Four letters loom over the plan to redevelop North Point Mall in Alpharetta.
Three of them are “NHL” because the project’s developer vows to create a space worthy of a professional hockey franchise. The last, as some local officials have put it, is “the A word” — also known as apartments.
“As soon as you mention ‘the A word,’ people freak out,” Alpharetta Planning Commission member DC Aiken said in a meeting last week to discuss the mall redevelopment proposal.
Jamestown, the developer behind Ponce City Market and operator of Alpharetta’s Avalon, aims to transform North Point into a sports-anchored district capable of hosting an NHL team. In addition to a 20,000-seat hockey arena and practice rink, the plan includes up to 1,385 apartments, hundreds of hotel rooms and new office and retail spaces.
The proposal is approaching a critical vote Monday to change the mall’s zoning, and City Council members will decide how — and whether — the plan proceeds.
“This is a driver for the next 30 years of economic impact in the city of Alpharetta,” Tim Perry, managing director and chief investment officer at Jamestown, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “It may be the largest vote relative to economic impact in the city’s history.”
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
After nearly five hours of discussion, the planning commission voted 4-3 in early August to endorse a plan with nearly 75 conditions, including a contingency that an NHL franchise must be awarded to the project before residents can occupy apartments. The recommended deadline is Aug. 24, 2031, providing a five-year window to convince NHL brass or else the mall would revert to its current zoning.
“The reason that we have to tie it to that (NHL decision) is because we see an arena, we see practice ice, we see two hotels,” Kathi Cook, the community development director for Alpharetta, told the planning commission.
“There may not be a need for some of those uses without that franchise,” she said.
Chasing the puck
Alpharetta has spent recent years evaluating whether North Point Mall — once a regional shopping haven that is now past its heyday — could be the way to woo pro hockey back to the Atlanta area.
Atlanta has twice had franchises in the Flames and Thrashers, teams that came and left after failing to catch on. Other cities would also love to land a franchise, including ones that have yet to have their first crack at the NHL.
In February, North Point Mall’s owner, insurance giant New York Life, provided a jolt to Alpharetta’s hockey ambitions, selecting Jamestown to run the mall and work toward a sports-focused redevelopment. The announcement excited many hockey fans across Georgia, especially those clustered in Atlanta’s northern suburbs.
“I played hockey at The Cooler (ice rink in Alpharetta) before that closed sadly, and I visited North Point Mall growing up all throughout high school, and it was the place to be,” Alpharetta resident Colin Lucas told the planning commission. “It is definitely not much anymore …. I just see great economic potential over the next 30 or 40 years (in this plan).”
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
Beyond the proposal for North Point, a competing metro Atlanta group has pitched a similar project a few miles north along Ga. 400 called The Gathering at South Forsyth. Both proposals are comparable to the Atlanta Braves’ development outside Truist Park.
Neither group, however, has laid out a clear ownership group, which would need to pay a reported $2 billion fee for NHL franchise rights.
NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has shared his doubts about both Atlanta efforts, including a competing plan in Arizona. The Houston Chronicle reported earlier in August that billionaire Dan Friedkin “has exclusive rights to bring a second NHL team to Texas,” with both Houston and Austin being considered. A decision on what would be the NHL’s 33rd franchise is expected to come in December, the newspaper reported.
The NHL has not confirmed, but both Bettman and Bill Daly, the league’s deputy commissioner, have spoken favorably of Friedkin’s pursuit.
“Neither Arizona nor Atlanta are quite as far along in the process as the Friedkin opportunities,” Bettman told reporters at the league’s board of governors in June.
But if the NHL goes to 33 teams, it would seem likely a 34th would be needed for balanced scheduling.
Perry declined to comment on ownership discussions and NHL lobbying taking place for Alpharetta, but he said he’s confident the North Point Mall effort will stand out.
“We firmly believe there is an arena and a professional sports team that will be attracted to (this type of environment),” he said.
Seeking relevance
North Point Mall is unique among Georgia’s traditional shopping malls.
Built in 1993 on a 100-acre site, it continues to attract about 3.3 million shoppers each year and maintains a diverse list of tenants. It isn’t the image of other dead malls around metro Atlanta that are in various stages of being demolished for mixed-use projects and healthcare offices.
But it also doesn’t mirror the packed mall floors of Buckhead’s Lenox Square and Phipps Plaza or Dunwoody’s Perimeter Mall. It has some residents questioning whether the effort to replace North Point Mall is moving too quickly.
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
“Sports is great, but I’m not comfortable with the speed of this project,” resident Bruce Creller told the planning commission. “ … Are we just going to build, build, build and hope people come here?”
Perry said the mall was designed along Ga. 400 to attract up to 15 million visitors per year at the peak of America’s mall boom. The redevelopment plan will better meet the tastes of modern shoppers and mirror other mixed-use projects, ranging from Avalon to the Braves’ home at the Battery, he said.
“There is a lot of nostalgia, and there’s a lot of quality retail there at the mall that we intend to reimagine,” Perry said. “Not take away from the community, but bring back in more relevance.”
Alan Rubenstein, regional head of asset management at New York Life, told the AJC earlier this year that the mall will likely “be around for well over a year in its current state” regardless of the redevelopment effort. The speed the project can progress is up to the NHL, Alpharetta city leaders and other market forces.
Heartburn over housing
Mixed-use districts typically rely on offices and housing to provide around-the-clock vibrancy and activity between sports matches and events.
Despite the pandemic’s impacts on the office market, Jamestown’s plan includes up to 750,000 square feet of new workspace. About 22% of Alpharetta’s existing office space is vacant, Cook said, which is down from the post-pandemic peak of 25%.
But new offices tend to lease better than their older counterparts, in both Alpharetta and across metro Atlanta. This trend has city leaders and Jamestown officials confident that office needs to be part of the North Point plan.
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
For-sale housing, however, is a larger challenge that doesn’t fit this project, the developer’s leaders said, which prompted pushback from multiple planning commission members.
“I think you’re missing a really important component,” board member Karen Richard said of for-sale townhomes or condominiums. “I think people are going to want to live there and invest there.”
Alpharetta requires 68% of the city’s housing stock to be owned rather than rented, and apartments have long been a controversial development type in the affluent suburb. Richard and her fellow board member Jill Reynolds tried to add a recommendation to the North Point plan that would require 300 for-sale units during a later development phase, but that proposal was outvoted.
“We don’t necessarily want to be a junior Buckhead, Sandy Springs or Dunwoody,” Reynolds said. “We’ve usually always tied mixed-use with for-sale and rent.”
Julie Sellers, an attorney representing North Point’s development team, told the planning commission that requiring condos or for-sale housing would likely kneecap the project.
“The challenge is we’re not there now,” she said, referring to condo demand in the mall area. “And we’re not going to be there in the first phase of development.”
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
Credit: Courtesy of Jamestown
Perry added that hampering all development work until an NHL commitment would also set the project back, saying mixed-use districts can’t feel empty when they first open. He said Avalon opened with 60 tenants and the Battery had restaurants, a bustling boulevard and other elements in place when the Braves first took the diamond.
“We want to get ahead and deliver a more complete experience on opening day when the puck drops,” he said. “That’s what is important … something that feels complete.”
How to attend the meeting?
The Alpharetta City Council meeting will take place 6:30 p.m. Monday at 2 Park Plaza. The city also streams its meetings live on its YouTube channel and city website.
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