Belk (Williamsburg, VA @ Windsormeade Marketplace)

I know, that’s a tiny sign. I assume this is due to Williamsburg’s strict zoning laws.

I think this Belk opened in late 2006. I didn’t go in today. Next time I will.

Becker Village Mall (Roanoke Rapids, NC–Dead Since 2002?)

So, last Monday my friend Gary & I drove out to Roanoke Rapids, NC to find different sodas and drinks. He told me when he was doing research on the city that there was a mall there; Becker Villiage Mall and it had a JC Penney and a Belk. I always like to visit new malls dead or alive so I was excited about this.

I knew things were going to be bad the minute we saw the sign. That is one oudated sign!

We walked in and Gary said, “Oh.my.God” and I said, “I’m in love!!”.

There were only three, four people walking in the mall. One was a custodian.

Upon doing research, we learned that this closed in 2002–when most of the mall packed up and moved out when KMart shut down.

This place looks like it was here from day one.

Gary took this picture from the bathroom hallway. My friend Sarah saw the pic on Flickr and said, “that’s a mall? weird. it looks like the science building at my school.” She also supplied the Becker photo.

I took a picture of the JC Penney as we were driving away.

So, this place only had six stores open:

JC Penney
Belk
Clarie’s
Shoe Dept
MasterCuts
Hibbet Sports
and some generic “urban” store called Hit Wear.

The mall was small and about the size of two drugstores. When we both came home, Gary did research on the mall. Apparently KMart closing in 2002 killed this place. He found some things of interest:

totally oudated floor plan of the mall

An article from June of 2002 about renovations to the mall–sorry, I did not see any renovations to this mall. it seemed pretty dated.

Another article from the same paper from 2003. This one is about more stores moving out of the mall

Gary also showed me a pdf that had a picture (albeit very small) of the mall during its heyday. I don’t have the URL for it though.