Historic Re-Development Begins on Evergreen Plaza

The historic rebirth of the Evergreen Plaza began Wednesday morning as demolition crews set to wrecking the 1950s’s-era enclosed shopping mall.

“I believe today that somewhere here with us is Arthur Rubloff who had the foresight to build the Evergreen Plaza in the early 1950s,” Mayor Jim Sexton said, before taking the ceremonial first swing at the building during a groundbreaking ceremony on Wednesday.

“I know we all came as kids and purchased Easter and Christmas suits.” the Evergreen Park mayor continued. “There’s a lot of history here but there’s a lot of history to be made and will be made for the next several generations.”

The project is being redeveloped by Tampa, FL-based DeBartolo Development and Lormax-Stern Development, of suburban Detroit.

“We looked at this and you have seen a million-square-foot vacant and functionally obsolete property,” said Karl Zarbo, Lormax-Stern’s director of operations. “As developers we viewed it as an opportunity to bring a brand new, first-class shopping center to your community.”

With a targeted completion date of 2017, the project is expected to spark hundreds of construction and eventually retail jobs.

“We are going to be putting a lot of local people to work.” Sexton said. “That’s the plan we promised and we will fulfill. There will be demolition jobs and construction jobs, and by the way all union construction jobs.”

The developers have agreed to hire 25-percent union and minority workers from the Evergreen Park community.

Once the jewel of the Southland, hundreds of thousands of shoppers flocked annually to the mall to shop at Montgomery Ward’s or buy shoes at Florsheim. The Plaza originally began as an open air shopping center but with the advent of enclosed malls like Schaumburg’s Woodfield and Mt. Prospect’s Randhurst, the Plaza turned inward and underwent enclosure.

Now, the pendulum is swinging in the other direction again, as retail centers are moving back to open air malls.

“They’re a lot more cost effective,” said Jay Adams, vice president of development for DeBartolo. “People in general want to park in front where they want to shop, and go in and go out. I think a lot of it has to do with people’s spending and buying habits. A lot of shopping is done online. It’s really not that experience where you go and spend all day at the mall.”

The developers are pumping an estimated $120 million into the re-development. Some of the names being floated as possible tenants include Dick’s Sporting Goods and Whole Foods.

A pad is being prepared for a new Carson’s rebuild on the site. The existing store will remain open during construction. During Wednesday’s ceremony, Carson’s announced that its new building would be completed and open in fall 2016 in time for the holidays.

The developers are pumping an estimated $120 million into the re-development. Some of the names being floated as possible tenants include Dick’s Sporting Goods and Whole Foods.

Original story -- With a ceremonial first swing of a gold sledge hammer by Evergreen Park Mayor Jim Sexton, the long-awaited redevelopment of the Evergreen Plaza at 95th Street and Western Avenue begins.

“I can’t believe this day is actually here,” the mayor said.

Village officials, representatives from Lormax Stern and DeBartolo, the developers of the project, and residents gathered Wednesday morning for an official groundbreaking -- and wrecking -- of the Evergreen Plaza.

Once a mecca for Southland shoppers, the walls came tumbling down as wrecking crews began tearing down the 1950s era shopping mall.

Patch will have more on this story later.