Mall magnate Scott Congel wants to put the Medley Centre name to bed. His SRC Development firm is now calling the Medley Centre, previously Irondequoit Mall, Lakeridge Centre.

The name change is part of a rebranding effort, says SRC spokesperson Jim LeBeau.

The SRC folks were in front of Rochester Broadway Theatre League representatives this morning to pitch their idea to make performing arts center part of the Lakeridge Centre redevelopment project. The plan is to convert the dead mall into a mix of hotel, convention, office, residential, restaurant, retail, and entertainment space.

SRC's basic pitch wasn't terribly different from the four others that RBTL has heard. The presenters played up the site's proximity to the Route 104 expressway and Ridge Road. The site has 1 million square feet of built space, the infrastructure to support substantial development, and the proper zoning and approvals are in place, said Carmen Spinoza, SRC's president.

"It's very accessible to the entire market," he said.

The theater would have its own entrance off of East Ridge Road, but patrons who enter Lakeridge Centre from Route 104 would easily be able to drive through the development to the theater, Spinoza said. The development will have surface parking as well as covered parking decks.

The theater that SRC pitched was modeled after the Durham Performing Arts Center in Durham, North Carolina.

As has been the case with the other proposals, the developer and the site-selection committee went behind closed doors to talk about the financial aspects of the proposal.