Big New Ideas For Fort Worth's Ridgmar Mall

Follow CBSDFW.COM: Facebook | Twitter

FORT WORTH (CBSDFW.COM) - A major overhaul is looming for a big North Texas mall as one its anchor stores prepares to leave.

Macy's announced it is pulling out of Ridgmar Mall in Fort Worth as part of the department store chain's national cutbacks.

But the mall owner has big ideas for that huge space.

"I hate it," frequent Ridgmar visitor Paula Decker said. "I hate they're going to close the store."

Decker has seen Ridgmar mall go from almost vacant to completely revitalized after renovations to the property several years ago by owner GK Development, Inc.

But now, Macy's says it will shut down its 150,000 square foot store this year.

"It's a shame," Decker lamented. "Because that means we're going to have an empty store again."

But the president of GK Development, Garo Kholamian, told CBS 11 today malls in many markets are evolving beyond single stores occupying enormous space and Ridgmar may evolve, too.

The developer has already converted vacant, big store spaces into comfortable walking areas with smaller shops in Iowa and into a stylish cafe as part of a North Dakota redevelopment.

GK Development has already started a multi-million dollar makeover project at Ridgmar. And now the company is looking at designs that could change Macy's into mixed use space with shops, eateries, open walking space and even hotel or residential space.

"We love that idea," Decker said with a smile. "It's great! Thumbs up on that!"

Next door to the mall at Dagwood's restaurant, they're not too worried about Macy's closing. They have a larger customer base than just mall traffic.

"A lot of it comes from the community back there and the businesses down the street and then the base obviously," said restaurant employee Henry Ramirez, referring to Fort Worth NAS JRB.

But they say replacing part of the mall with something like a hotel could bring an even bigger, out of town customer base to their store.

"Yeah, of course it would," Ramirez said. "We get a lot of people who are visiting Fort Worth, too. We're like really really popular on yelp and Facebook right now."

The developer says they don't have a timeline for the project since they just found out Macy's is leaving. But they already have architects drawing up ideas for what that space might look like in the future.

(©2016 CBS Local Media, a division of CBS Radio Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)