Destiny USA Informations

Destiny USA (previously known as Carousel Center, 1990–2012) is a six-story super-regional shopping and entertainment complex on the shore of Onondaga Lake in Syracuse, New York. Main anchor stores include J. C. Penney, Macy's, and Lord and Taylor. Other major stores include At Home, Best Buy, Dick's Sporting Goods, Forever 21, DSW, Old Navy, Nordstrom Rack, Saks Fifth Avenue Off 5th, and TJ Maxx.

Destiny USA opened on October 15, 1990 as the Carousel Center mall. The mall has six above-ground floors and one underground floor. The lower three floors and the underground floor are used for retail shops. The first and second floors span the length of the mall and house the various shops, vendors, restaurants and entertainment venues, with the major food court and namesake carousel located on the second floor. The third floor includes a 19-screen Regal Cinemas, restaurants, and entertainment options. The fourth floor is primarily administrative offices. The underground floor, known as the Commons floor, houses medium-sized stores, a chapel, kiosks, and two underground parking garages. One underground garage houses Best Buy's installation center. The Commons floor does not span the full length of the mall and is only in the original mall structure built in 1990, not the 2012 addition.

Destiny USA has outside parking surrounding the mall on nearly all sides. On the Hiawatha Boulevard side, additional parking lots are located across the street from the mall and a pedestrian bridge was built to connect the parking lot to the second floor of the 2012 addition. Parking includes one above ground and two underground parking garages. The mall is served by CENTRO buses. There are main entrances on nearly all sides of the mall. Other entrances are located through the anchor stores and from the underground parking lots.

The site of Destiny USA was originally a landfill named Marley Scrap Yard, surrounded by several square blocks of oil tanks, collectively named "Oil City". South of these oil tanks sat the Franklin Square industrial neighborhood. In 1987, The Pyramid Companies studied redevelopment of the neighborhood. In July 1987, The Pyramid Companies announced plans for a 1,000,000 sq ft (93,000 m2) shopping center at the scrap yard site. The plan caused controversy with other local shopping centers and malls. The Galleries of Syracuse, a smaller mall (now offices) had recently finished construction in Downtown Syracuse and there was concern that the mall at Oil City would put an end to downtown retail.

Two of the biggest opponents to the project were the competing mall developers in the area, Wilmorite Corp. and Eagan Real Estate Inc, which both operated several malls in Syracuse's suburbs. Wilmorite, which was building the Great Northern Mall in the nearby town of Clay, was accused by the Syracuse city government of using associates in Connecticut to form the "Citizen's League for an Environmentally Acceptable Northeast," which lobbied against construction of the Carousel Center mall at Oil City. Eagan meanwhile filed criticism of the mall, claiming that a 25 percent drop in downtown retail sales would occur if the mall was built. It proposed an additional downtown mall with a "Walt Disney-like attraction."

During construction, the mall faced several delays, primarily around environmental cleanup, as the site is a brownfield cleanup site. The mall opened on October 15, 1990, as the Carousel Center, named for the 1908 Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters (PTC) carousel, PTC #18 operating within the mall.

When it opened, Carousel Center featured a unique mix of discount and upscale department stores. Charter anchors included JCPenney, Kaufmann's, Steinbach, Lechmere, Chappell's, Hills, and the last Bonwit Teller ever built. Each department store was two levels, except Steinbach and Lechmere shared a building, with a store on each level, as well as Chappell's and Hills. A basement "Commons" area featured covered parking and additional junior anchors, including The Rx Place and Filene's Basement.

Another unique feature of the mall was the Skydeck, which was on the top levels of the central tower. This offered an events space that would be used for fundraisers, proms, fashion shows, and many public and private uses.

In 1992, The Pyramid Companies began clearing oil tanks south of the mall for a strip center called Carousel Landing, which would feature 650,000 square feet of additional retail.

In 1994, Lord and Taylor opened as the last new anchor, removing the remaining oil tanks on the property. The same year, Borders Books and Music opened a two-level store, replacing a side corridor with entrance.

By 1995, Carousel Landing was still not built because of potential environmental impact. By 1996, The Pyramid Companies finally got approval to condemn the oil tanks.

In 1996, Steinbach was replaced with Home Place, a northeast-based upscale home furnishings store, which closed two years later.Nobody Beats the Wiz also opened in 1996 in the Commons level, but had an even shorter life: it opened in the summer of 1996 and closed by the end of 1997 due to the chain's financial troubles.

In November 1997, less than a month after Lechmere closed (a result of parent company Montgomery Ward eliminating the chain), the Pyramid Companies announced they would build an expansion to Carousel Center that would double the mall size instead of building Carousel Landing. Under this plan, the expansion would house about 150 new stores and three anchors, with many of the stores both new to the market and often not found in traditional malls. The Pyramid Companies officials claimed the expansion would be complete by the year 2000.

In 1998, CompUSA store and a Kahunaville restaurant opened in the Commons Level and Best Buy opened in part of the former HomePlace/Steinbach location.

In 1999, Hills was acquired and rebranded by Ames Department Stores. In March 1999, DSW Shoe Warehouse opened in part of the former Lechmere. In October 1999, Bally Total Fitness opened with a grand opening featuring the cast of Baywatch. The Bally Total Fitness filled in the remaining part of HomePlace/Steinbach location that wasn't occupied by Best Buy.

In March 2000, Bonwit Teller closed their location at the mall as the chain filed for bankruptcy. The space was taken later that year by one of the first American locations of HandM. It was also the first mall location. In May of that year, Kaufmann's Furniture Galleries opened in the mall, in the other half of the former Lechmere.

In 2001, Xpress Place (formerly The Rx Place) closed as the parent company Phar-Mor went bankrupt.

In 2001, The Pyramid Companies cancelled the previous expansion project that would double the size of the mall for a project that would triple the size of the mall instead. The new project proposed to rename the mall from Carousel Center to "DestiNY USA". The Skydeck was closed for new administrative offices for the megamall. The Pyramid Companies promised an extravagant experience in which diners could eat at restaurants while watching people in wave pools, or visiting the aquarium on the site, among other things. There would also be a large Central New York Visitors Center inside the mall. However, the path to DestiNY USA would not be easy. The Pyramid Companies needed public funds and tax breaks to make the project possible and people worried the mall would be obsolete before all of it was paid. Eventually it was decided the mall would be developed in phases, with an 800,000 square foot addition built first. Despite this, The Pyramid Companies continued to unveil further plans for Destiny USA, including a year-round glass-enclosed park and amphitheaters. Eventually, the large tax breaks and the magnitude of the project would cause much controversy.

In 2002, Ames closed when its corporate parent company went bankrupt. At about the time of Ames closing, construction of the $180 million, 47 floor, 1,300 room Grand Destiny hotel purportedly began with a ceremony during which a steel beam was driven into a Carousel Center parking lot. At least 40 more pilings were driven over the next three weeks, but construction stopped by December 2. The stated reason was a dispute about whether this hotel would be considered "leasable space", which is a term used in the payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) agreement between the county and the developer.

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