The mall's origins can be traced back to the Timothy Eaton Compnay, who first acquired a 99 acre site at Dufferin and the 401. When Simpson's bought adjacent land, the concept of the mall was born and work began to connect these two giants with other retail that would attract customers accustomed to shopping downtown.
In some sense, Yorkdale changed the entire layout of the city. While the rise of the suburban shopping centre was happening elsewhere in Toronto (and all across North America), none proved so successful as this one, which encouraged more developments of this kind in other parts of the suburbs.
Car culture was at its peak when Yorkdale took shape, and the mall's location is indebted to its proximity to both the 401 and Allen Rd. The latter was originally planned as the Spadina Expressway, a highway that would link the 401 with downtown Toronto. While community activists successfully halted its southward extension, Yorkdale waited to open until the existing portion was complete.
They don't build shopping centres quite like this anymore. Upon opening, Yorkdale boasted a grocery store, a buffet restaurant, a two-screen movie theatre, and duelling department stores. It was a place where you could do all of your shopping. The lure of driving to the suburbs was that everything was in once place.
Since the 1990s, it's become progressively more upscale, now attracting high end fashion and jewellery brands like Tiffany's and Burberry. It's remaining anchor tenant is Holt Renfrew, which partially occupies the space where the old Dominion grocery store once was. It's a bigger, flashier space, but from the start is was designed to be a retail destination.
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by Derek Flack via blogTO
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