Express Avenue
Express Avenue (Tamil: எக்ஸ்ப்ரெஸ் அவென்யூ) is a shopping mall in Chennai promoted by Express Infrastructure, A division of Express Newspapers Pvt. Ltd. It is home to the largest gaming arcade in South India. Built at a cost of , the mall is spread over , including of leasable (retail) area. The mall has 10 anchor tenants and 150 vanilla tenants. Description. The mall is situated near the Royapettah Clock Tower. The mall is built on a 8-acre site inside the historic Indian Express Estate and has four floors of retail space, a building for corporate offices and a hotel . Out of 10 acres, about 3.57 acres have been taken up by buildings. The rest have been used for car parking, drive-ways and landscaping. In all, the mall has 26 lifts, 34 escalators and 4 travelators. Express Avenue hosts a mixture of shopping, business and leisure. The mall is bounded by Whites Road, Woods Road and Patullos Road and has a three-level basement parking space for over 1,500 cars and a parking area for bikes. It has a total development of including 900,000 sq ft of retail space, 100,000 sq. ft of hotel, 200,000 sq. ft of office  space, 400,000 sq ft of parking space. The mall was inaugurated on 26 May 2010. E Hotel, a 44-room four-star boutique hotel, was built in the mall at a cost of 300 million. Entertainment and leisure. The entertainment portion of the mall is . The Escape Cinemas, the second branch of SPI Cinemas, consists of an 08-screens multiplex with a capacity of 1,600 seats covering , which is the city's largest cineplex. California-based Giovanni Castor played a key role in the overall design of Escape. The mall is home to the largest gaming arcade in South India . Besides stand-alone stores like Bath & Body Works, Burberry, Montblac, Lacoste, Moschino and Armani Exchange the mall has an Lifestyle and a 65,000 sq. ft Pantaloon, Big Bazaar, H&M and Forever 21. The anchor tenants are expected to take 300,000 to 400,000 sq ft, while the vanilla tenants would occupy up to 400,000 sq. ft. The food court has 25 counters and includes food chains such as Chili's, McDonald's, Burger King, Taco Bell, KFC and Pizza Hut. The mall has six atria with a height not less than 75 ft each. The atrium areas are covered with tensile  fabric and the centre of the atrium is covered with glass. Express Avenue has also have an exclusive showrooms for BMW and Volvo. Food court. The court, also called EA Garden, has 25 counters with several food and beverage options including Oriental, North Indian, South Indian, American and Italian. Fun City. Fun City, a prominent attraction of the mall, is a play area for children. Business chamber. The business chamber is the first such marketing space to be built inside a mall in India. The area of this zone is over of office space at prices intended to compete with  special economic zones and IT parks elsewhere in the city. Parking. The three-level basement parking is equipped to handle about 2,000 vehicles. EA Bot (Express Assistant). In April 2017, the center launched the customer assistant robot EA Bot in the mall at Royapettah. The autonomous robot uses image processing for its movement around the center atrium. EA Bot was developed in collaboration with a maker community in Chennai.