Alberni Mall is an outdoor shopping mall located in Port Alberni, British Columbia. Formerly an indoor mall until April 15, 2007, major renovation and redevelopment of the former mall complex began in the spring of that year, and it will most likely also be renamed as part of its updating.HistoryIn 1977, Royal Oak Holdings, a Vancouver-based company which had recently opened the Ironwood Mall in Campbell River, British Columbia, were approached by a group of Port Alberni citizens about building an indoor mall in their city. At the time, Port Alberni was one of the few larger towns in British Columbia that did not have an indoor mall. The proposition received support from then-Port Alberni mayor Jim Robertson, the city's council, the Alberni-Clayoquot Regional District, and major retailers. A twin movie theatre and two banks were included as part of the proposed mall's original plans, but those plans were dropped prior to the beginning of the construction phase.The mall's site, a then-wooded area located on the southeast corner of Johnston and Cherry Creek Roads, was cleared in the summer of 1978 and construction began in August that year. The mall was completed and opened its doors for the first time as the Alberni Mall on May 30, 1979, with 42 stores and services, including original anchor tenants Safeway and Kmart.Alberni Mall prospered through the 1980s and into the mid-1990s, but hard times began to befall the mall beginning in 1996, when Safeway closed its location at the mall on November 14, even though they retained their lease; rather than let a competing supermarket chain take over their former space, Safeway opted to sub-lease it to Liquidation World. In 1998, the Canadian stores of Kmart were purchased by the Hudson's Bay Company, with the intent of turning most of them into Zellers stores and closing the rest.
