Portland City Council voted 10-0 to uphold the Lloyd Center Central City Master Plan on Wednesday, clearing the way for the demolition of the 65-year-old mall and its historic ice rink. While property owners plan to close the site permanently in August, displaced skaters and community members are organizing to secure a new permanent rink.
Portland City Council Votes to Uphold Master Plan for Lloyd Center Redevelopment
The plan to redevelop the Lloyd Center Mall and its surrounding land will move forward despite two appeals aimed at saving the mall and its ice rink. During a Wednesday meeting, the Portland City Council cast an initial 10-0 vote to uphold the Lloyd Center Central City Master Plan, with two councilors absent and one recused due to a conflict of interest, according to reporting from the Portland Mercury.
The Council’s decision follows extensive public testimony sessions held in June, which drew hundreds of comments from residents seeking to keep the shopping center open. Advocates emphasized the mall’s value as a small business incubator and community gathering space, while also focusing heavily on the prospective loss of Portland’s only public, indoor ice skating venue. Conversely, a smaller group testified in favor of the redevelopment plan, which had earlier received a unanimous approval from the Portland Design Commission.
The approved master plan sets out a vision for a dense, mixed-use community featuring new residential buildings, retail stores, and open green space. Property owners Urban Renaissance Group and KKR Real Estate plan to permanently close the mall in August, noting they would proceed with closure even if the City Council overturned the master plan. Although the real estate firms have not yet applied for a demolition permit, the property lacks historic or protected landmark status, leaving the city with virtually no legal leverage to intervene.
Councilors Acknowledge Public Nostalgia While Looking Toward Future Infrastructure
During Wednesday’s proceedings, councilors expressed sympathy for the appellants and shared personal memories of the shopping center in its heyday. However, they recognized that the city lacked the legal authority to prevent the closure or demolition, warning that rejecting the redevelopment plan would forfeit the city’s influence over the future site.
“This redevelopment represents a generational opportunity to build much-needed housing and modern infrastructure right in the heart of the city. …I know that change is incredibly hard, especially when it touches places that hold our history, my history. But as your city councilor, I must look toward tomorrow.”
Councilor Loretta Smith, District 1
Mall advocates argued that the city administration could have acted more boldly to broker a preservation compromise and criticized the planning process for limiting public engagement. Matthew Henderson, an artist and owner of Virtua Gallery at the mall who represented the Save Lloyd Campaign at the hearing, expressed disappointment following the vote.
End of an Era for America’s First Mall Ice Rink
Opening in the 1960s, the Lloyd Center Mall served as a major commercial anchor on Portland’s east side. Although its major department stores shuttered over the preceding decade, cheap rents recently allowed independent business owners and artists to spark a moderate revitalization. At the center of this revival has been its ice rink—noted as the first mall ice rink in America, where Tonya Harding once trained.
With its final day of operations scheduled for August 8, regular skaters like Wendy May are preparing to say goodbye. May, 69, served on the leadership team of the Save Lloyd Ice Coalition, which mobilized to appeal the master plan. Despite efforts that included outreach aided by Ilia Malinin during the Winter Olympic Games, the preservation push did not stop the closure.
The rink’s physical limitations—measuring roughly a third the size of a standard sheet, making it too small for hockey and certain elite routines—never hindered its role as a diverse community hub offering 50 hours of public skating and 12 hours of lessons weekly. Without a municipal ice rink in the Portland Parks & Recreation portfolio, local skaters will now scatter to suburban facilities such as Sherwood Ice Arena, Mountain View Ice Arena in Vancouver, and the Winterhawks Skating Center in Beaverton.
Transitioning Into the Bridgetown Ice Skating Collective
Rather than letting the community dissolve, the advocacy group behind the preservation effort is refashioning itself into an official nonprofit organization. Now named the Bridgetown Ice Skating Collective, the group is actively fundraising and meeting with local politicians to locate a flat, 1-acre parcel of land within city limits for a permanent facility.
In the short term, the collective is scrambling to secure interim ice time to bridge the operational gap. During public hearings in July, City Council President Jamie Dunphy suggested opening the city-owned Veterans Memorial Coliseum as a recreational facility. The Portland Winterhawks already host frequent postgame open skates at the venue, offering a potential template for future community access.
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