Greenspoint (Gunspoint) Mall - Houston, TX | a dangerous dead mall | ExLog #38

the ball [Music] [Music] hey what's up guys my name is Sal and this is another expedition log on today's expedition we are visiting the second-to-last place from my 2018 golf mall tour when I first heard about this mall I only knew that it had a pretty low occupancy and that it was in a pretty sketchy part of town but of course I had to make the trek out there to Houston to see this place but when I finally got there it became incredibly apparent to me that the area just wasn't sketching it was actually pretty dangerous and during my walk through this mall there were a couple of guys that were constantly following me all over the place and throughout the video I challenged you to spot these three occurrences and there are three of them where you see these guys kind of either waiting for me in a doorway or waiting for me to come out of a store and then there was a time that I have followed them but this mall has some incredible history to it some incredibly sad history there are some wonderful parts of this wall that are lost in time it's super vintage and there's a lot of aesthetic charm to this place while the mall at its center has some business still happening the center of the mall is doing okay at least when I went in 2018 every single concourse to courtyard is dead every single one of those places that had an anchor is now dead the mall has a beating heart but every single one of its limbs is dead so come take a walk with me on the second-to-last mall from my 2018 Gulf waltrip the greens Point Mall known by locals as the guns Point Mall in Houston Texas but first a word from our sponsor the wolf men trying to sell you furniture - I'm here one of my 500 mark showroom to show you we have a complete line on how to start top with us do it all let's go we're going do it this time go I'm me and I'm Donna in today's top story is Gallery Furniture is over [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] stylists are top we just did our let's go we're going do it this time go wrong in 1974 news erupted that Federated Department Stores Realty was set to begin construction of a shopping mall at the center of I forty five in the North Belt in Houston Texas at one point two million square feet the mall would dwarf some of Houston's earliest shopping centers the mall had its grand opening on August 5th 1976 with its first anchor Foley's and Sears just opening a few days prior the Folies brand was actually owned by Federated Department Stores at the opening of the mall houston police mounted officers even patrolled the parking lot on horseback as a sign of security to give a sense of strong confidence to shoppers and employees [Music] could you imagine this just try to picture this a mall actually having a grand opening the doors are locked to the mall concourse and then the developers and the owners and everyone involves in the executive committee they get up on a giant podium wearing suits among their friends and family in the community with news outlets rallying among the community and then they cut the ribbon put the key in the door and they turn it and they let the eager shoppers inside to the massive complex for anything the shoppers imaginations would conjure but today it's the complete opposite developers are locking the doors to the mall with no fanfare almost in the dark of night they're locking the doors while the exterior anchors remain open keeping prying eyes away from the cavernous maze of empty hallways only to avert the public attention away from the catacombs of yesterday's retail [Music] in a November 17th 1976 Houston Post article the developer said quote the interior landscaping will be used to create the illusion of a brick paved street lined with shops natural light from Clare stories and skylights will permit planting full-grown trees into three courtyards unquote close quote the mall was designed to have the feel of New York's Central Park with the full sight with full-size ficus trees adorning every courtyard and even in the center court there was a waterfall that you could walk through to get to a cafe in the food court which must have been amazing JC Penney was added in 1977 to the greens Point Mall and 1978 Montgomery Ward opened along with 14 News stores for the event Darth Vader Chewbacca and r2d2 traveled from a galaxy far far away for the occasion along with the Kojak actor Kevin Dobson this was a big event and the community was looking forward to this for a long time so this mall was a huge deal for this area the mall even had some art installation that was incredibly fascinating and I believe that this sculpture I'm about to talk about was at the courtyard at the end of this concourse that we'll see in a second and according to a 1978 Houston Chronicle article the piece was called almost calculated and it was a musical structure that was composed of 24 counterbalanced tubes which were controlled by a constant flow of water and as the tubes descended they struck the brass and antique symbols which were cut to create five distinct notes and this was created by a Baltimore sculptors bill Powell and Dan sellers and it must have been amazing but today there's no music in this courtyard [Music] Hey looking around [Music] [Music] a Lord and Taylor was added in 1979 with Joss Keyes anchoring the south end of the mall by 1980 by then there were more than 160 stores at the mall and partly due to this success federated decided to sell them all for an undisclosed figure to Holdings arm of Prudential real estate investments during the eighties kids would head to the mall on a Saturday afternoon to see movies at the general cinema like Blade Runner aliens and Batman when the Greenes point-five general cinema first opened the very first movies shown there were Blazing Saddles Bugs Bunny superstar lifeguard One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and ode to Billy Joe as kids roamed around these massive corridors and courtyards among giant ficus trees and a waterfall that they could walk under their allowances with vanish in places like Babbage's and Aladdin's castle and they would spend too much time inside the Folies just waiting in line for the Ticket Master to open so they could get tickets to see someone like the Rolling Stones or Eric Clapton these days the mall is lifeless and dangerous perhaps it's because back in 1984 the Houston police mounted officers that's when they ended their horseback patrol at the mall they probably should have kept that going by the mid to late 1980s the greens Point Mall was not only a sprawling complex for urban and suburban shoppers alike but it was becoming a haven for muggers killers thieves and rapists in 1986 during a 12 month long sting operation where Houston police would plant flashy expensive cars in the parking lots of eight Houston area malls Green's point led the pack in cars stolen with 360 total Grand Theft Auto cases Alameda mall was second with 334 one year later after Kempo took over allied stores the Jos keys was converted into a Dillard's in late 1987 in a plan to revitalize the mall just 12 years after its opening prudential would pump in 7 million dollars in renovations bringing a fresh look to the mall which is kind of surprising to me that they felt they needed to do so much just after the first decade of the malls operation and i don't believe they did much during that renovation and i couldn't really find much on exactly what they did so if you're from this area and you remember back in 1988 1989 what exactly changed here if you could tell me in the comments that would be awesome lord and taylor had it's 51 stores owned by the may company at the time it came to the mall in 1979 however by 1989 the may company began selling some of its Orden taylor locations to california-based Mervyn's of which the Greenpoint mall location was one and by 1990 the conversion from Lord and Taylor to Mervyn's was complete you see back then there really were no malls that were crime free I'm sure that's even the case today you know there's crime at most malls but it seems the crime was much worse back then into the early 90s the surveillance state was far less stringent and prevalent as it is now with the internet and big brother and the internet-of-things watching everything constantly back then the shadows were home to many of the skeletons that lurked around some of these immense courtyards at night and they could hide there because the only thing they contended with were closed-circuit television system however there were two high-profile cases that began this stigma that attached to this mall between 1991 and 1992 and they would permanently scar the reputation of greens plant one evening in September 1991 an off-duty sheriff's deputy named Roxanne alley wife and mother of four and serving with the police department for four years at the time was walking to her car parking of Dillard's when the witnesses saw two armed men forced her inside her Ford Aerostar van about 90 minutes later authorities found Ali's van engulfed in flames near TC jester and Laurel Creek a short time after that Ali's body was found less than a mile away from the burn ban with gunshot wounds to her head until today the murder remains unsolved just over a year later taxi driver Larry D Gibson was shot in the back of the head by a passenger while right outside the mall near the junior anchor Beals department store the gunman was quickly arrested and later convicted in the murder and after these two senseless and hateful crimes the mall was begrudgingly renamed by locals the nearly one and a half million square-foot shrine to Commerce and crime would now be known indefinitely as the guns Point Mall shortly after these two murders between 1991 and 92 the Houston PD brought a persistent presence into the mall which they hoped would give shoppers and mall employees alike a greater sense of security the mall would suffer further through the 90s with the construction and direct competition of the woodlands mall Deerbrook mall and the Willowbrook Mall these three would give shoppers an alternative and a safer place to shop which hurt them all in years to come Prudential would place the mall for sale in the late 1990s and by 1998 the now 1.7 million square foot mall was purchased by the man who produced a film crash Bob yari through his purchasing arm de properties which would later become try yaar company as part of this deal they also purchased the Mervyn's property and the building for JCPenney who decided to shutter in 2000 Montgomery would also shutter their doors just one year later in 2001 over the years senior anchor Foley's would change hands among many controlling arms from federated it went to the toronto-based campo corporation then it was owned by allied and then on August 30th 2005 Foley's was reacquired by federated when the company merged with the may department store company on September 9th 2006 Foley's was renamed to Macy's as part of the rebranding and the store was renovated to a bleached whitewashed boring mess the same year the trier company which was bought the Ares company who owned them all they announced a 32 million dollar renovation to convert them all to an open-air town center however just a year later they put them all up for sale even allowing purchasing agents to buy the entire mall or just individual properties they really did want to unload them all which was rather prophetic given what would happen the next year on Tuesday November 27th 2007 Ohio native Jason Hawkins who was facing some personal issues such as a failed marriage a pretty heavy child support case which was pending in Cleveland and inevitable eviction from his apartment Jason Hawkins set out on a path of destruction in Houston that day he was spotted at 6:40 a.m. that Tuesday morning walking out of his local 18t store where he worked and moments later the building was reportedly up in flames he then went to the gym at the greens Point Mall leaving shortly before 10:00 a.m. to call his ex-wife this is Jason I'm in Houston he said calmly in a taped message I've done some terrible things down here as well as some good things but I love you to death yes this is a farewell type phone call unfortunately so I guess if you watch the houston news you'll see me close quote right as he was getting to the gym Joanna Starr Gonzalez a bright-eyed purpose-driven member of society was arriving at her job she worked at a lingerie shop called body luxuries at the greens Point Mall one of seven children Gonzalez had an affinity for space the cosmos and stars she had a hot pink star tattooed on her shoulder and on her back was a cluster of three bigger stars her sister said she just loves stars and considered herself a big star close quote as Joanna was opening the body luxury store raising the gate while on the phone with her manager Jason Hawkins came up ducked under the gate and he grabbed her due to the commotion and screaming noticed by fellow employees at the mall the police and mall security were called immediately as security was alerted they were running around the mall banging on the closed metal gates telling everyone to evacuate and back at body luxuries I can't help but think that what Joanna was looking at in those moments of peril as she was being held by Jason as she was looking around the mall at the ficus trees and the waterfall and listening to all the commotion and taking in the sights in what were most likely her last moments in the moments before the police arrived while security attempted to intervene but police said security backed off after Hawkins grabbed Gonzalez by the neck and pointed a gun at her head Hawkins pulled the trigger killing Joanna instantly he then calmly walked behind the counter at the body luxurious lingerie shop and like a coward that couldn't face his life and problems like a real man he shot himself leaving behind just pain and anguish for the families affected by this senseless murder Joanna was just an innocent victim of a senseless murder from a weak-willed man that couldn't face life [Music] [Music] Sears left them all in 2010 and in an effort to show signs of revitalization the 10 years long vacant JCPenney building was demolished paving the way for the future of greens point despite this sign of forward momentum Bob couldn't give them all away as no one wanted anything to do with it and the baggage that it carried it's a dangerous area wrought with crime and to sell them all would mean a certain loss so Bob decided to just cling onto the property and let it rot over the years his intent seems to be to draw as little attention to the mall as possible after everything that has brought such bad press to this property the mall went radio silent for years with the only news coming up each year of the annual parking lot carnival for the local community and attract less and less of a crowd each year in 2016 news broke of a group of investors called a global Plaza Union which was led by Chinese investors who were in the late stages of purchasing them all and who also had plans to immediately turn it into a mixed-use development once the transaction was complete Macy's decided to bail in 2017 and Dillard's followed suit in late 2018 both shuttering their doors as of today the only two places occupying a majority of the space and I'm really hesitant to call them angers I don't think they are but they do hold the most square footage at the mall out of any one tenant and out of the six former senior anchor buildings only two of these remain the two that hold the most space right now are the premier cinemas and the fitness connection the infamous gym at the guns Point Mall who knows what the future holds for this place maybe Bob yari will just keep doing nothing or maybe they'll finally transform it into a safe shopping center that it sells confidence and positivity in its employees and shoppers as always I'd like to thank every one of you for watching this video I'd like to thank my patrons for directly sponsoring my cause to get out there and film these places and without you it would be a lot harder and if all of you just gave a dollar I'd be able to do this full-time I'd also like to thank the Devils of discord family and to join the discord and the conversation you can find a link below in the description and to all of my subscribers of which we are now over 17,500 so thank you all so much for supporting this channel over the years and there's a lot more to come next up will be the end of the 2018 gulf mall tour the court animal in Baton Rouge Louisiana thanks again everyone take care [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Sal

Views: 189,310

Rating: 4.6717157 out of 5

Keywords: century iii, century 3 mall, dead mall, pittsburgh, mall, vaporwave, dan mason, urbex, mallsoft, fiesta mall mesa, schuylkill mall, 80s, 90s, mall walking, moonbeam, plaza, decay, food court, expedition log series, abandoned, sears, mountaineer, west virginia, sal, exploration, Baltimore, schuylkill, docu vlog, investigative, documentary, film, gunspoint, gunspoint mall, greenspoint, greenspoint mall, houston, texas, dangerous, crime, murder, dan bell, dead mall series, eddie lampert, jake williams, asmr

Id: ykawXG8F4FA

Length: 25min 16sec (1516 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 16 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/some_random_kaluna]

Hey man, thanks for doing this. But when you're going into sketchy malls, you need to take along some friends too. Camera and audio operator. Numbers make robbers think twice.

Mahalo for doing this series. I'm subbed now. :)

[u/DirtyDiddler23]

I go to this mall every Tuesday and Thursday to train lol

[u/amatrixa]

Definitely not located in the best part of town. I used to work near the Houston National Cemetery area, where Beltway 8 meets I-45, it was quite a change from the western areas of the city I was accustomed to. After work, once I got to my hotel, I stayed put and didn’t venture out like I used to. It’s a drab and ugly part of the city with endless shopping centers, scary people and lots of traffic, an urban hell within an urban Hell.