"If you do it right, it's going to be special."
Alpharetta Mayor Jim Gilvin said that in February 2019, after the city council approved an 83-acre redevelopment of North Point Mall that included demolishing the vacant Sears building and adding apartments, restaurants, a rock wall, and a play fountain. That plan never broke ground. The Sears box sat empty for two more years, then briefly became a walk-through dinosaur exhibit called Dino Safari, which opened in November 2021 and closed in October 2023. The demolition that was supposed to happen never did.
On August 25, 2026, Alpharetta's city council approved another redevelopment of North Point Mall, this one bigger and louder than the last. If you shop at North Point, walk the AMC to catch a movie, or send your kids to ride the carousel in the food court, the headlines about a 20,000-seat arena and a possible NHL franchise probably reached you before this article did. What's less talked about is that this is the mall's third approved redevelopment since 2019, and neither of the earlier plans was built.
The Vote That Made the News
The council voted 4-3 to rezone roughly 99 acres of the mall property, clearing the way for a plan from Jamestown, the Atlanta-based developer behind Ponce City Market, working with New York Life and the Machete Group. As approved, the plan calls for about 1,385 apartments, 750,000 square feet of office space, 650 hotel rooms, and 565,000 square feet of retail and dining space, with nearly 27 acres set aside as open space and new connections to the AlphaLoop trail. The centerpiece, at least in renderings, is a 20,000-seat arena designed with an NHL franchise in mind, something the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported drew a packed council chamber and public comment that ran past midnight.
That's the version of this story most outlets are telling. It's accurate. It's also not the first time Alpharetta has approved a version of it.
A City That's Approved This Mall Before
North Point's redevelopment history reads less like a single project and more like three different companies taking a swing at the same 100 acres over seven years.
| Approved | Developer | What Was Promised | What Actually Happened |
|---|---|---|---|
| February 2019 | Mall ownership at the time | 83-acre addition with apartments, restaurants, a rock wall, a play fountain, and demolition of the vacant Sears | Plan stalled. Dino Safari opened in the empty Sears space in 2021 and closed in 2023 without the demolition happening |
| 2021-2022 | Trademark Property Company | A phased "Village, Neighborhood, Station" concept, with construction targeted for as early as 2023 and an opening by 2024 or 2025 | Never broke ground. The property's direction shifted before construction started, and the plan was superseded |
| August 2026 | Jamestown, New York Life, Machete Group | Roughly 1,385 apartments, office and hotel space, retail, and an NHL-ready arena | Approved 4-3. No construction start date has been announced |
Trademark's CEO at the time, Terry Montesi, told trade press the new North Point would make the mall unrecognizable to longtime shoppers. That plan is now part of the property's history rather than its future. The pattern worth noticing isn't that Alpharetta keeps approving big plans for this mall. It's that approval and construction have been two very different things here for most of the past decade.
The Part Everyone's Watching Is the Part That's Least Settled
The arena is the detail generating the most attention, and it's also the detail with the least certainty behind it. The bid competes directly with another local effort, The Gathering at South Forsyth, located about six miles north near the Forsyth-Fulton county line, for the same prize: an NHL franchise that doesn't yet exist in Atlanta. In June 2026, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman said Atlanta's bids, including the one tied to North Point, were "not as far along in the process" as competing bids from Houston and Austin, which are currently considered the frontrunners for the league's next expansion team.
None of that stops the rest of the plan. Developer David Carlock said as much during a July 2026 community meeting, telling residents the broader redevelopment isn't dependent on securing a franchise. In practice, that means the apartments, retail, and office space are the part of this project actually moving forward. The arena is the part still waiting on a decision nobody in Alpharetta gets to make.
What Changed at the Mall Without Any Vote at All
While the zoning fight played out over council meetings and renderings, the mall's own tenant roster kept turning over on its own timeline, the way retail always does. Great American Cookie closed its North Point location in March 2024. The Lego Store closed in February 2026. Chick-fil-A's food court location closed in April 2026 after 33 years in the same spot, longer than most of the mall's shoppers have been alive.
Those closures happened independent of any rezoning vote. They're the kind of ordinary retail attrition that shows up at aging malls everywhere, and they're a more honest preview of what daily life at North Point looks like right now than any rendering of a future arena.
What's Still There This Fall
Von Maur, one of the anchors expected to remain even after redevelopment, is running its Fall 2026 Beauty Bash from September 18 through 20 and a "Liverpool Week" style event through September 27. Spirit Halloween has already opened its seasonal storefront inside the mall. Dillard's is also expected to stay put as an anchor once the surrounding retail is rebuilt.
Reporting on the redevelopment has noted that stores are expected to remain open throughout the approval and construction process, which for a project of this scale, according to the developer's own past statements about timelines, tends to run in phases over years rather than months. The last time this property's ownership tried to put a number on it, back in 2022, the estimate was development across the next decade. Nothing about the 2026 approval suggests that math has changed.
So the arena might or might not happen. The apartments, retail, and office space do not depend on that decision, and no construction start date has been announced yet. What's certain is narrower and closer to home: the mall you can walk into this week still has Von Maur running its usual fall promotions, Spirit Halloween stocked for the season, and an AMC still showing movies. The bigger story is a long one, and Alpharetta has watched chapters of it end without a change in the skyline before.
If you're keeping an eye on how the North Point corridor reshapes itself over the next few years and want a read on what it might mean for property values nearby, call or text Sarah at Stovall Properties Group for a conversation grounded in what's actually happening on the ground, not just what's in the renderings.
