San Bernardino hires a development team to fix Carousel Mall

Now comes the hard part: coming up with a plan that is likely to work. Nothing less than the future of the city’s downtown is at stake.

After more than 20 years of false starts, missed opportunities and renovation plans that didn’t pan out, San Bernardino may finally be ready to fix the downtown eyesore known as the Carousel Mall.

The city council last month voted 6-1 to hire two developers – Renaissance Downtowns USA and ICO Real Estate Group – to come up with a plan to fix the beleaguered 43-acre downtown site next to Interstate 215.

Councilman Juan Figueroa cast the dissenting vote.

Both developers have until July to work out a final development plan and present it to the city council, according to Mayor John Valdivia.

In the meantime, city staff is funneling all documents, staff reports and other information regarding the property to the development team to help it formulate its plan, said Michael Huntley, San Bernardino’s economic and community development director.

The developers have said they want to make the mall site a pedestrian-friendly hub for a revitalized downtown – exactly what San Bernardino officials are asking for – and on one major issue they appear to have made up their minds. Whatever their plan for the site ends up being, it won’t include any part of the building now known as the Carousel Mall.

“It’s pretty clear that demolition is the only approach to fixing the property,” said Donald Monti, president and chief executive officer of Renaissance Downtowns USA. “The building does have some interesting elements, and it has been there for awhile, but the best approach is to level it as quickly as possible.”

During a virtual council meeting in March, Renaissance/ICO presented a rough outline of how it envisions transforming the mall site, including reestablishing the area’s original street grid for better traffic access.

Ultimately, the property could have as many as 3,500 residential units – it currently has no residential – along with retail, entertainment, commercial and office development.

Renaissance/ICO is also proposing planting trees that would create an “urban canopy” on the site, while installing trolley cars and a Riverwalk with gondolas. The latter would be modeled after the world-famous Riverwalk in San Antonio, Texas, according to Huntley.

During their online presentation, Renaissance/ICO officials stressed that the Carousel Mall property is more than an outdated retail location needs to be replaced.

Done correctly, the site could serve as a potential model for future downtown development in California, if not the United States. At the very least it will be the centerpiece off of a revived downtown San Bernardino, something the city has tried to make happen for years.

“This is potentially a transformative project,” Monti said, one day after taking a walking tour of the property. “It has tradition, it’s in a great location, and it has the city strongly supporting its revival. There are some bones there, and our job is to come up with a plan and put some meat on those bones.”

Monti and Ernesto Hidalgo, executive vice president of new development for Renaissance Downtowns, both declined to discuss the walking tour of Carousel Mall, which has been shut down since 2017.

They also stressed that the presentation they made to the council in March was essentially a first draft of what they have in mind for the Carousel Mall site, and not a final plan.

“We’re very open to community outreach,” Monti said.

Finally, they declined to discuss how the project will be paid for or how much it will cost, except to say that demolition alone could cost $4 million to $10 million.

San Bernardino has money to help pay for the project, but the exact figure is not available, Valdivia said.

Valdivia, who has called fixing the Carousel Mall site and reviving downtown the most important issue facing San Bernardino, expressed some concern about whether Renaissance/ICO will be able to deliver an acceptable project.

“So far I’ve heard a lot of platitudes but not a lot of substance, and I’m concerned about that,” Valdivia said. “In January we gave them six months to come up with a plan, and I haven’t seen a thing. I want to see a development agreement or an exclusive negotiating agreement, I don’t care what, but I want to see something.”

Carousel Mall opened in 1972, as Central City Mall. It changed its name in 1991 after a children’s carousel was installed on its lower level.

The mall performed well for about 20 years but began to slip in the early to mid-1990s, in part because of competition from Inland Center Mall across town. By 2001 its remaining anchor tenants – Montgomery Ward, JC Penney and Harris-Gottschalks – had all abandoned the property, and none were replaced.

When it closed, Carousel Mall was down to 14 specialty tenants.

At one point office tenants were signed, but they failed to produce the foot traffic mall management hoped they would.  Several other ideas –  removing the roof and making the mall an outdoor venue similar to Riverside Plaza, bringing in international tenants –  were suggested but never tried.

In 2014, the city hired a consultant to determine the best use of the property, but that agreement was terminated due to lack of progress. San Bernardino officials then began soliciting interest from regional and national developers, which lead to the partnership with Renaissance/ICO.

In February, Councilman Theodore Sanchez called several proposals “fascinating,” but said the city needed to work fast.

“We are at the whims of the market,” Sanchez said then. “The window is open now, but it feels like it might be closing.”

Meanwhile, the city is waiting to hear from Renaissance/ICO, and Valdivia said he will not support extending the July deadline if it appears a plan won’t be ready by then.

“We need to hold these people’s feet to the fire,” Valdivia said of Renaissance/ICO. “Ultimately, this is the council’s decision and I will support whatever they decide to do. But I did not get elected mayor to work for developers.”