Scotia Square

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Scotia Square
Location	1899 Albemarle St, Halifax, NS
Opening Date	1969
Management	Crombie REIT
Owner	Crombie REIT
No. of anchor stores	1
Total retail floor area	194,724 sq. ft.
No. of floors	3 (1 Retail) (2 Office space)
Parking	1,698 spaces
Website	https://scotiasquare.com/

Scotia Square is an enclosed shopping mall in Downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia. It is part of Duke Tower, which is a 16 floor office complex. Barrington Tower, Cogswell Tower, Brunswick Place, and other buildings are connected to the mall via Downtown Halifax's pedway system which is called "Halifax Link". It's the largest pedway system in Atlantic Canada.

History

In the 1960s, Halifax decided to follow a popular trend of the time. This trend was called "Urban Renewal". This was when urban cores or downtowns would see lots of changes, like many buildings being demolished to build towers, and roads being changed. As part of Halifax's Urban Renewal plan, Cogswell Street and all of its buildings were demolished to build a new highway called highway 111, also known as "The Circ". To make this highway, many buildings were torn down. Including the community of Africville and other places. Eventually, people began to oppose the development, and the part that would demolish the Halifax Waterfront and build a third bridge was cancelled. Since part of Downtown was already demolished, the Cogswell Exchange was built instead. Next to the exchange, Duke Tower was built, which was part of the original plan. The bottom part of Duke Tower was built as a shopping mall, Scotia Square.

Scotia Square in the 1970s

The mall had an opening date of October 15th, 1969. It had 29 stores on opening day, later on, 30 more stores opened. The original anchor of the mall was Woolco, which was on the second floor. A Famous Players Theatre was also a tenant. In the centre court of the mall, there was a large fountain which shot water up very high. This remained for many years until it was replaced with another fountain, which was removed around 2012.

In 1974, a hotel opened at the mall. It was originally called Chateau Halifax, later on, it was converted to Delta Hotels. It's currently called Hotel Halifax.

In 1976, The malls name was changed from Scotia Mall to Scotia Square. The year after, a seven stall food court opened on the lower level of the mall.

Throughout the 1970s, other towers related to the development opened, these towers were connected via pedways.

In 1980, Barrington Place opened. This tower is located directly across the street from Scotia Square, it originally had over 50 tenants on opening day. Its counted as a part of Scotia Square. In more recent years, Barrington Place lost almost all of its stores and is now mostly offices.

In the 1990s, the mall had some renovations done such as a new mall fountain that replaced the other one and other modernizations such as new floor tile.

In 1994, Woolco was acquired by Walmart, almost all stores were rebranded as such, this excludes downtown locations. Because of this, The Woolco closed at Scotia Square and was turned into offices, most retail left the second level and was turned into offices. Retailers at Scotia Square are now only located on the first floor.

In 2006, a new Scotia Square logo was introduced, the logo wasn't used on the building until the 2010s.

The food court after Its renovation and expansion.

In 2016 and 2017, the mall had major renovations done, the main mall entrance was expanded and completely changed, the food court and the retail section saw many changes as well.

As of today, Scotia Square doesn't have any major anchors, but there is 2 junior anchors which are Dollarama and Lawtons Drugs. Throughout the last decade or so, Scotia Square has lost most of its national tenants such as Reitman's, The Source, The Head Shoppe, TELUS Mobility, and others. These days, mostly local tenants fill the halls of Scotia Square. The most popular part of the mall is the food court, which is called "The Mix". It features 11 different stalls, which include McDonald's, Subway, A&W, Tim Hortons, and others.

In 2024, The part of Barrington Street in front of the main entrance was demolished to facilitate the further construction of the Cogswell District, which is a major development that demolished the Cogswell Exchange to return the area back to a grid system, many new towers and buildings will be built in this development as well.

Gallery

Here are pictures of Scotia Square & Barrington Place from August 2024

Scotia Square

Entrance, by Lawtons Drugs

One of the mall corridors, notice how all of the stores are closed

The end of said corridor, near Dollarama entrance

Another look at Dollarama plus H&R Block

A corridor, Dollarama is in the opposite direction

Main corridor, looking towards the main court and food court

Main Court

"The Mix" Food Court

Another shot of "The Mix" Food Court

Upper Floor, looking towards the main court and ped-way to Barrington Place

Main corridor on the upper floor, no longer used for retail

Lower level, looking towards NSLC and an entrance which is closed off because of major construction

Lower level escalators which go to the centre court on the main level

Barrington Place

Looking towards a corner store, one of the last retail tenants left in Barrington Place

Main corridor of Barrington Place, no longer used for retail

Public Transit

In front of the mall is Scotia Square Terminal, Halifax Transit operates many different bus routes that go to this stop. In the 2016/17 Scotia Square renovations, an indoor waiting room was added to the terminal.

Because of the current Cogswell District construction, the terminal has temporarily closed and has moved down the road for the time being. When the Cogswell District is complete, Scotia Square Terminal will be completely redone with better waiting areas, dedicated bus lanes, electronic signs that show the estimated time for the bus arriving, and other things to make Halifax Transit a better and more reliable service in Downtown Halifax.

Below are all of the current Halifax Transit bus routes that serve Scotia Square

Scotia Square Terminal

Route No.	Route Name	Route Type		Route No.	Route Name	Route Type
1	Spring Garden	Corridor		93	Bedford Highway	Local
2	Fairview	Corridor		123	Timberlea	Express
5	Portland	Corridor		127	Cowie Hill	Express
7 A/B	Peninsula	Corridor		135	Flamingo	Express
8	Sackville	Corridor		136	Farnham Gate	Express
9 A/B	Graystone/ Herringcove	Corridor		137	Clayton Park	Express
10	Dalhousie	Corridor		138	Parkland	Express
29	Barrington	Local		158	Woodlawn	Express
84	Glendale	Local		159	Colby	Express
161	North Preston	Express		165	Caldwell	Express
168 A/B	Auburn / Cherry Brook	Express		182	First Lake	Express
183	Sackville	Express		185	Sackville	Express
186	Sackville	Express		194	West Bedford	Express
196	Basinview	Express