Harbour Town (shopping centre)

:"This article is related to Harbour Town, the shopping centre concept. For information about the golf course, see Harbour Town Golf Links."

s in one centre. There are presently three such stores operating in Australia. They are especially popular with tourists, although many locals also shop there.

As of December 2006, there are currently three locations: Biggera Waters, on Queensland's Gold Coast; West Perth, in Western Australia; and at Adelaide Airport, in South Australia.

Gold Coast

Harbour Town Gold Coast is located on the corner of the Gold Coast Highway and Oxley Drive Biggera Waters, Queensland. The Gold Coast centre opened in December 1999 when The Lewis Land Group of Companies opened Australia's first and largest purpose-built brand direct factory outlet shopping centre.

There are about 120 outlet stores including Oroton, Nike, and a David Jones Warehouse. Also, there is a large Woolworths, and a large 14 screen Reading Cinemas complex. Disapproval was expressed by some local residents at the demolition of a Drive-In movie area on the site, which had been for many an integral part of the Gold Coast's cultural heritage for a generation.

Perth

Harbour Town Perth is located in West Perth and features around 80 specialty stores including names like Nike Factory, Adidas Factory,JAG, Ojay, Esprit and Table Eight. The center is situated over 2 floors and has a square design. The centre opened in 2004. Plans for expansion are currently being formulated, although no plans have been formally announced.

Adelaide

Harbour Town Adelaide is situated in West Beach, South Australia. It features over 100 outlet stores in an L-shaped design. The main stores in the centre are Morrissey, JAG and Esprit outlet stores. Since major upgrades to the Adelaide Airport and the opening of South Australia's first Ikea store nearby in 2006 the centre has seen an increase in trading and plans are underway for expansion. Because its construction in the 2000s involved the creation of a new road perpendicular to and intersecting with Tapleys Hill Road which necessitated an additional set of traffic lights, many local residents of West Beach as well as those who consistently used Tapleys as a fast arterial route between Grange/Fulham/Port Adelaide and Glenelg/southern suburbs expressed discontent. Community and Green groups in the area have also expressed dismay at the planning decision to use previously vacant airport land for the construction of two major commercial outlets (Ikea and HarbourTown) which promote values of consumption and which depend heavily upon private vehicle transport access, just at a time when the recognition of the unsustainability of such ventures seemed to be entering mainstream discourse.

Melbourne

In late 2008, a new 41,000 sq.m Harbour Town centre will open in Melbourne's Docklands precinct, more specifically in Waterfront City, near to a large new observation wheel (Southern Star Observation Wheel), similar in many ways to the British Airways London Eye. The new centre will feature over 200 stores, and like other Harbour Town centres, a majority of the stores will be outlets.

External links

* [http://www.harbourtown.com.au/ Harbour Town Australia home page]
* [http://www.harbourtownadelaide.com.au/ Harbour Town Adelaide]
* [http://www.harbourtown.com.au/goldcoast/ Harbour Town Gold Coast]
* [http://www.harbourtownperth.com.au/ Harbour Town Perth]
* [http://www.waterfrontcity.com.au Waterfront City Melbourne]