The dining hall at Chinook Centre in Calgary is one of the busiest eating areas of any mall in Canada. Our Special Projects team  nevertheless maintained an uninterrupted public experience throughout the renovation and opened a state-of-the-art dining hall with additional food court outlets.

The 30,000-square-foot dining hall seats more than 800 guests and offers 20 dining options. The rejuvenation marks the latest noteworthy upgrade to Cadillac Fairview’s Chinook Centre food court since the previous revitalization in 2000. The restoration provides guests with an enjoyable dining experience in a modernized and polished space. 

The construction process itself catered to the mall’s users, tenants and their needs. In this phased renovation, the team upgraded half of the dining area and then began on the other half once the first was complete. This ensured the dining hall remained open at all times to the mall’s guests. By working closely with The City of Calgary’s inspection department, the team maintained a tight turnaround schedule.

Our involvement throughout preconstruction was critical because it meant being able to efficiently schedule base-building construction, tenant fit-out construction and city approvals. The sewer system for the new food court was cause for concern as it dated back half a century and lay above existing tenant space. During preconstruction the project team investigated the conditions of the sewer system and worked with the mall operations group to redesign it. The team replaced the sewer system in its entirety.

We held to the 135-calendar-day schedule for each of the two sides of the dining hall so the restoration finished ahead of the busy holiday shopping season. Now, Calgarians and mall users can benefit from additional seating, ease of flow and new design and layout.