CHARLESTON, W.Va. – The buzz is building after Charleston Mayor Amy Shuler Goodwin’s announcement that the city is in talks to acquire the Charleston Town Center Mall property from its current owners.

The mayor delivered that news during her state of the city address on Monday and said that after months of conversations with the Hull Group, which purchased the mall in 2021, the city is ready to move forward with a redevelopment project.

“We have come to a point in our discussions that we have to start thinking about what this structure would look like. We have looked at other malls across the country,” Goodwin said on 580 Live with Dave Allen.

Plans call for the property to be donated to the city by the Hull Group, and Goodwin intends to establish a development council to control the mall once the transaction is complete. City officials are already looking at other cities that have completed similar projects for inspiration.

“Cities that we have looked at, Columbus, and their downtown mall and that structure; Raleigh; Charlotte; big states—Massachusetts with their population and Boston and what they’ve done; Connecticut; Utah—what those mall structures now look like,” Goodwin said.

Many of those developments have turned former malls into open-air, mixed-use facilities with traffic flowing through them. Goodwin wants that kind of space in Charleston but understands it takes a lot to make them work.

“Everybody likes to say the word ‘mixed-use.’ What does that mean? Well, it means housing. It means shops. It means offices. It does mean coffee houses and eateries, but there are a lot of things that have to be done for those things to happen,” she said.

While excitement for redevelopment of the mall property is growing, Goodwin warns that it won’t be a task the city can accomplish overnight.

“The development of the mall took a decade. This is not going to be six months, a year. This is going to be years in the making,” she said.

As the city government embarks on its plans for the mall, Goodwin plans to seek input from the public on what the community wants to see. She believes the mall needs to be part of the growth occurring in that section of the city.

“Look at what has been developed in and around there. This is a place that has momentum, but the mall is totally disconnected from all of that momentum, all of that investment, and that is why it is so important for the city of Charleston to be engaged in this conversation,” Goodwin said.

Goodwin said her desire is for the redeveloped space to serve Charleston for generations to come.