiny” is way to busy. Also what most people don’t know is that in the back area “where a lot of the offices were” is a dental claims clean up company that employs a decent amount of people.
Lisa Dunn interesting
I think a nice addition to the videos would be a "YOU ARE HERE" indicator on a picture of the mall map in the corner of the video, showing where the footage is being taken throughout the entire video. Does that make sense?
Speaking of which... Here's a photographic of the same exact mall back when it first opened all-the-way back in 1954, if you are curious about it:
image.syracuse.com/home/syr-media/width960/img/vintage/photo/2018/02/07/shoppingtown1jpg-bc15694d6a1b973b.jpg
As you can probably see; this was originally a stirp-mall!
This was the mall we use to go to. It was still booming in 2010 and 2011. This was when we spent the most time here. It was packed full of ppl.
2015, the food court was still up.
2018, only thing open was SEARS. It was a fast decline.
So into RetroWave music already thanks to the first videos I had seen of dead malls in the past and now your bumper music inspires yet another track that I just bought. Couple this music with your awesome coverage and yet another video that I enjoyed thoroughly, Anthony! Thanks for all you do... will consider becoming a Patreon supporter if I can financially do so. :D
i’m 15 now, as a little kid at the age(s) of 8-10 i always used to go here with my mom to go shopping, eat, anything. Now sometimes we go there just to go to the movies. Everybody goes to Destiny USA now, truly one of the best malls. Sad to see Shopping town basically dead
This used to be the spot! Until destiny USA came along, and they don’t have to pay taxes for 30 years.
As someone who lives less than 20 minutes away from this place, it has gone downhill. I really think it started with the pet store. There used to be a pet store with dogs that the owners of the store ended up abusing. After that the mall has gone downhill.
When I was little I really remember going occasionally for Clare’s and whatnot. I would always play in the play area and then get a cookie, popcorn, and absolutely love it. And now that I’m older here’s about the other times that I remember going:
•I went to Clare’s to try to find a replacement for a necklace. That shit closed and I left.
•Some friends invited me to a movie (they had a Studio Gibli movie year thing) and I decided to go. We got there early so we explored a bit and found that a bunch of the store gates were unlocked. Chilled out in there for a second and jumped the gate and hung out in the old play area. Sad to know that some of the old buildings had been removed in the play area itself.(13:16) very easily jumpable gate. Went down the up escalator and left to my place.
•Occasionally in this time I went skating at the skating center with an old friend. (shop with the red windows at 5:59) her brother who was about 5 at the time I think needed to use the bathroom, so we ran him into this kids bathroom area. The place smelled of something out of a weed basement and it was littered with mold everywhere. Little kid toys in the corner and a bucket collecting water from the ceiling in the middle of it. Definitely to drag in little kids. Someone left bags in there. Went skating, saw some people, quite a few were in there actually! Stopped our little skating adventure and headed home. But before then I showed my friend that I could still fit in the little kid riding things. (16:22) Brickz for Kidz was still up and running in the building. (4:04)
•Went to another movie with the same friends. Walked in to find out that Fun Junction had closed and I legit wanted to cry. That place was my childhood and I made so many friends and memories there. They had the best cheap laser tag y’all have no idea! It was a nice movie though and we won some ducks out of the claw machine before leaving. I swear that building makes more money from claw machines than anything else in the damn building.
•Came back again with my friend to go skating again. We took a quick home video of the entire building, re-took a VERY old photo of me standing in the same place, and it was very surreal. We took the back entrance, very scary. (15:20) I always wonder if the poster for the company on the little stand still exists. If I ever end up going back (which I probably won’t) I’m taking the poster.
•Last time I went was to go skating. It was very,, weird. We went into the building just me and her and there was the old guy following us the entire time, staring at us through the window and all that creepy shit. The really nice girl who rung us up said to be safe and gave us a free pass to the rink. We skated for about 17~ish minutes before deciding that this was too sketchy and heading home. Nobody else was in the building. Although the guy followed us when we took some false turns, we tricked him and ran. Never went back after that. The lady said that he owned something in the building and that he had been trying to talk to kids for the better half of a week. Youch.
All in all, lots of memories. If you ever need any more info please pm me here on on Instagram @Neonn_Neo! I’ll be very happy answering any questions you might have!
Holy shit!!!! I remember that goddamn pet store! The staff were so rude and I felt so bad for all the animals. Even though I was a little kid, I sensed something was going on there.
The sear wing was slated to to be demolished and turned into a strip mall but was halted because of a tax dispute
I'm from SYR -- about a fifteen-minute drive from Shoppingtown, actually -- and the mall used to be a great place to go for shopping, movies, and goofing off in general. Carousel/Destiny fills the economic hole that Shoppingtown's demise has left, but to see the old mall standing and rotting leaves plenty to the imagination about how one could better use that space. When retail started pulling out of Shoppingtown, community spaces and local businesses started moving in, and that made the mall seem like a place that could thrive. That skate park was always busy, and places like Fun Junction and the karaoke Spot always had families and kids hanging out. Plus, the movie theater still does well today, even if it's not as big or as fancy as the one at Destiny. Shoppingtown could transition into something beneficial to the suburban residents of Syracuse. It doesn't deserve to remain just another dead mall.
My parents met in that TGI Friday’s while both working there!
Okay, but first of all: thank you for introducing me to Michael Oakley. I legit just bought his new album after watching this video.
Dana Cantu heck yeah!
Ace's Adventures I absolutely love love your videos, I’ve been following you for two years now! Can’t wait to see your future vids!
Was here a couple years ago when Sears was closing! Jcpenney was already closed and you could get lost in this mall. Very beautiful
Please visit the. Phillipsburg mall in warren New Jersey. We have five stores left!
Not surprised that this mall is dead being that Syracuse has Destiny USA and Syracuse is not big enough to support note than that massive mall. Honestly Destiny even shows signs of some struggle.
Also you blame moon beam or whatever for the mall but honestly wilmorite clearly doesn't plan things too well either.
I visited Destiny about 3 years ago. Yeah, that mall had some vacancies too.
no idea how this is still open.
i dont think it will be much longer
Just found your channel. As a local, I can answer what you were wondering around the 9:30 mark. Carousel Center (Now called Destiny USA- agree, dumb name) opened in October 1990 and became an immediate threat to Shoppingtown and the other malls in the area. Carousel Center was like nothing seen before in the Syracuse area - a mall with two floors and a basement level, with tiled flooring, glass ceilings in various parts to allow light to come through. The new Carousel mall housed a food court (a novelty for the area malls) and a carousel that had local historic ties. Shoppingtown, which had enjoyed it's prime location and loyal customers for many years, undoubtedly felt the pressure to compete. The original Shoppingtown still had that ugly 70's look that was so common up through the 80's, which was status quo for the time. In a last ditch effort to compete with Carousel Center, a massive "facelift" was given to the mall, including the tiled flooring and sky-light ceiling, to mimic Carousel Center's appeal. Additionally, a massive expansive wing was put on to house a food court and (you guessed it...) a carousel! Again, to mimic the allure of Carousel Center. Shoppingtown was able to hold their own for a little while with their faithful clientele who thought Carousel Center was simply too big and too crowded. However, time has not been kind to Shoppingtown, and with the loss of Sears, JC Penny's, and a few other anchors, it has gone the way of all dead malls now. Hope that helps.
Nobody is shoppin' at Shoppingtown
LOVE Michael Oakley. You and me appear to be on the same page in regards to music. We should hang out. lol Hey, thanks for taking me to the Mall. Keep up the great work!! :)
Ooooh that's Micheal Oakley intro gave me chills!
Seems like Moonbeam is at their finest, its a wonder people havent gone after them before now, they are an epitamy of a company that needs to be shut down.
I've said it before on your other videos...Love the music and one of my favorites to get into the "mall mood"..
Michael Oakley CONTROL!!!!!!!!!!!!
Lmao, this place is like a half hour drive from my house! The cinema is still open, I remember seeing Mockingjay Part II there because it wasn't playing anywhere else (it had been out for a long time). Shit, do I have some half-decent memories of that place.
Great tour! Don't hold back from talking over your vids, love the commentary. People can just mute and throw some vaporwave on, or leave an immature comment if they want to. But don't let them affect you.
Nice that you got into tgi's!
This mall has a lot of similar elements to my hometown mall which now even with revitalization, and decent traffic shows some early decay in the far ends of some wings.
F moonbeam.
There goes another piece of my childhood memories, which is pretty sad. Still, the place is a place of buisness and for whatever reason, that part failed. It'd be interesting to know a bit more about why it failed, but considering so many of the indoor malls are dying across the country, I think the biggest culprit is how people now shop, and there's not much to be done about that. I now live in MD and two such mall have also DIED and need to be knocked down. Usually what happens is just what happened to another local mall there, the Fayetteville Mall. I also loved that mall as a kid and remember going there for as long as I had memories. It got knocked down and a "town center" got put back in its place and it's doing well now. I suspect that something like this will befall Shoppingtown, which is sad for my memories of the place, but probably a LOT more economically workable. Besides, if I want to re-visit that feeliing, there is a meal near where I now live called the Columbia Mall (in Columbia MD of course) that is a DEAD RINGER for shoppingtown in its day...the place is always crowded, has better stores and shoppingtown ever did, and has an IMAX 3D theater attached to it...still, I will really miss the TOTALLY GUY barber shop that my dad used to take me to in Shoppingtown, that place was an institution. An old school barber shop run by guys for guys....
I'm so glad that I have malls in my area that are still vibrant, alive, full of people young and old (Holyoke Mass, Nashua NH, Manchester NH)
Dying malls should be made into apartments
Just another amazing video Anthony really sad to see what moonbeam does to these properties they need to be put out of their misery
I’m a life resident of Syracuse and to see a piece of my childhood dead is heartbreaking. I remember when my mom and I would catch the bus on James Street and go to Shoppingtown Mall on Saturdays.
I figured Moonbeam is just acquiring real estate to sell in the future.
@@BrianPacini No, fukcq off!
Hope Moonbeam get caught out, hopefully someone can step in and buy back the malls from them. In the UK it's a similar story buy not malls, mostly industrial business parks
Its done ,over, finito
Hi, new to the channel, love what I've seen so far! Thanks so much!
Welcome!
not bad not bad. I like the first 5 minutes of real life stillness.
You keep mentioning Carousel, I still think of the long, doomed one in San Bernardino😔
Another terrific video. Sad the only real life in that mall is the fountain. And to see 80 percent or more of 52 stores to shut leaving 7 (less with the community theatre closing :( ) Thank you Moonbeam for letting a property that can be fixed up and revived DIE. Selfish money grabbling blank.
Glad you got to check the insides of the stores and the TGI Fridays which looks like every other TGI Fridays I've been in. They are closing a bunch of locations. Seems the Retail Apocolypse is also hitting the restaurant sector.
Also I have zero issue with supporting your adventures through Patreon. Easy way to set up my monthly donation and done. #ProudPatreon
Think this will be your best year yet in filming these important places.
Catman Mark Blanchard the theaters are shutting down?
I live near this mall and it's really said to see what it has become. I remember hanging out here all the time back in the day. So sad....
It could come back if u put transportation hubs around them
The silence is perfectly fitting. Love this with no narration, just the forlorn images of emptiness.
Sad that the mall has been left to rot (literally). There’s so much beautiful natural lighting as well.
@@BrianPacini youre an idiot. Here's your daily reminder.
Wow... Im from Syracuse. Its amazing to see how much malls have died. And in 2020 Destiny is falling a little bit too. I went here just because of you. Thank you for coming to this wonderful city!
This discord hates Moonbeam. Slumlords.
Well everybody right it is now closing. The latest update for shopping town is Rite Aid will be closing due to the company wall greens wanting to shut them down. Don’t know The fate of the mall no probably kick everybody out who is left and she was down for a good locking the doors forever. Well if you want to keep up-to-date on chopping down download 9 WSYR news Channel online to your phone from your App Store and you’ll be able to keep up to date on stopping out and you’ll be able to ask for your stories team if you don’t live in the area what’s up with your Stories theme and they will give you an answer
The security there is ass. Was kicked out like a year ago for walking into the mall at 9pm. Apparently if you’re not physically in the movie theater you don’t belong on their property. No wonder it’s dying.
Wow. I left Syracuse in 1987, and haven't been back much since. In the 80s, much of what you see in this video was new, full of life. I even worked in a small furniture store on the first floor! They would send me to a weird "old" part of the mall where they had storage, I would sometimes assemble small pieces of furniture. From that storage area, I could hear the video games from the arcade - and one day I went exploring. The storage area I had access to was just walled off 8 feet high and the ceiling was 10 or prob 13 feet so I climbed over the wall and found myself in an abandoned TV news studio! I think it was WSYR but don't remember. From the studio I found a hallway that connected to an abandoned movie theater. I never ventured beyond that, not sure what else I would have found. Very surreal seeing this video!!
Lived in Eastwood (Syracuse) for 6 years, used to volunteer at the Dewitt Library in the mall...watched the mall slowly die from 2009 till I moved back to northeastern NY state in 2015. Think its death was exasperated by the building up of the Carousel Mall---now called something else.
SOLD! By Onondaga County. Negotiations with owner of Sears and Macy's buildings. Set for mixed use redevelopment. So far only on paper.
Ahhhhhhh I was just there days ago, !!! WHAT A SAD SHIT SHOW !!! IT WAS like a horror movie on Lifetime, im moving to Vermont and stopped at this exit to sleep for the night and stumbled up Dewitt first and then I thought, hey I'll go inside and check this possible dead mall out because im a dork like that , and I did and it was like a long funeral for a cat and I thought i was going to be carried away by bed bugs , next thing i recall im at the Hampton in Syracuse, and to see this pop up was a mind fuck , GREAT TIMING ! damn it was a sad place , really sad
Thank you for posting this, I went here when I was younger and I could barely remember now that it's closed. It's cool to see what it looked like when I used to hangout in the play area.
Brings back great memories. Place to get away , generally warm in winter and during hot summer days was place cool off and meet up with family and friends. Were special times there. Looked overall gleaming floors and sun shining through. Thank you for sharing. I use visit there ever since i was 10 in 1975. makes sad it wasnt able be utilized in other ways
OMG, I lived in Syracuse from 85 to 92. The place was dying then. I used to shop here. Just heard Great Norther Mall to the North of Shoppingtown just closed due to failure to pay its utility bills. Before I left we used to joke that we would all be serving each other hamburgers for a job. What do you do when there are not even retail jobs around to pay for that hamburger?
I grew up at this mall. My father worked here, as part of the company that owned and operated this mall (And Penn-Can Mall & Fairmount Faire). I have a bunch of memories of this place, and an extensive amount of info about it.
I remember this mall before they expanded and added a wing and a carousel. Sad to see this pace slowly decline over the decades, Whats even sadder is there was another mall just a few miles away in Fayettville that went through the same thing but that was able to be redeveloped into a town center and is now thriving.
With the possible renumbering of the nearby highway into a mainline interstate this property should be in the best location to re-brand itself, Just wish the owners would get their heads out of their a** and do something about it.
My father was production manager at wnys tv for 30 years . Yes remember sitting on the hill ( before Edwards, and JC Penny’s were there) watching the fire .
NYS don’t surprise me I’m in The Hudson Valley,NY😢😢
So sad. this was my go to mall when I worked at Syracuse University in the mid 1990's. Time goes so fast. I use to work at the JC Penny's there
Shoppingtown Mall and Penn-Can Mall were the best Malls in the Syracuse, NY area. It's a shame to see them gone but never forgotten
This is pretty cool, I haven’t been here for a long time so this video takes me way back
Update(June 1 2022): dang they finally closed this old place down. Never saw that coming in a million years definitely not ahaha
Shopping Town and most other malls died because Syracuse is a small retail area, but had several major malls and small retail areas. We were stuffing ourselves with commercial areas and not enough to balance.
So sad to see this mall die. I remember going there as a child every week for karate class. Always had to run up to gertrude hawk for a chocolate covered frozen banana. Oh and the laser tag days and fun junction
Very reminiscent of Irondequoit Mall/DEADly Center!
Seeing this mall the way it is makes me so sad. I used to work at Destiny USA (I agree, stupid name) and seeing the difference between the two is heartbreaking. I feel like Great Northern Mall in Clay NY is going through something similar. That mall is closest to my hometown and it looks like a ghost town, when it used to be so full of life. ): hopefully something can be done to bring these malls back to life and bring the communities back together. Great video btw!
I was in there a handful of months ago just checking it out and I took a photo and I hear from above me from the food court “you can’t take photos in here” and I look up and it’s a mall security guard and I look at him and go are you serious,no one and nothing is in here
I was there for a martial arts seminar a year or two ago and I was shocked to see no businesses in the food court. (I had brought my own lunch anyway.) Not a good reason to see something from your region on RUclips.
I wonder what the inside of the Rite Aid looks like. The store has to be very old school. Does anyone know if any other videos have the inside of the store documented?
rite aid sucks i havent really seen anyone in there in a while idk how they stay in buisness theyll be gone soon too
TheL&TRetailblogspot BlogMan Not old. It was remodeled around 2008 when Rite Aid acquired Eckerd Drugs.
i have lived in this area for 13 years and i grew up with this mall and carousel... it's been so sad to see it die over these past several years for no good reason. even though it's easy to say the destiny expansion to carousel was what killed it, i always suspected it was more down to predatory owners not giving a damn and letting the place literally rot. so thank you, now i know i'm right! i think the store closing that personally hurt the most was this laser tag place called the Fun Junction where my brother and i had many birthday parties, you can see the weird bronze-painted wall things in this video that were actually little windows into the laser tag area. when that place closed, i knew there was no saving shoppingtown :(
also, thank you for shouting out open hand theater, they are a great local organization and i went to their summer camp many times. luckily they are still around, just based in a new building.
Fun Junction and the movie theater to hell. There was one movie theater in shoppingtown that had a long staircase you had to go down to watch a movie. It was creepy at night
There was a library in the basement this mall was weird lol but I loved going there because it wasn't as busy as Carousel center at the time. Wow memoriea
Thank you for showing us that you breaking in entering which is a felony so you’re going to jail buddy
52 stores to 7! Oh WOW! I grew up on the southwest side of Syracuse and Shoppingtown and Carousel Center filled our family's shopping mall void after Camillus Mall closed. I went there a lot in high school and early college before I moved away to Pittsburgh (very close to CIII, I'm so sad to hear it's closing).
I recently moved back and visited Shoppingtown a few months ago, and WOW! Pretty much like your video here. So desolate and empty. It was very eerie and sad to be in that mall and not to be able to walk into a single open anchor store. That fact really broke my heart along with the completely empty food court. I remember eating Pavone's there with my mom.
I really, really hope that if the town of DeWitt acquires it, that they'll be able to successfully convert it into a community space. It's nice to know that's there's some local theaters and local stores in there.
Moonbean kiss of death for dying malls always say have big plans and nothing happens sooner or later mall closes and rots abandoned