Last sunday we went to a recently opened shopping mall named Ampe Skywalk in Chennai. One of my friend told me that the mall is very good. The mall is located in Nelson Manickam Road in Aminjikarai. We took a car from our place to the mall. So the first place we visited in the mall is Car Parking. The mall has got a multi level car parking extending up to the terrace. It has got the automatic ticket system for parking. When the car enters the parking, he should press the button in the ticketing machine to get his parking card. The parking fee for cars is Rs.20 per hour. ( I think this is little bit costly ). I think this is the only place in chennai where the automatic ticketing system is available as far i have seen.
The mall has got ground + five floors. It is designed in such a way that one can see the full view of the mall by standing near the corner in any floor. Now let's explore floor by floor.
Ground Floor:
This floor has got my favourite restaurant which is none other then McDonalds. Unfortunately i could eat only French Fries that day here as my stomach did not had enough space to have a McDonald burger. I love the burgars in McDonald. Other popular restaurant in this floor is KFC. I know it is very popular but i had not tasted food here before. Many shops of international brands are available in this floor. Some of the popular shops in this floor are The Body Shop, Van Heusen,Levis, Westside, Rado watches, Louis Phillipe, United Colours Of Benetton etc. Univercell mobiles and Titan showroom were also available in this floor.We can call this floor as "Floor of Brands"
Another interesting shop in this place is the Tata Star Bazaar. It is a very big supermarket and iam amazed at the kind of things available here. It has groceries, vegetables, fruits, stainless steel vessels, melamine vessels, choclates, T-shirts, electrical appliances like mixie,grinder, fan etc, shoes and casual slippers, toys, cushions, bed spreads, plastic items, perfumes etc. I may have missed out some things because i can only remember these things. It also got a small bakery and a mini restuarant inside the bazaar. One can get any item from A-Z here.
First Floor:
I could see lot of shops here especially for men. We can call this floor as "Men's apparels". The popular ones here are Reebok, Zodiac, Allen Solly, Lee/Wrangler, Pepe Jeans,Rockport,Provogue,Peter England, Adidas etc.
This floor also has got Cookieman shop and Coffee day Cafe. Archies Gallery is also available in this floor.
Second Floor:
The second floor can be called as "Ladies & Kids floor" as the many shops are related to these two. Popular ones in this floor are Diva, Health & Glow,United Colours of Benetton Kids ,Biba,Naturals Salon,Lilliput,Mustard,Soch etc. Poorvika mobiles has got a showroom in this floor.
Third Floor:
Third floor can be called as "Food Floor" as it has got so many restaurants in this floor. The food court here is very large and can accomodate 500 people. ( It is only my guess. I have not counted it ). Here we are not allowed to buy food from the restaurants here directly using cash or credit card. We have to buy a card called "F3 card" from the food counter . We have to pay the approximate amount for the food we are going to eat in this counter and get this card. We can get the balance if we have paid in excess after all the purchase is over.Using this card only we can purchase food at the restaurants. We can keep this card with us for future use or we can return it back before we leave the mall. All varieties of food like North Indian, South Indian,Continental,Arabic, Chinese, Kerala etc are available here. The pure vegetarian restaurants available here are Hot Chips, Jus Parathas, Kailash Parbhat and Mr & Mrs Idly. Other restaurants include Little Mexicana,Curry House,Arabian Hut, Pizza Hut,Wang's Kitchen,Delicasio etc. Two Ice cream shops named Kiwi Kiss and Milky way are available here.
Fourth Floor:
This floor can be called as "PVR floor" as the PVR cinemas is located in here. It has seven screens and the total capacity of all the screens is more than 1500. Ticket booking machines are available here through which we can book tickets using our credit card. I don't know about the show timings as i did not see any movie here till now.
Fifth Floor:
This floor can be called as "Parking Floor" as it is the only thing available in this floor.
Comments :
Main attractions in this mall are PVR cinemas, Tata Star Bazaar, KFC, McDonalds etc. The paints used for walls in the mall are not very much attractive. Even though the mall is brand new, some of the places looks quite old.Also the rest room facilities provided for such a big food court is very small and it is very annoying to see the long queue standing for that. This facility needs to be improved. It is a good place for people in T.Nagar, Anna nagar etc as it is very near to them. We can expect good improvements in future as the mall is new.