May 5, 1998
By NOEL S. BRADY
Journal staff reporter
The owner of Northgate Mall has big plans for redeveloping the nearly 50-year-old shopping center in north Seattle.
The first major overhaul in 25 years for this self-proclaimed oldest mall in the country will include at least half-million square feet of new retail, office, hotel, cinema and residential construction.
Project designer Rod Johnson of Callison Architects was scheduled to present the plan yesterday evening to the Seattle Design Review Board for the mall's owner, Simon De Bartolo Group Inc. The company also owns Tacoma Mall and the San Fransisco 49ers.
The proposal outlines an eight- to 15-year redevelopment period. According to the design review application, new construction would fill the mall's existing south parking lot with 115,850 square feet of retail and restaurant space; a 100,000-square-foot cineplex; 170,000 square feet of office space; 150 residential units and a 216-room hotel.
On the northwest corner of the mall property, the developer would replace an existing medical building and theater with 125,600 square feet of new retail and restaurant space. Plans also call for a 20,000-square-foot expansion of Lamonts; an additional 80,000 square feet for Nordstrom; a new 80,000-square-foot department store and 120,000 square feet of office space, as well as another 90,000 square feet for offices on the eastern side of the complex.
John Shaw, a planner for the Seattle Department of Construction and Land Use, said the DeBartolo Group had been planning some type of redevelopment for years, but exactly what the developer had in mind was never clear. A Northgate community master plan drawn up in the early '90s emphasized a desire by the planners and the mall's neighbors to utilize the its street-front parking lots as retail space, which begs the question: where will shoppers park?
"I'm not aware of a parking structure," Shaw said. "That will be something they will have to address. The general development plan is supposed to be an overall proposal for what they intend to do."
Seattle's Transit Manager Jared Smith said the mall owner have been in early negotiations with Sound Transit over incorporating a light rail station into the redevelopment project. That portion of the Link light rail system has yet to be funded, but it is feasible that Sound Transit could find money to extend the system to Northgate within the next two years, he said.
The plan to redevelop Northgate comes just a year after the mall spent more than $18 million to renovate portions of its interior, including a new domed food court.
The mall, which was completed in 1950, hasn't had a major external renovation since 1974 when a roof was added to the shopping center.
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