South Tyler's Shopping Loop Just Split Three Ways, and the Middle One Isn't Finished Yet

If your Saturday errand run used to mean one stop at Broadway Square Mall and maybe a walk through the Village at Cumberland Park afterward, that loop is quietly becoming three separate trips this fall, and they are no longer interchangeable. The mall spent the summer swapping out local storefronts for national names. Cumberland Park spent it doing almost the opposite, adding a market of independent vendors and a Korean bowl concept that isn't even open yet. And the vacant land between the two, the stretch everyone in Holly Tree has watched get scraped and regraded all year, is finally showing what it's going to be: not another parking-lot strip center, but something built specifically so people stick around.

Here's what actually changed, and why it matters if you're the one deciding where to park on a Saturday morning.

The Mall Traded Local for National

Broadway Square Mall spent the first half of 2026 rotating its tenant list. Talbots announced its closure in January, and two locally rooted shops, Weird & Different (started by a Tyler Junior College graduate, still selling online) and the specialty retailer Attic Salt, also shut their doors around the same time. In their place, the mall brought in three national anchors, and all three finished construction on nearly back-to-back timelines.

Sephora's buildout, a 5,928-square-foot renovation estimated at $675,000, wrapped by mid-June. J.Crew Factory's space, a roughly $600,000 job in an existing storefront, was targeted to finish by July 1. And Lululemon, which had tested the market with a pop-up as far back as April 2025, completed an $810,000 renovation of a 6,263-square-foot space by August 20, converting from pop-up to permanent. Add those together and the mall spent close to $2 million this year on beauty and activewear alone, a bet on the same category of national retail you'd otherwise drive to Dallas for.

If you haven't been inside the mall since spring, that's the headline: three storefronts you'd recognize from a bigger market, filling space vacated by names only Tyler shoppers would have known.

Cumberland Park Bet the Other Way

A few minutes down South Broadway, the Village at Cumberland Park spent the same stretch of 2026 doing something closer to the reverse. On September 19, just two days before this was written, The Collective Boutiques held its grand opening at 8970 S. Broadway Avenue, Suite 144. It's a vendor marketplace, individual rented spaces for independent apparel, home decor, specialty foods, and handmade goods, the kind of format that gives small sellers a storefront without them having to lease and build out a whole space themselves.

Next door, in the old Which Wich spot at 8982 South Broadway Avenue, Cupbop Korean BBQ is under construction for what will be the first East Texas location of the fast-casual chain best known for build-your-own bowls of marinated beef and spicy pork over rice and noodles. It's also a useful example of how much these projects can shift once permits are filed. The initial state filing estimated a $20,000 renovation finishing by September. The updated filing, submitted in late June, revised that to a $200,000 buildout with a completion date of October 6. That's a tenfold jump in projected cost and a month's slip in timeline, the kind of detail you'd only catch by watching the permit record rather than the press release. If you've been checking the storefront hoping for a bowl before Halloween, plan on early October instead.

Dave & Buster's is also still mid-build at Cumberland Park, positioned directly across from Studio Movie Grill and set to be the chain's first East Texas location. As of the last public filing, no opening date had been confirmed, so it remains one to watch rather than one to circle on the calendar yet.

The Corner That's Still Dirt

Between those two centers sits the land most Holly Tree residents have been watching all year without much to show for it: Parkside, the Genecov Group's 92-acre project at 8851 South Broadway Avenue, directly across from Cumberland Park. If you've driven past and wondered why it still looks like earthwork rather than a shopping center, that's because it currently is. Recent updates describe major grading and infrastructure work underway on what developers are calling Parkside North, the retail-facing half of the project, while Parkside South, planned around a creek and tree canopy that ties directly into neighboring Faulkner Park, is still further out.

The design intent is worth knowing even before a single storefront opens. Developers working with Genecov, alongside architecture firm OMNIPLAN and landscape firm TBG Partners, have said the goal is a place people move through on foot between shops and restaurants rather than a lot you park in, buy something, and leave. Plans call for an enlarged pond at Faulkner Park, a walking trail connecting the two properties, and an extension of Centennial Parkway across Broadway to serve as the development's north entrance. Genecov's own project materials put the site's built footprint at more than 600,000 square feet once complete, filling the land between Cumberland Park and the park next door. No tenants have been announced. Developers have said businesses are interested but that names won't be released until leases are finalized, so the speculation you've probably seen online is still just that.

What This Actually Means for Your Loop

Three destinations, three different jobs, in other words:

• Broadway Square Mall is now where you go for the national retail you'd otherwise drive to Dallas for, Sephora, J.Crew Factory, Lululemon, alongside its existing anchors.
• The Village at Cumberland Park is where the independent and the new-to-market show up first, The Collective Boutiques' vendor stalls now, Cupbop in early October, Dave & Buster's whenever its build finishes.
• Parkside is the wild card still under dirt, a longer-term bet on a walkable connection to Faulkner Park that won't reveal its tenant list for a while yet.

None of this changes what Holly Tree feels like day to day. Hollytree Country Club's rhythm of golf, tennis, and clubhouse dining hasn't shifted, and the quiet, tree-lined streets that make the neighborhood what it is are a few minutes removed from all of this construction. But if your usual errand loop runs down South Broadway, the map you had in your head in June is already out of date, and it's going to shift again once Parkside starts naming names.

If you want the earlier read on how this same stretch of South Tyler shows up during Rose Festival season, our Fall Playbook for Holly Tree covers the Old Bullard Road side of the corridor. And if you're weighing what any of this means for a home search in the neighborhood itself, our Holly Tree neighborhood guide is a good next stop.

Shauna Bright works this corridor of South Tyler daily, from the custom homes tucked behind Hollytree Country Club to the storefronts reshaping Broadway. If you're curious what any of this growth means for your own address, schedule a private consultation or request a home valuation, no pressure, just a clear read on where things stand.