Memories of TriTowne
The new shopping center at Plymouth Drive and Route 70 was controversial from the start.
The new shopping center at Plymouth Drive and Route 70 was controversial from the start.
Local residents ‘have fought the variance and intend to go to court to block the center. They contend that traffic on Route 70 is already heavy and the center will only increase congestion’.
A law suit was filed claiming the development does not comply with Evesham’s master plan and zoning ordinances.
The developer sued the town and refused requests to perform a traffic impact study.
In this atmosphere, construction began on the TriTowne Plaza in 1974.
As we are about to welcome the new Renaissance Square to our town, it’s important to remember that projects this large are never easy or universally welcomed. Many of the same complaints that residents have raised over the past year or two were raised back in 1974, yet the town survived and the center flourished, for a while anyway. And that contested projects like TriTowne, to those of us under 50, were ALWAYS a part of Marlton.
What follows is a personal history of the TriTowne plaza.
As I started writing this, I thought back to a record of my youth, which was played so often it needed to be replaced more than once. The album tells the story of the momentous opening and the eventual closing of a glamorous theater. The pictures on the front and back of the album cover tell all you need to know of the story.
I grew up just over the Evesham border in Cherry Hill, so the TriTowne plaza, once completed, was not something I visited often as a child. I lived within biking distance of Clover, so when I needed to buy hamster food, baseball cards, Atari cartridges, or the latest Styx record, that’s where I went. And right next door was Acme, for all my candy and soda needs, plus they had a Donkey Kong Jr. machine!
At times though, my father would need to go to Kmart. This was long before Walmart came to town, so unless he wanted to drive out to the Cherry Hill Mall area, Kmart was the place to go. Sometimes he’d give me some quarters so I could go play video games at the Twilite Zone. Nothing was more exciting to me as an 8 year old than a pocket full of quarters and no parents. The world was at my command.
While no one seems to remember it being there, I also have fond memories of a Baskin Robbins being inside the mall between Superfresh and Kmart. While it wasn’t as scenic as Cowtail Barn, they had clown cones, which were my favorite, though sometimes I would opt for the bubblegum ice cream. (The thought of that nauseates me now.) We’d get ice cream and walk through the small indoor mall or sit on the benches that lined the walls.
We also came to TriTowne to pick up Little Caesar’s quite frequently. While it was definitely not the best pizza pizza around, it was certainly the MOST pizza pizza around. Two for the price of one? How could anyone resist that marketing strategy? (If you want to call about the job listed below, please remember the area code was 609 back then.)
During the renovations of the TriTowne plaza over the past year, I took great joy when the Little Caesar’s sign was visible again, if only for a few days.
As a teenager, I hung out a lot at the Burger King, as I had a lot of friends in Marlton. I had many an overcooked burger and greasy fries in the mid to late 80s. We were occasionally kicked out though we would always return the following week. While I protested then, they always had good reason to kick us out. Burger King was also where I stumbled to after losing the one fight I was in as a teenager. Actually fight isn’t the right word. My friend was losing a fight badly, I tried to break it up and took a right hook in my left eye and was knocked out cold. We stumbled to the Burger King afterward, me with a concussion and quickly swelling black eye, my friend with a bloody nose, and asked for ice. They were most gracious in helping us out. I never did thank them for that.
I moved to Marlton in late 1991. I had just graduated college without a lot of disposable income. I was an avid reader and the fact that the library was located right in TriTowne was a godsend. The library had moved to TriTowne plaza in 1976 and stayed there until it moved to its current location at the Municipal Complex. I probably went their once a week for new books and the occasional VHS tape. Aside from being free, it was much closer to home than the Erols/Blockbuster where the Shoprite is now.
Originally opened as an A&P in 1975, the supermarket closed in 1982 and re-opened as Superfresh in the 1983. It thrived in the center throughout the 80s.
In the early 90s, I went to Superfresh at least once a week. As my diet then consisted of hot dogs, Hamburger Helper and Ramen Noodles, Superfresh was the perfect small town grocery store.
I left New Jersey in 1993 and returned again to Marlton in 2003. By this time, Walmart was across the street from Kmart and the Superfresh felt very dated, old and small. Now shopping for a family of 4, Superfresh just didn’t have the product selection that Shoprite or Acme did. I would stop there when I needed to pick up a couple of items (at least until Bottom Dollar opened briefly at Crispin Square), but it no longer got the big weekly purchase. Walmart and Target were visited frequently with Kmart merely an afterthought.
While we would occasionally go to the Subway (and later the Chinese restaurant), the shopping center no longer drew us. And when Kmart changed to Sears Essentials, you could see the writing on the wall. Who would ever need to buy a washing machine and band-aids in the same store?
Yet the little Superfresh outlasted them all. It survived the opening of a newer and larger Superfresh, which was originally intended to replace it, just ½ mile away at Marlton Crossing, which was opened from 1987 through 2000. It survived the closing of Sears Essential but finally closed in 2013.
The End. For now.
As Renaissance Square is on the verge of opening, I hope the time we residents have spent debating the merits of the project are behind us. I look forward to revisiting this story in a few years, to update it with stories of the nice dinners we’ve had at the new restaurants, the convenience of seeing all my doctors in one building, and being able to take my dogs for walks on the new walking trails.
To be continued….
Author’s Note: The quotes and ads above come from Courier Post articles published at the time. And all the Evesham photos are from John Flack and were used with his permission. His flickr photos can be found here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/42444189@N04/albums/page2/
And he has a book on Evesham which can be purchased here:
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