An extant asset
Although the city of Omaha did exceed my expectations as a whole, I have to say that their retail game is a little lacking. Never having been over-malled, the metro only ever saw a total of six enclosed shopping centers built within its borders over the decades. Besides several exurban “lifestyle centers” dotting the Big O’s outskirts, there remains only one viable shopping mall remaining in the entire metro, Westroads, which also happens to be one of its most senior extant developments.
1- The main entrance in the front of Westroads Mall. 2- Five below and a former mall entrance. 3- Von Maur’s store. 4- JCPenney and the front facing main entrance. 5- JCPenney’s old school façade. 6- JCPenney from under the parking deck.
Located not far to the northeast of the struggling Oak View Mall, Westroads sits on Omaha’s main east-west thoroughfare, Dodge Street. Perched impressively at the summit of a hill of sorts, the main facility is prominently displayed over the convergence of Dodge and Interstate 680.
Westroads Mall lease plan ca. 1975. View the full PDF version here.
The foreground facing anchor Von Maur dominates the front façade with the balance of the low slung monolith hiding sheepishly behind. Just to west of the upscale department store sits the modern edifice of the former Younkers location while, barely noticeably, JCPenney occupies its spot wedged between the eastern fringes of the main building and the facility’s lone parking structure.
1 The rear of JCPenney abutting Dick’s Sporting Goods. 2- Dick’s unique edifice. 3- The northwestern exterior of Westroads Mall including Dicks, the AMC Theaters, Flagship Commons and the former Younkers. 4 & 5- The façade of the former Montgomery Ward/ The Jones Store/ Younkers location. The smaller mall entrance in the southwest corner that formerly led to the food court.
I entered Westroads Mall from the northwest at the recently added Flagship Commons food hall, a handsomely conceived collection of Flagship Restaurant Group vendors housed within the somehow casual yet formal, darkened yet inviting confines of the former TGI Fridays. Though conventional in its basic footprint, a straight line with anchors at opposing ends and one at the midpoint, unconventionally, Westroads actually houses twin parallel concourses with each end capped anchor having double mall entrances located in close proximity to each other on each level.
Westroads Mall lease plan ca. 1997. View the full PDF version here.
Like Omaha’s other early shopping malls, Westroads incorporates few skylights along its main corridors with the majority of the natural light finding its way through the glass ceilings located over center court and at the bookends. I appreciated the darker motifs throughout the facility, as well as random staircases located just beyond some of the entrances. There was also a basement level that today houses a single tenant, Forever 21. I imagine, like most centers of its generation, it was once the location of barber shops and dental offices.
1- One of the old style staircases just inside one of the main entrances. 2 & 3- The bottom level concourse. 4 to 6- Center Court from the first level.
The Flagship Commons food hall was constructed as a replacement for the Westroads Mall’s earlier added food court, though a smaller collection of nationally based eating establishments is located near the interior entrance for Dick’s Sporting Goods on the upper tier. The Dick’s itself has a very distinctive and unique façade that deviates almost completely from the sporting goods store’s normal template.
1- The three tiers of Westroads Mall. 2- Forever 21 is the only tenant in the basement level. 3- One of the few skylights of Westroads sits over center court. 4- Center court looking to the northwest. 5 & 6- The corridors around center court.
Westroads Mall opened in 1967 as the third enclosed retail facility to be built in the city in as many years. The original anchors were JCPenney, Montgomery Ward and Omaha-based department store Kilpatrick’s. J.L Brandeis and Sons, another hometown nameplate, opened a multi-level store in the facility’s northwestern corner not long after in 1972.
Westroads Mall lease plan ca. 2011. View the full PDF version here.
In 1982, however, Younkers took over the Kilpatrick’s chain as well as their space at Westroads Mall. The same Des Moines based retailer went on to purchase J. L. Brandeis and Sons in 1987, reconfiguring their smaller location into Younkers west. Additional shops as well as a new anchor opened in 1994 when Davenport, Iowa based luxury retailer Von Maur debuted on Westroads Mall’s southeastern edifice.
1- A rare skylight over one of the corridors. 2 to 4- Scenes around the upper level concourses. 5 & 6- The mini food court wedged between JCPenney and Dick’s.
Just three years later, Montgomery Ward departed not long before the entire chain would go bankrupt. Later that year, Kansas City based The Jones Store took occupancy of their space, subsequently completely gutting the entire building and expanding the footprint. However, their tenure was short lived as they departed in 2003. Younkers took this opportunity to consolidate their operations into the much larger The Jones Store area.
1- Dick’s mall entrance just past the mini food court. 2- JCPenney’s twin mall entrances on the second floor. 3- The newest corridor leading to Von Maur. 4- Von Maur’s mall entrance. 5 & 6- The shuttered former mall entrances for Younkers.
A lower level food court debuted in 1991, though it would later be replaced by Flagship Commons and the newer mini food court in 2015. The Container Store is now housed in the former food court. The former original Kilpatrick’s location was remodeled and opened as a Rave Cinemas in 2008, which itself has displayed the AMC banner over its doors since 2013.
Westroads Mall Mallmanac ca. 2023. View the full PDF version here.
Westroads Mall is also well known for being the unfortunate location of several shootings. In 2007, nine patrons were killed in a random attack in Von Maur. In 2021 there were two more gun related incidents; one in March involving a shoplifter in JCPenney with another later that year just outside of the same anchor. Fortunately, there were no casualties in either of the later occurrences.
Scenes in and around the Flagship Commons food hall.
Despite these incidents, Westroads Mall doesn’t seem to have gained as much of a reputation as a crime ridden dystopia as many other malls in the same position have. It remains a popular retail entity and has been able to retain its title as Omaha’s and Nebraska’s largest and most successful enclosed retail facility over its more than half century of existence.
