The retail landscape in South Delta changed in a big way a few years ago when the Tsawwassen Mills and the Tsawwassen Commons shopping centres opened for business at the Tsawwassen First Nation.
One has to go way back to a different time in Delta, in 1974, when there was talk of a regional shopping mall opening within Ladner.
That was the year Royal Oak Holdings of Vancouver, which was responsible for developing Lougheed Mall in Burnaby, sought support from Delta council to build an $18-million, 440,000-square-foot regional shopping complex accompanied by a $3-million, 150-room hotel. It would have been built on a 40-acre site bounded by Highway 17, 60Avenue and 64 Street.
The same company was rejected by council the previous fall in a bid to construct a $15-million regional shopping centre at the former Paterson Park racetrack site in Ladner.
In 1973, Leon Dirassar, vice-president of Royal Oak Holdings, said the Paterson Park mall would have had two major department stores, a junior department store, a supermarket and other smaller stores. He insisted a regional shopping centre was needed by Delta residents and that such a mall "would in no way be harmful to the town of Ladner."
He added prospective tenants "have been pressing us and there are many who want to do business in Delta."
A report by the firm Gordon Soules Marketing and Research, commissioned by council, had recommended against the Paterson Park plan on the basis that it would have "a permanent detrimental impact on the economic viability of shops in Ladner and Tsawwassen," adding, "No new retail outlets would locate in either Ladner or Tsawwassen and many of the existing stores would likely close."
The Soules report, though, recommended that if the Paterson Park proposal was defeated "that the municipality encourage the development of new retail shopping facilities and the modernization and expansion of existing businesses in Downtown Ladner."
After that 1973 proposal was shot down, talk of South Delta getting a mall heated up again when Delta elected a new mayor in Tom Goode along with his slate of alderman, all having reportedly a friendlier view of shopping centres.
In early 1974, council approved a motion by Ald. Lorne Hope instructing the planning department to carry out a study with the view to select "one or two sites in the South Delta-Ladner area" for a major shopping complex.
Around the same time, Dawson Land Company had been pitching its $3-million Harbour Market development for downtown Ladner.
That plan was called off in protest by the company over council considering the Royal Oak proposal. New Democrat MLA Carl Liden would throw cold water on the mall pitch, however, saying "it was the wildest kind of dream" it would receive government approval.
He cited several reasons, including the complex being located on farmland within the new Agricultural Land Reserve. The idea of a big shopping centre in South Delta remained alive in 1976 with Royal Oak Holdings still in the picture, as well as council giving "serious consideration" to purchasing Paterson Park from the Delta Agricultural Society.
It would have been a complex land swap that would have paved the way for a shopping centre at the park, which was not in the Agricultural Land Reserve. The society would get land elsewhere to build a new harness track. Paterson Park was home to a harness track for decades before ceasing operations just a few years earlier.
However, at the time, the Optimist reported that several Delta Agricultural Society members expressed doubts Paterson Park was a suitable site for a major regional shopping centre, although Goode was not so pessimistic.
As far as concerns from local merchants, Goode noted businesses in other communities "had been assisted by the introduction of a major regional shopping centre."
The civic politicians eventually shot down that mall plan, with Ald. Ernie Burnett saying Delta wasn't prepared to see high-rise or commercial development at the park.
It remains vacant to this day with no plans on the horizon for development.
The western 4.85-hectare portion is now owned by the city and the eastern 3.81-hectare section is owned by Kwantlen Polytechnic University.
