The Square at Campus Pointe officially opened during the summer bringing new life to the northeast corner of Shaw and Chestnut avenues.
The grand opening ceremony which was held July 15 inaugurated five of its new establishments; Cold Stone Creamery, Beach Hut Deli, Mad Duck Craft Brewing, Screenworks, and Wahoo’s Fish Taco.
“They are all exceeding their sales projection for this early in their opening. There’s good patron traffic and in some cases there is a wait time to get in,” said Debbie Adishian — Astone, associate vice president of Auxiliary Operations and Enterprise Development “That’s a good thing!”
There are eight other establishments that have yet to open at The Square, but Astone said we can expect them to follow shortly. Some of these establishments include Pieology, which is in the process of hiring, Wok it Out, Yogurtland, and Hyatt Place Hotel, which will hopefully begin Construction in 2017, said Astone.
“The Square at Campus Pointe will continue to be built out in phases and additional retail concepts will be opening over the next few years,” said Astone. “Developments of this size sometimes take 10 to 15 years to fully build out.”
Even though a few establishments have been added to The Square, Maya Cinemas is still grabbing the most attention from students like biology major Jessica Aguilar.
“The movie theater is right there and it looks really nice to me,” said Aguilar. “I feel like it’s more modernized than other movie theaters right now.”
Although there is parking available along Maya Cinemas within The Square and a parking lot along Matoian way and Chardonnay avenue, Campus Pointe faces issues with overflow parking.
“The developers are working together to try to determine how best to accommodate overflow parking from residents living at Palazzo now that the The Square is open,” said Astone. “Parking is always a challenge with mixed use projects but I am confident solutions will be identified to mitigate the problem.”
Located adjacent to Fresno State, The Square is a convenient place to visit for Jacqueline Villegas, junior English major.
“It’s walking distance and it has really good places,” said Villegas. “There affordable for students, and it’s actually really nice, and small. The environment is nice.”
Currently the only retail store at The Square is Screenworks and the only other shop planned to open in the future is Cricket Wireless. No plans have been revealed to bring other shops to The Square.
“My friends and I are surprised that there are no retail stores, we thought there would be a couple of retail stores sneaking in,” said Kelly Hosey, graduate physical therapy student.
Astone said that they plan on taking into consideration what the people want at The Square and will be doing this through social media.
“If you have ideas about other retail services you would like to see at The Square let us know,” said Astone. “A survey will be going out shortly on social media.”
For Andrew Martinez, a freshman business major, only one thing comes to mind when asked what The Square was in need of.
“Chipotle, you can’t go wrong with Chipotle,” said Martinez.