Big stores and little downtowns

Some cities will probably always be viable.  New York, Chicago, San Francisco and cities like New Orleans are all looking pretty good, and probably always will.  Places like Boulder will probably always be pretty cool too.  But smaller, older, industrial cities are in the dumpster, aren’t they?

We drove through the Midwest a while ago and I was saddened by the state of older industrial cities.  And I realized they all have a few things in common; an empty factory or two, sprawl, and giant mega-stores just outside the city.

I don’t have a solution for the empty factories, that’s for someone smarter.

But people are still there and they still shop, don’t they?  Just not downtown.

Very sad.

Sprawl and giant stores didn’t just kill the little stores; they killed the little downtowns.

Those wonderful downtowns with their individual little shops, actual people buzzing up and down the sidewalks, and a sense of energy all seem to be gone.

Now we seem to be mostly a nation of sprawling suburbs, don’t we?

We don’t see a lot of people buzzing around those suburbs, do we?  Except in their cars, because it’s too far to walk to anything.

It’s sad, but I guess it isn’t terrible.

It’s visually boring, but not terrible.

For the struggling industrial cities the solution is as simple as it is impossible: A Wal-Mart, a Kmart and a Target in their once thriving little downtowns.

But that’s never gonna happen.

And that seems pretty close to terrible.