*The image features Mayor Danny Sharpe at the ribbon cutting ceremony for the Gold Meadows Shopping Center in 1977

Let’s go to the mall everybody! As a smaller community, we often feel as though we are lacking in options when it comes to shopping. Most of us will go to Maple Ridge, Port Coquitlam or even further to satisfy that shopping urge. Did you know that there are quite a few shopping plazas in Pitt Meadows?


Golden Meadows Plaza (G&H Mall)

Our first official shopping plaza was Golden Meadows having opened in 1977, with the official opening occurring on November 10th 1977 (although some stores had already opened by that point). It sat right beside the municipal hall and library on the corner of Harris and Ford Road. Stores like the G&H Grocery Store, Pitt Meadows Pharmacy (owned by Lawrence Chan),Pitt Meadows Florist (creation of Fran Deharnais and Joy Gauthier),  a beauty salon, a doctors office, a bank and a restaurant originally called the plaza home.

Over the years other popular spots called the plaza home including Stix ‘n’ Stones billard parlour, Budget Foods, Aries Place (Greek Restaurant),Marina pizza, Kaja hair salon, flea market, and many more. Unfortunately, the shopping centre started to lose businesses, as more shops sat empty over the years. In January of 2008, the old plaza was demolished. Today, the only memory of the little plaza is in the people, as most of the newer generation will never know what it was like wandering the aisles of the G&H.

 

Meadowvale Shopping Centre

Meadowvale Shopping Centre was a multi phase construction project. Meadowvale construction started in the 1980’s on the corner of Lougheed Highway and Harris Road. The project was done in three phases; Phase 1 was a 10,000 square foot convenience centre anchored by Petro-Canada and Hasty Market, Phase 2 was a 110,000 square foot shopping centre anchored by IGA Food Plus, Harris Road Triplex Cinemas, and Pharmasave, Phase 3 was a 60,000 square foot service centre (Maple Ridge News, 1990).

Meadowvale has seen many community favourites come and go (Harris Road Cinemas, the Dollar Store, IGA, just to name a few),it is still a corner stone location of Pitt Meadows.

 

Meadowtown Shopping Centre

In early 2001 plans for a large shopping centre called the “Mayfair Place Shopping Centre” started appearing before Council. By June of that year, it was approved by Council. The Centre was going to be a 440,000 square foot shopping centre anchored by a grocery store and department store. By 2004, the complex had been named “Meadowtown” with Superstore and Cineplex being the two “anchor” tenants of the development. Both businesses opened in November of 2004. Other businesses that opened in the early years of the centre included winners, Jsyk, VanCity, Boston Pizza, and Petcetera.

Today, Meadowtown is still a shopping hub for a lot of residents of Pitt Meadows. The two original anchor stores still operate there. Some of the stores have seen a lot of turn over over the years with Petcetera coming to the forefront of our minds as it is now a Dollarama.