I have lived pretty much my whole life in North Carolina and remember when Wakefield was a cow pasture. The farmer who owned the land sold it to Raleigh instead of to wake forest. The area where this mall is at was all woods. A lot of what I remember in that area was woods and some homes. It was nice back then. It was quiet and peaceful. All that has long been ruined by the unattainable growth of that area.

Wow, I remember when this opened, it was a such a big deal, didnt have to go all the way to crabtree or cary anymore. I haven't even been near it in years. I watch abandoned videos all the time but to see something I remember so vividly with new activity and life as a kid almost totally dead now is pretty crazy.

When I see these videos of abandoned malls, I’m amazed that the Streets at Southpoint is thriving like it is. It’s sad to see a mall like Triangle Towne Center go down so quickly.

Just landed the outdoor contact to revamp the entire landscape architect for the triangle town center commons strip. Working with several new business looking to open up later this year on the strip.

This mall attempted to compete heavily against Streets at SouthPoint (by which its modeled after) but also Crabtree is such a powerhouse of a mall (even when it floods). The area was just overmalled and the perception of crime is what did this mall in. Sadly this mall was a showplace when it first opened with a nice creek and fountains outdoors and also at the mall there was a small waterfall and also a big one indoors at the escalators in the middle. The mall sadly is a shell of its former self. ☹️

When Triangle Town Center opened around 2002, that was a nice area. The worst part was the huge increase in Traffic.

Should have done a video on NorthGate Mall in Durham.

The area itself is pretty good, especially with the hotel & new luxury apartment complexes recently built within a mile. The Commons never really recovered after the 2008 recession, most of the stores were gone before Covid. Champps & Trattoria restaurants right across from each other were among the first to go. Had many great meals at The Twisted Fork. Traffic was a pain only around Christmas, no major issues the rest of the year. Have been living within 2 miles of the mall for over 20 years now.

I remember visiting Triangle Town Center with my family back around 2003 to 2006 until I mover away. Sad to see it in such a sad shape.

I live in Raleigh and never knew this area was here! Thank you for sharing!!! Wow. Very sad.

This is so weird to watch. I remember when a huge extension was opened on 540, and the last exit was the exit that led to this mall. I remember that highway extension opening in 2003. The mall may have been opened prior to that. I remember going to this mall and having dinner there in November 2003. So to see this place like this is so weird. I remember 540 not even being there. In 1998, I remember taking off at the airport, and there was this huge scratch in the earth, and I was like, what are they building? Well, it became the first section of 540 which opened between 40 and US 70. Then they extended it a little further to Leesville Rd. Then much later they opened 540 to the exit where this mall is. What I also remember was the Southpoint Mall in Durham being built. It opened in 2002. They built it between 2000 and 2002. Before that mall was built, there was NOTHING THERE. NOTHING. It was woods, trees, and a few small houses. Then they completely changed the character of that area by opening Southpoint. I remember it being the same with Triangle Town Center. There was no reason to go up there because it was totally rural and there was no highway going to it yet. And they just keep building, and building, and building... For anyone who was not here before 2000 - let me just tell you, it was so rural. It was so cheap. There was no traffic. It was also a much lower income area. And everyone was like, "Go to Raleigh and Durham!" Well, they did, and pretty much ruined the place. The population growth is unbelievable. Well, the NC state government wanted it this way. Even 40 between Chapel Hill and 147 was not open until 1988. 40 used to stop in Benson. They opened it all the way to Wilmington in 1990.

I went there to not to long ago!..its amazing cause this area is still booming. You would never know this place even existed within such a booming area. Thanks for the video.

I used to love going there, they had a Ted's Montana Grille and The Twisted Fork restaurant where you could sit outside have a beer with your tapenade. Great steaks. Its all vacant now, the whole mall is near empty after Sears left. The food court is still going strong.

I live near here and its not the worst part of the city.Yes,the pretty mall is half dead inside and the had issues outside a few yrs ago but it been fine since then.I do miss some of the restaurants that have closed near the back entrance to Barnes and Noble.

There are several factors that contributed to the quick decline of this mall but I believe the main factor was poor management of the mall. The area around it is still thriving and it has a large enough population to be sustainable because it is easily accessible from Wake Forest, Rolesville, Knightdale, Wendell, and other smaller towns north on US 1. I know some of the people that used to own shops in the mall and they mentioned the rent was very high which caused many shops and restaurants to leave because it was hard to make a profit, especially if they had locations in the other nearby malls. The traditional mall concept is over saturated in Raleigh and they may want to just tear it down and try a different concept. This is how North Hills went from a dead mall to one of the busiest areas in Wake County. The North Hills mall looked even worse than this back in the early 2000s before the developers came in with a targeted plan and execution.

Oh wow, that Men's Warehouse is where my sons got their tuxedos for my oldest son's wedding in March of 2015. I don't think I've been back to that area since so this is really surprising to see!

If memory serves me right, there was a violent gang brawl in the mall in 2008 several stores closed, and in 2021 the mall declared bankruptcy and was sold for 33 cents on the dollar. I never thought it was that great of a mall to begin with. It had no sense of direction. Meaning of vibe

I live in Raleigh but I never liked that mall. I had no idea it was in that condition. Ever since they had that brawl I never really went back there.

I was at The Commons two weeks ago snapping photos with my 1998 Sony Mavica (one of those floppy disk digital cameras), that Men’s Warehouse had no signage up. Definitely gone. The daycare was busy, lots of kids using that chain linked turf as a play area of sorts. Triangle Town Center is my favorite mall, the style and architecture screams 2002. I like the logo as well (a strange ice cream cone looking thing lol). My parents brought me to this mall in 2003 for Christmas. At that point they poured mock snow down from the ceiling in one of the glass covered sections of the mall. As of today Triangle Town Center seems okay. All of the original anchors are present except Sears which closed in 2021. Even Barns and Noble (a junior anchor) is doing great. Saks seems fine as well which is interesting.

Orvis is a Lands End or Eddie Bauer competitor. It’s like an expensive outdoorsy clothes store.

I was *in* the mall shopping with my 2 young kids and husband during the 2010 incident. It was scary. Basically the reputation after that was don't go on the weekends/at night. Eventually the stores I liked mostly left, so we just head to Crabtree which has issues too but better security & a good mix of stores. The outdoor area there never thrived as much as the similar/nicer area at Southpointe Mall in Durham.

The teens of idiot parents played a role in ruining this mall. I used to go to this mall when it opened. Stopped going after all the teen shootings and gatherings. A shame.

I was at opening day. It was awesome-family friendly. None of those apartments were there. We had a very cool scrapbooking store and jewelry & accessory store out there. We had a bad drought & they took away the cool little stream that ran through there. Then the recession, then all those apartments, then the teenagers running wild. I saw it myself. It was menacing. Which was too bad because there were good kids who ate lunch at the food court from the surrounding schools. Of course, now there's Amazon too.

When opened was extremely busy especially the restaurants. Yes the crime caused people to stay away and frequent Crabtree mall. The TTC mall is not doing well

This mall is inconvenient to get to, the retail selection was not interesting enough to draw people in and the layout of the outdoor areas and parking is awful. Northills and the on the local mall not far away pull the people. This was a poorly planned development behind the trends and this is why it is the way it is.

I moved to NC later on and only initially came across Triangle Town Center because the Hello Kitty cafe truck was stopping by there 😂 and rushed over. I visited the actual mall after which kinda seemed slightly struggling for a Saturday morning before covid. Then later on I visited it again after covid hit and it seemed mostly dead inside 😅 could of been the two times I went though. I've gone to Crabtree & Southpoint & even Cary Towne center when it was open more often. I had no idea about this outdoor area really / it being abandoned so that was cool to see in your video.

The restaurant with the turret, closest to the mall, used to be an Italian Restaurant and it only lasted a couple of years; the owners were into some less than legal stuff from what I remember. The problem with that mall is that it has nothing that sets it apart from any of the other malls; literally the same shops as most other places. I still live in this area and I go here for the F.Y.E. and the Barnes&Noble. Look at the area around it and it is thriving but that mall has been mismanaged by whomever owns the property; they've filed bankruptcy at least once

Raleigh is one of the 10 safest cities in the country on damn near every list I've ever looked at. I've been all over the city and never once felt like I was at risk. I'm sure there's a few apartment complexes here and there that are no good, but as far as any region of the city - anywhere in Raleigh is relatively safe. (Source: just looked at Forbes & USNews for the moment, but I've seen it ranked that high every list I've ever seen).

What an amazing residential area that would be!

The mall and outdoor plaza was a pairing popular at that time... Waterbury CT has brass mills Mall and Commons. Outside Baltimore...white marsh mall and commons... Seems worth a dive into the financial streams... You definitely touched on something between online shopping and now distant and punative approach to teenagers... Going to brass mills was the Friday hangout for teens-late 90s. Now, Malls don't let kids in unaccompanied and close much earlier than back in the day

I live about 50 miles away near the VA/NC line. Raleigh was the place to shop for us. I remember taking my young family to the Twisted Fork for our limited times out after payday. Like what a lot of people said … changing consumer dynamics, 2008 recession, and the final nail of Covid did it in.

Yes this malls rep was ruined buy a "gang fight" but this is exaggerated it was not 200 people and gang is a strong word, unruly teenagers is more appropriate. Also there was a shooting that happened here aswell. Both of these things killed the reputation of TCC. There is also an over saturation problem that led to this mall shutting down. Valley Crabtree Mall is in a better location to wear people are.

Imagine a "no unaccompanied minors" rule in a 1980s mall. Malls were the primary hangouts for teens in the 80s.

That's really sad. I remember when they opened this mall up. I moved out into that area from the Leesville RD area of Raleigh as the mall was opening up. It was a great mall at the time. Sad to see what's happened to it. I now live an hour and half away from the area so haven't been to that place in a while.

That would make for a good movie set

Another Ian classic what would the month be without your videos👍😎

I am from Raleigh. It was a major hangout for my daughter in her friends in high school. Yes the gang violence was a major problem. Also the posh North Hills Mall probably helped put the nail i the coffin.

In the overall area this is towards the upper right, I live near the lower left and this is the first I've heard that it was closed. I've been up there many times, but obviously not in quite awhile. It may not be one of the best areas of Raleigh, but it's certainly not a bad area. Like you said though, just too much competition. There's another similar style mall in the upper left and a couple busy ones in the middle. If you consider the entire area it is over 2M people, but that was just wasn't a prime location and there were better options. Interesting to see it like this.

I lived in Raleigh from 2013-19, and this was the closest mall to my house. I frequented the main mall, but not the Commons area that is the subject of your video. All but one of the restaurants, the Twisted Fork, were closed even then. Most of the retail shops were open then, but nothing that interested me. The closed restaurants still had menus in the windows and were expensive. Orvis was open then, but a very expensive store.

3:27 ,those Cobra Chickens 🦢🦢 took over

Also back in 2008, the Wake BOE studied mall voting - that is having a super early voting center at the Cary Town Center and Triangle Town Center (near Men’s Warehouse). They were both great locations with lots of traffic at the time. They had about 10 other OSEV sites in Wake County but those two got about half the OSEV site in Wake County. Buses brought people to each site so there were tons of voters. It’s just that shopping trends changed and so did a few of the nearby neighborhoods - even at the Cary mall which was too close to NCSU and some section 8 housing nearby.

I live five minutes from the mall, and it had so much potential; it's sad to see it go down. I'm surprised that Saks is still there

I used to work at Barnes and Noble at this mall, and still have a friend who does. We watched as the businesses on the outside of the mall closed one by one. The interior of the mall is doing ok, but the exterior really never took off. Plus, this tried to mimic Streets of Southpoint and just didn't get it. Crabtree mall in Raleigh is still very busy, but Cary Town Center (same real estate company as Triangle Town Center) which has been around for a lot longer, is now demolished.

Just to the north, Stony Point near Richmond VA seems to be headed on a similar trajectory.

Dillard's is the only reason to go to that mall now. I remember when it opened and it was a really cool mall.

The Twisted Fork used to be pretty good back in the day. My, how the surrounding neighborhood has changed. I would not go there now even if everything was open.

This mall has many parallels to Oak Hollow Mall in High Point. Forcing something in the wrong environment. Speaking of environment, look up Stevens Creek Nature Preserve. This land southeast of Charlotte, in Mint Hill, was eyed by a developer to build a mall practically in the country. Other than being adjacent to I-485, this land-use made zero sense. Fortunately the land was preserved and is now a protected forest.

Loved eating at The Fork and Champs.

I live a few miles from there. Reports of gang violence are BS, there was a skuffle, but it was very overblown by the local Karens. The mall isn't "doing fine", it's doing like other malls, not well. That outdoor part was pretty good, and since it's relatively warm here it was usable all year long. They should have made the mall itself smaller, that would have made the outdoor part a little more desirable.

3:30 it's not totally abandoned. canadian tourists still frequent. in 2010 or 11 i did a photoshoot for twisted fork for the triangle restaurant week. that is so sad to see the beautiful area abandoned like that. aside from the canadians.

What's crazy is I moved to Raleigh in 2011 and during that time most of that outdoor part was built afterwards and stores collapsed before 2020. Some gang violence was a thing because of teens gathering at the mall. This outdoor area collasped before covid. What's cool is Spirit Halloween just opened in the abandoned sporting goods store.

Still live close. Sad to see how dead it is now. Use to be full of people. Especially at the bar lol.

We used to go there all the time when it first opened. My boys love A&F. My Mom would go there. However, when it opened, as a Raleigh native, I was doubtful of the location. It just was not a good choice. Don't ask me why - I just had a feeling. Thanks for the video. Really appreciate the update.

Men’s Wearhouse actually relocated to another location in that area.

Man, I forgot that place even existed.

I live around the corner from Triangle Town Center and it's really depressing going in there. So many stores are gone 😢

I think the last time I went there was 2014. I loved the Barnes and Noble, but it was too dangerous. We went to Crabtree or the Cary Town Center when it was still thriving.

Interesting, in October, 2024, Nordstrom Rack is slated to open a location in outdoor area.

I live in Wake Forest and was excited to have a mall closer than Crabtree. It is much smaller than Crabtree and Southpoint, but aside from that, it really never had a great selection of stores IMO. The indoor mall has a lot of empty space too. The surrounding area has a lot of crime. I used to love eating at Twisted Fork. The abandoned restaurant across from it you were looking at used to be Champs.

I remember when they built this mall....it never touched the old Crabtree mall... and just the layout alone was just weird to me

It's weird that I still consider this a new mall, and it's already closed. I guess that shows my age.

Grew up behind this mall and saw this from the very beginning to now. Everything changed after the massive fight in 2008 that you referenced. The unaccompanied minors rule and the reputation this mall got from that incident really changed who you saw coming to this mall almost overnight. The mall was also poorly designed (nightmare holiday parking and traffic flow by mid 2000s standards) and executed (lots of complaints about store rents being too high, forcing some big time moves that happened before they should have). It’s almost hard to believe but they seemed to build this mall for a slightly higher tier consumer than Crabtree, evidenced by TTC having the only saks fifth avenue in all of NC. (Albeit a laughably bad Saks now that desperately wants out of its 20+ year lease) A combination of the fight, which was covered into the ground by local media, happening right as development efforts and consumer demand shifted to downtown changed this surrounding area for good imo. Twisted Fork and Champps restaurants were both gems. Sad to see today.

Even more than Streets at Southpoint this looks like Brier Creek, which is thriving.

It is not abandoned, just un occupied.

I remember this place from yrs ago. It makes me sad

Yeah that’s not a bad area whatsoever. I live in Wake Forest and consider that to be a nice accessible area. Crime is about 3 miles down closer to Raleigh in Mini City. Malls always attract a specific type of crowd anyhow. Essentially people that just like to loiter.

Unless you were very familiar with this shopping center, it was difficult to navigate. The downtown shopping vibe is nice but not very practical without vehicular access. I've seen some recent attempts at this idea but with street traffic and parking and it seems to be doing better. When I shop in Raleigh, I prefer Crabtree Valley Mall. I wish more people would balance their onling shopping with bricks and mortar store shopping. Amazon seems to be taking over the world.

I used to eat at the Moe's there all the time. There actually used to be a creek that ran through the entire thing, but it was filled in a few years before the stores were all abandoned.

Developers anticipated that the construction of 540 would result in a boom in that area of Raleigh. But then housing builders decided to only build sparse, higher end homes, hoidy toity places, lower density and blew it.

It never got off the ground. I remember when this first opened, I use to work at the Champs Restaurant. It was like the first to go. It was built in such a bad location and built in such a stupid way.

That place at 10:19 was an Italian restaurant called Giannis and Gaitanos, I used to be a bus boy there in high school (2007ish). It closed a few years after that and nothing ever reopened in its place. The owners were reportedly connected to the italian mob and someone from that family went to jail for trafficking drugs.

Is there a plan to do something w the mall?

It's a beautiful day in Pinehurst⛳

We need an Ikea to in that area. The shopping center across the street is thriving

I live near this mall. I noticed how you walked up and down the same area, over and over. That's because you are trying to give the illusion that this mall is mostly abandoned. Shame on you! Those same stores that you keep walking up and down and around are more like an annex part of the mall. The main part of the mall itself is still open and busy.

DANG the mall is closed i didnt know

I was there when it opened

Ate at Twisted Fork a few times many years ago. This vid is just very sad . . .

I liked the mall it was too awkward to get in and out of the parking lot to the street

Men's Warehouse has been through bankruptcy and I don't know the current status. I think they closed a lot of stores

Remember going there back in the day. Belk’s ect

This was my favorite mall to go to. Sad that it is in the state that it is.

Seems like perfect place to put a Police Department, Urgent Care, Cafeteria style restaurant to support a homeless shelter. Why leave these places to ruin from lack of use/upkeep? How is letting a building rot more profitable? I really don't get extremely rich people that insist on sitting on millions/billions of cash instead of using very small portion of the money to improve EVERYONE'S life. Yes...I want to tell others how to spend their money. Simply because, fairly obvious, they can't seem to figure it out. If you have 250 million, pretty much just sitting in investments, creating more millions, who benefits? Banks? Investment firms? Guarantee they ain't paying taxes on it so society not seeing any benefit at all. I'm all for, EAT THE RICH!

I am sad. This makes me sadder.

Sad what crime does.

Orvis is more towards a competitor for REI not Bass pro/Cabelas.

That whole median space with the rocks and water features just seems … ugly, even when it was open and working. What’s wrong with some small trees and benches?

Like a ghost town and it's not even that old.

But the developers got their money

That was P.F. Changs

went to TT yesterday and there was a homeless lady washing herself outside the entrance....it was ...great......That being said they are putting the spirit halloween in the commons this year.....so theres that

I was also thinking about Oldtown

The area has 2,300,000 people. The mall should not have been built, though.

damn Canadian's pooping at the Mall...

Never really liked this mall. The outdoor mall was not welcoming...no place to sit, rocks placed in odd places. The indoor mall seemed full of teens running, yelling and pushing their way all over the place. We didn't feel safe there. People need to feel safe, especially at night. The Barnes and Noble was beautiful, but overpriced.

Strange - outdoor shops are so much more pleasant to shop at. Streets of Southpoint in Durham is still going strong. A look at the location on the map explains the problem, - located east of Capital Blvd, - bad area. Also, I do most shopping on line now and only use stores to return items. Love the geese.

Would make a great skate spot if it weren’t for all the brick

So what now, people want indoor walking malls to come back. I knew this would happen. Nobody wants to walk store to store in the heat, cold, rain, strong winds. Who ever thought of these outdoor malls must have been an idiot. Soon there won't be any shops of any kind, thanks to on-line shoppers. Stores will not exist in the future. Sad.

It really sucks that you cant just go shopping for all the miscreants and riffraff running amok in public places. This is a problem in many cities.

Welcome to JoeBama's economy and Roy Cooper's NC...