Partial roof collapse at old Bayside Expo Center

Interesting that you said it was a mall at one point. I remember reading that somewhere. (probably Wikipedia also)

And of course as many times as I've used google maps and historicaerials.com I never bothered to look at the Bayside Expo Center from above. (or even notice)

You can usually tell which parts of a mall are the anchor stores and what is the indoor walking area by what the roof line looks like. Most indoor mall anchor stores are typically NOT apart of the mall structure itself (structurally), rather a separate-but-attached configuration, so they can be torn down easily for expansion or total store rebuild without effecting the rest of the mall.

The Bayside Expo Center is no different.

If you look at it from above, it's pretty clear which sections were the anchor stores (red), and what was the main part of the mall (blue). That little red peice must have been small "outpost store" like a restaurant or pharmacy. The white parts, I'm guessing were added on post-mall.

And if you click here, you can see when it was actually a mall (or closed as one) in 1969.

Anyhow.. this makes sense to me now.

Many years ago I worked a contract job for two weeks at bayside for some focus group company who rented out the entire center for this focus group. Since the groups were small, there was long periods where we had nothing to do to (we had to escort people around and make sure they didn't touch anything), so we (the temps) all just roamed all over that complex.

I just remember being all perplexed by layout. Just so big and vast. Lots of rooms, but it just didn't make a whole lot of sense (unlike the Hynes or WTC). And not just one big contiguous space. Very wearhouse-y

Of course now thinking of it as a former mall, now it makes sense.

Anyhow waaay off topic. But interesting. And yes I do second the fact that I'm sure it didn't survive very long considering it was next to Columbia Point and not near anything else.