Oshawa Centre

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to navigation Jump to search

Article Draft

Lead

Oshawa Centre is a two-storey shopping mall located in the city of Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. Located at King Street and Stevenson Road, it is the largest mall in Durham Region and the largest in Ontario east of Toronto with over 230 retail stores and public services. Its Executive Office complex includes the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care of Ontario.

The Oshawa Centre is owned and managed by Ivanhoé Cambridge. One of Durham Region Transit's bus terminals is located outside of the mall's south-east entrance, from which there are regular bus services to Oshawa GO Station, Whitby GO Station, and the campuses of Durham College, among other destinations.

Article body

The shopping centre opened as a shopping plaza in 1956 and was enclosed in 1968.

Ivanhoé Cambridge had the grand opening of the $230 million renovated and expanded a portion of the mall on September 29, 2016. The renovation and expansion project began in the summer of 2013 which included 60 additional stores within the mall. In 2014, Zellers was torn down to make room for what is now parking space. The former 1950s-themed food court was replaced with a new 1000-seat food court. The food court was relocated to the east section of the mall, in the new addition.

Former large retailers at Oshawa Centre included:

Zellers (closed and torn down due to renovation) and was originally supposed to be a new Target store, but never came to fruition.
Sears (closed 2018 with the liquidation of Sears Canadian operations) -- vacant.
Mark's Work Wearhouse (Moved across the street beside the Canadian Tire)
Eaton's (closed down in the mid-90s)
Famous Players (closed down when a new Cineplex theatre opened in North Oshawa)

The former Westmount Public School, a heritage building built in 1925, was acquired in 1988 and was demolished in September 2018 to make way for the mall's future expansion.

In recent years, several new stores have been added in an attempt to attract more customers to the mall. This includes MIXTA, a grab-and-go spot that serves South American cuisine^[1], and the Blimey British Shoppe, a bakery emphasising British baked goods and imports^[2]. Both of these businesses officially opened their doors in March of 2021^[1]^[2]. The owner of the Blimey British Shoppe, John Perks, also owns a Star Wars themed gift shop in the Oshawa centre, which opened in late 2020.^[3]