MARGATE — Despite the glut of retail space in the area, city officials say they are excited about the opening of Peppertree Plaza, which will be the city’s second largest mall.
Under construction for more than a year, the mall is 50 percent built and is expected to open by late fall. The nearly 280,000-square-foot mall is being constructed at a time when vacancies dot the city’s major malls along State Road 7 and Atlantic Boulevard. The city’s largest mall, Lakewood Plaza on West Atlantic Boulevard, has some empty stores.
“I’m not worried” about getting the stores in Peppertree Plaza leased, said the city’s Planning Director Walter Fufidio. “It appears there are anchors there.”
Peppertree Plaza, which will have a Publix supermarket, banks, restaurants and clothing stores, is on the southeast corner of Sample Road and State Road 7.
Fufidio said he thinks the mall will draw a healthy crowd because it is at the northern end of the city, near new housing subdivisions planned for Margate, Coral Springs and Coconut Creek.
Fort Lauderdale-based developer HSW Investments, Inc. is constructing the mall. A second mall, Coral Pointe, is planned across the street on State Road 7. A Home Depot store is being constructed behind that mall.
Customers will be able to travel more easily from one mall to another by driving on a recently constructed four-lane road. The U-shaped road runs south from Sample Road along the west side of Peppertree Plaza to State Road 7. The road picks up on the west side of State Road 7 by the Coral Point mall and goes back to Sample Road. The road was built with more than $1 million in impact fees paid to the city by the developers of the two malls.
