Chicago mall that staged the famous Blues Brother movie car chase set to fall soon.
The long abandoned Dixie Square Mall, where the Blues Brothers famously filmed a police chase, has a new developer who plans to demolish the shuttered shopping center and build new stores and housing.
Preliminary plans for the 35-acre site at 153rd Street and Dixie Highway in south suburban Harvey, as well as surrounding blocks, call for big-box and smaller retail stores and as well as housing over five years, said Thomas Planera, chief counsel for the Chicago-based developer, MG Development South LLC.
The mall could be demolished as soon as later this month, but that hinges on Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan who has a pending lawsuit against the previous developer, the city of Harvey and several others, alleging environmental violations.
Dixie Square Mall has been an eyesore for years. It opened in 1966 and was one of the state’s first enclosed shopping malls. The doors were shut in 1979, but were famously reopened for the “Blues Brothers” scene in which John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd led police on a wild car chase through the building.
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