The beleaguered San Francisco Centre, a once-grand shopping center that hosted 200 retail stores prior to the pandemic, is permanently closing on Jan. 26.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports an employee at Ecco’s, the mall’s last remaining tenant, confirmed the shutdown’s date. BART, the city’s mass transit system, has already closed the Powell Street Station entrance that connected to the mall. Alicia Trost, BART’s chief communications officer, said in a statement. “Depending on the property’s future use, any new ownership may wish to reopen the entrance. At that point BART would entertain a new license agreement for reopening the entrance.”
The economic disruptions created by the pandemic, coupled with changes in consumer shopping trends and San Francisco’s rising crime levels, brought chaos to the retail center that was once the city’s largest mall. Since 2023, anchor tenants Nordstrom and Bloomingdale’s left the mall, along with nearly all its dining establishments.
The 1.5 million-square-foot property was foreclosed on in November, selling for $134 million – 10 years earlier, the property was valued at $1.2 billion. The few remaining tenants were evicted by the mall’s new owner, DBJPM 2016-SFC Emporium LLC, which did not offer an official announcement on the property’s closure. It is unclear what the company plans to do with the property.
