Parking garages at The Galleria are photographed in Houston, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026 .
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Parking garages at The Galleria are photographed in Houston, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026 .
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Parking garages at The Galleria are photographed in Houston, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026 .
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Parking garages at The Galleria are photographed in Houston, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026 .
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Parking garages at The Galleria are photographed in Houston, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026 .
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
New parking fees at the Galleria, Texas’ biggest mall, have some shoppers upset and annoyed that even if they just want to window-shop, it’s now going to cost them. But in the end, shoppers say all they can do is shrug their shoulders and live with the change.
Retail experts say the grumbling from shoppers will be worth it if the new revenue is used to make improvements at the Galleria.
“I guess if the mall is trying to make more money, then they know people are going to come here and they can just squeeze out a couple dollars,” Vidal Servellon, a shopper who came to the Galleria with a friend to buy a new pair of jeans, told the Chronicle Thursday.
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The Simon Property Group, which owns the mall, announced earlier this week that starting Nov. 2, shoppers will pay $2 for a four-hour stay; $5 for five to seven hours; and $25 for up to 24 hours.
The property group said this week the new parking fees will be part of a “modern parking system.” But it’s unclear how the new parking revenue will be used at the mall. A spokesperson for the Galleria and the Simon Property Group, the largest owner of malls in the U.S., didn’t return several emails seeking comment.
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The bet that Simon is making is that shoppers’ distaste for a new fee won’t put them off from visiting the Galleria, said Thomas McMillan, director of the Center for Retailing Innovation and an executive professor in marketing at Texas A&M University’s Mays Business School. The shopping center has more than 400 stores and claims to have 30 million visitors per year.
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Given the sheer number of people who visit the mall, there’s “an obvious opportunity” for its owner to earn revenue from parking infrastructure, McMillan said. The mall owners likely feel the charge is worth some grumbling if the company follows through by using the revenue to make improvements to the mall, he added.
“Shoppers are going to be a little bit upset because they’ve had free parking for a long time,” McMillan said. “Even a small charge to them will feel significant, especially if the experience doesn’t improve.”
The Simon Property Group reported $962.7 million in net income through the first six months of 2026, according to a quarterly report released in August.
The move to squeeze more money from mall-goers comes as malls appear to be reversing years of declining trends. In September, the Wall Street Journal reported that mall property values had jumped more than 13% in the last year.
“Clearly, malls, retail centers at large, are having a cultural moment,” Simon Property Group CEO Eli Simon said in an August earnings call. “People realize that they’re not going away.”
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McMillan, the Texas A&M professor, said there was a risk that a fee could deter people from going to the mall to window-shop. In retail, casual browsing often leads to future sales, he said.
But a fee might also make the mall less intimidating to some shoppers. A fee could open up parking spots and let determined shoppers complete their errands sooner.
“If the fee helps preserve spaces closer to customers’ destinations, it could mean less time circling and shorter walks through the garages, potentially helping visitors feel safer and more comfortable,” said Caroline Harrelson, strategy director at The Retail Coach, a retail recruitment and economic development firm.
News reports about crime in the Galleria area in recent years have occasionally prompted safety concerns about the mall. A Chronicle analysis in 2022, near the peak of the discourse about pandemic-era crime increases, found that incidents of violent crime at the Galleria were uncommon and usually numbered in the single digits per month.
Much more common were property crimes associated with retail businesses, including shoplifting and vehicle thefts. Simon Property’s public statements about the fee don’t specifically say it intended to invest in security features at the mall, and experts said that a nominal fee is unlikely to deter crime.
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“The fee itself does not prevent crime; any safety benefit depends on the security measures supporting it, including lighting, surveillance and patrols,” Harrelson said.
The news about the fee prompted some visitors to think about their future mall strategies.
Nicholas Webb, a Houston resident who came to the Galleria Thursday, viewed the new parking fee as a way for the company to make people more focused in their shopping.
“They’re basically making you shop purposefully instead of coming to the mall to hang out or to see whatever you want to see,” Webb said. “They want to capitalize on you being here for however long.”
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Webb and Shunta Williams, whom he was shopping with, had mixed feelings about the fee. Still, they didn’t anticipate the fee deterring them from coming.
“I don’t agree with it, but I guess it’s going to happen,” Williams said.