Plans for redeveloping Oakwood Mall have involved eliminating enclosed lease space and creating an open-air shopping environment.

The current developer’s concept is the same as that of a previous developer, City Manager Jerald Gilbert said.

“It’s difficult because the mall is big, complex. There’s lots of stores they’ve got to work on leases with,” he said of the $40 million-plus project. S Squared Development has been working on the concept since the fall of 2014.

“We knew that one of the things we would have to do is deal with Sears, and Sears took care of that themselves: They left. We immediately started our design of the project, which includes removing the Sears building and (putting) a new multiplex theater in the space, cutting off the front of the mall and creating more of a lifestyle combination power lifestyle center at the mall,” S Squared Development Principal Bill Stone said, adding it would be an open-air center.

The city of Enid’s retail consultant, Rickey Hayes, of Retail Attractions, said it’s fairly common in small market malls to “de-mall” the site.

“What that means is you would keep the anchor tenants kind of in place, refurbish their structures, and you kind of tear down the enclosed lease space and convert it into a more modern drive-up shopping experience. And whether you call that a lifestyle center or a power center, or whatever it becomes, the tenants are accessed by the consumer from the outside. Instead of parking and going into an enclosed mall, it’s actually a drive up in front of the individual tenants, kind of a more modern shopping trip for the consumer,” he said.