Central Park Avenue

As you might remember, I wrote about the Greenburgh Nature Center a while back. As you might have guessed, it is in an area that is surrounded by deep woods. What you might not have guessed is that an area surrounded by deep woods is off to the side of one of the busiest roads in Westchester County, Central Park Avenue. It starts in White Plains as Central Avenue, continues into Hartsdale where it becomes Central Park Avenue, keeps going into Scarsdale, and finishes in Yonkers. Along the road are several shopping centers that contain many big retailers. In this blog post, I will be writing about some of the highlights along Central Park Avenue in hopes that it might convince you to check it out. 

One of the first shopping centers you’ll see on Central Park Avenue is called Westchester Square, and it’s located in Hartsdale. It features a variety of retailers, including three main anchor tenants which are clothing store Marshall’s, grocery store Trader Joe’s, and electronics store Best Buy.

Continuing up the road, we have a variety of other businesses, including an IHOP restaurant, a Blinds To Go store, and an Ethan Allen furniture store. Further up, there is a store called The Tile Shop, which is much bigger than I would have expected it to be. Down the road a bit more is D’Errico Jewelry, which also has a store right here in Mount Kisco. In the same area, there also used to be The Scholastic Store, which sold books that were released by the company Scholastic, but it closed at some point in time, and has since become NYC Adventure Boot Camp. Up the road, there are some more common businesses like Burger King, car dealerships, the clothing store Men’s Wearhouse, and a HomeGoods store. 

A little further up the road is another shopping center called Midway Shopping Center. This is a shopping center that I remember going to a few times when I was younger. I went there because there was an educational book and toy store there called Lakeshore Learning Store, which is still there today. I am also old enough to remember that one of the anchor tenants at the shopping center used to be home furnishings store Linens ‘n Things, which was also two levels. When they went out of business, the first level became Shoprite, while the second level became Jo-Ann Fabrics. There are several other interesting businesses here that are worth checking out, like Planet Fitness, a store that sells a variety of Japanese-inspired products called Daiso, a discount store called Amazing Savings, Panera Bread, Chick-Fil-A, and Chipotle Mexican Grill.

Right after the shopping center is a little plaza that has the businesses Buy Buy Baby, Best Plumbing, and Orangetheory Fitness. I found out some information about this plaza on the internet, which is that Buy Buy Baby has been there for a long time, and that at one point in time, one of the other businesses there was the toy store Zany Brainy. As someone who enjoyed going to the old Zany Brainy in Danbury to buy Thomas the Tank Engine toys, I know that my younger self would be mad that I didn’t go to its other location in the area. A little bit next to this plaza is another one that used to have a pet store called Pet Goods, which is where a challenge on an episode of the show “Impractical Jokers” was filmed. 

Across the street is an empty building that used to be occupied by a two-level Babies R Us. Next to that is also where Yonkers begins, along with another shopping center called Central Plaza. This shopping center has several unique and notable businesses like Party City, Five Below, and Barnes & Noble. I also have an interesting history with one of the stores at the shopping center. Many years ago, one of the stores here was K.B. Toys, a store that I loved going to when I was younger, as they had toys of characters from two of my favorite shows growing up, “Thomas the Tank Engine” and “Theodore Tugboat.” I would regularly go to its store in Ossining until it closed, so when I saw that its store in Yonkers was still open, I knew that I had to go there. I returned a few weeks later, and I saw that not only were they going out of business, but they also had very few toys left, so I just got a plush SpongeBob toy. 

Continuing down the road, there are many more shopping centers with a variety of unique businesses such as Bob’s Discount Furniture, Burlington, DSW, Best Buy, PetSmart, Fortunoff Backyard Store, P.C. Richard & Son, a Toyota dealer, Raymour & Flanigan Furniture, a Kia dealer, a Jeep dealer, a Honda dealer, KFC, Subway, Taco Bell, Frank Pepe Pizzeria, Wendy’s, Outback Steakhouse, and Chuck E. Cheese.

Further up the road even more are two massive shopping malls. These are Cross County Center and The Mall at Cross County. They both have a lot of fascinating tenants there right now as well as in the past. I would share them with you all right now, but upon doing further research, I feel that it is worthy of its own blog post, so I will just say that you should stay tuned for that.

Overall, I am amazed at how many businesses and shopping centers can be on one road that goes through four different towns. It’s also fascinating that a main road with all these popular businesses has a nature center surrounded by the deep woods right off to the side, as it feels like they should be in a completely different place. Writing this post was also fascinating for me, as since I haven’t been to this part of Westchester in years, I had a great time learning about what businesses are currently located along the road, what businesses have recently opened there, what businesses have closed and are still empty, and what businesses have replaced ones that closed. So, head on down this famous road and go to some fascinating businesses!