Resurrecting a screename I haven’t logged into in 15 years here… I beg to differ on the decline of Mall of the Mainland being because of Baybrook, Baybrook was always the better mall to go to (and it was built in 1978 I believe). I was born and raised in Galveston and we frequently drove right past Galvez and Mall of the Mainland to go to Baybrook. It’s a testament to Baybrook’s strength as a mall, that even these days, in a era where malls are have become a bygone relic, Baybrook is bigger and stronger than ever, having added an outdoor mall area too.
I would describe Mall of the Mainland as a blip, it was never “the place” to be, it really only had about 5-10 year heyday if you could call it that. As a Galvestonian the main reason to go to Mall of the Mainland was the movie theater (or sheer laziness if you were shopping and didn’t want to drive 12 more mins to Baybrook), which after the closure of the Broadway Theater and Galvez Mall theaters became the closest theater. This even fell off after the megaplexes came into fashion in the late 90s. Suddenly, rather than bother with the dinky old 12 screen at Mall of the Mainland you’d drive 20-30 miles to go to the AMC 30 at the beltway or Cinemark in Webster. Then they built the small theater in Galveston which was good enough and left pretty much no reason to go to Mall of the Mainland at all.