Opened on October 25, 2019, the new American Dream Mega Mall, located in East Rutherford, NJ, 1 h and 45 min from FCS, is officially the largest mall in America, covering 4.8 million square feet of retail and entertainment, 5 billion dollars in profit, and 16 years in the making. This incredible mall has a Nickelodeon Universe park, the largest indoor theme park in the US, with roller coasters and other rides, and coming later 2019 and early 2020 will be an ice rink, ski slope, DreamWorks Waterpark, and 500 retail stores and dining. Nickelodeon Universe is 40% open, and some of the rides will open later. Big Snow, the ski slope, along with Dreamworks Waterpark, aren’t open yet but will open soon. There are also going to be two 18 hole mini golf courses, bowling alleys, premium dine-in cinema, Legoland discovery center, sea life aquarium, mirror maze attraction, rock climbing, concert venue, and a London eye style Ferris wheel, standing at 287 ft. One of the roller coasters arriving to this complex is the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Shellraiser. The TMNT Shellraiser will have a record breaking 121.5 degree drop, the steepest drop in the world, barely beating the previous record holder Takabisha, which is 121 degrees steep. The second record breaking coaster that this mall has is Shredder. Shredder is the world’s longest free spin coaster. This new mall seems insane, maybe a little over the top, but is very exciting.
Aiden Naik’s opinion: “I saw that the mall seems very big and more like an entertaining center and Resort more than a mall. I don’t know why you would even want to shop here, you could just go to your local mall. I would only come here for the entertainment purposes like Nickelodeon world and the water park that’s opening up soon. I would just go to Costco and shop at a local mall if I had to.”
Sam Lord ‘25 and Aiden Naik ‘25