Provo Towne Centre has a dead mall reputation, and the owner now wants a major remodel to make way for a new mix of retail and housing.
But the mall’s unpopularity has created space for a unique community to grow there in recent years, with stores like We Geek Together and Wandering Wizards. Some have even called it America’s nerdiest mall.
Mark Petersen is a 51-year-old Utah County public defender who plays Dungeons & Dragons at the mall every week. He played D&D as a kid and got back into it two years ago.
“My wife and I don't have children,” he said. “I've spent a lot of my life just waiting, and at that point it became an impossibility for us.”
For a couple of weeks after that realization, he was lost and wandered around malls looking for something to do. That’s when he encountered this community. Now he’s a dungeon master — the one who creates the world for a D&D game — and he has 15 to 20 people at the mall he counts as friends.
“Having something else to focus on that's prosocial, that gets me out of the house where I'm meeting new people,” he said. “It’s kind of embarrassing how great I feel.”
He’s joined a big community. In 2023, We Geek Together set the Guinness World Record at the mall for the largest Dungeons & Dragons game. In a YouTube video posted by Geek Knights Studios, the mall’s hallways are packed with people, and a raucous cheer erupts when they announce the count of 1,227 players.
But just because the mall is well-loved doesn’t mean it’s doing well financially for the owner or the city. Owner Brixton Capital wants to modify or tear down most of it, keeping the big anchor stores and building a mix of new retail and housing with an open concept.
“It's not a good asset currently for the community from a placemaking standpoint, a business standpoint or really from a revenue generation standpoint,” said project executive Justin Long during a March 24 Provo City Council work meeting. “So we'd like to bring this into the 21st century.”
The outdoor plan worries Madison Nelson, a D&D player who has gone to the mall every week for the past three years.
“It's a closed space, and it's actually crucial for several markets and fairs that cannot take place outside during the winter because of unpredictable weather,” she told the Provo Planning Commission at a March 11 meeting.
The Provo Farmers Market holds a winter market in the mall, but if the redevelopment plan goes forward, market manager Debie Valdez said they’ll have to find a new location. She doesn’t think there’s another as large venue in Provo, so they’ll have to limit the number of vendors. That’s if they can find a place that fits their budget.
Nelson also told the commission she believes there’s already a retail space in the city like the one Brixton wants to build — The Shops at the Riverwoods.
“With the Winter Olympics coming to Utah soon, shouldn't we be highlighting what makes Provo different?” she asked the planning commission. “I have seen no benefit to the proposed remodeling that will miraculously make it more appealing.”
So what would make it more appealing? Turns out, it’s not just nerds who want something different from malls these days.
There’s a recipe for what makes a successful mall, said Brigham Young University urban planning professor David Simpson, and the first ingredient is experiences like Dungeons & Dragons games or laser tag.
“People want to go and do things, not just go and buy something, when they can probably do that more efficiently online,” he explained.
Next, mix in good transit, walkability and housing. Because people “want things accessible,” he said. “They don't want to have to get in their car and drive, you know, 16 different places.”
In the end, there’s no foolproof recipe. Whether Brixton Capital is the alchemist that can brew a good potion depends on who you ask.
At the planning commission meeting, project executive Long said they’ve met with the individual businesses and are working on ways to have them come back after construction.
“We'd love to do that to the extent that's practical for the project and for them,” he said.
Long added that they’re looking at different strategies and lease structures to support a range of tenants while keeping the project financially viable. But rent is cheap right now, and Barbie DeSoto worries some tenants won’t be able to afford the fancier new mall. She was on the planning commission when they voted on the project and recently resigned for personal reasons.
DeSoto also worries the developer has less skin in the game to do what’s best for the community because Brixton is based in California.
“They don't live here. You know, they don't have any other view but making sure that that makes money,” she said.
The planning commission, city council and community are concerned about walkability and safety with a planned roundabout for cars in the middle of the development. She said the commission tried to represent residents’ worries, but the city is in a tight spot.
“What leverage do we have besides saying no to the whole project, you know?”
She said the city doesn’t want to do that because the mall isn’t doing well, and Provo is heavily dependent on sales tax revenue.
Brixton Capital turned down KUER’s interview request. But in an email, Long said that while it’s true they’re not headquartered in Utah, “our approach is to be long-term stewards of the communities in which we invest.”
Long said they’ve had a local team for the past decade. He also believes walkability and the roundabout aren’t at odds, saying that roundabouts usually slow down traffic. Plus, the development will create a nearly two-acre outdoor community gathering space, Long said in the council meeting. Affordable housing is also part of the plan.
There are competing priorities when it comes to walkability and parking. Long said the big stores that are sticking around — JCPenney, Target and Cinemark — have approval over all changes to the mall, and negotiations have been going on for years.
“All those kind of major players that are retailers have their own business needs that they're obviously concentrating on,” he said.
Simpson, the urban planning professor, said the developers also need to listen to what the community wants for the redevelopment to be successful.
Council member Craig Christensen called the plan “tremendously exciting” and said at the work meeting that it would be a “wonderful asset to the city.” But the council still has questions and concerns to discuss at another work meeting.
