Over the past few years Oxford Properties’ Hillcrest Mall has been expanding rapidly, with the closing of Target in 2015, the mall saw the opportunity to convert space that was previously occupied by anchor store into an expansion of their north wing to house stores such as HomeSense/Marshalls (46,450 ft²), Old Navy (15,005 ft²), and Indigo (22,460 ft²) amongst others. In addition to creating space for multiple LNM and CRU tenant spaces, the project also include an extension to the existing main mall corridor with upgrades to the Food court and washrooms.

The HIDI Group provided mechanical, electrical, and communications for Target Backfill, which was designed by MMC International Architects which focused heavily on design and aesthetics.

Challenges

Challenges our team faced included limited hydro service capacity, interfacing with the existing mall infrastructure and upgrading of the incoming cold water pipe. Solutions came in way of coordination with Alectra Utilities to arrange service upgrade through a provision of new hydro feeder and new padmount transformer. Along with working with utilities, our team had to work together with the other stakeholders and the Oxford to ensure the requirements were addressed for the interfacing of the old Target space to the existing mall. Upgrades to the incoming water was achieved by working closely with the contractor and city inspectors.

Sustainability

To help limit the mall’s carbon footprint energy efficient LED lighting was used throughout the expansion with automated time of day and occupancy based lighted controls which allowed the mall to cut energy usage costs. Low consumption plumbing fixtures were used in the washrooms to reduce water wastage. While high efficiency variable gas fired roof top equipment to reduce overall energy and gas consumption costs.