I had this thought while I was walking downtown pondering the feelings of those who feel the downtown doesn't cater to residents.
Did the downtown abandon residents? Or did residents abandon the downtown first?
Think about it. The entire urban renewal project grew from the motivation to renew a stagnant and dying downtown. I didn't live here at the time, so locals can call me on any misrepresentation.
But local legend and works like the Port In Progress series leave little doubt that local leaders felt the downtown needed fixing. In fact, they were prepared to tear down the downtown in order to save it.
Some might argue that's what the HUD dollars did anyway. But I don' think anyone can really argue that our downtown is a vibrant part of the city. Yes, a good deal of that life is instilled by visitors, but so what. The place has a nice hum.
I drove recently through downtown Malden on Saturday. The storefronts were filled by many of the shops we claim to want on State and Pleasant Streets. But I'll be honest, the downtown was desolate. Those shops closed up, and the people went somewhere else. Hell, maybe some of them came to Newburyport.
I came away realizing I really do like our downtown. Yes, I agree with folks who responded to the poll recently. We could use a few more shops selling our daily needs. But downtowns are living entities that evolve to fit the needs of its customers. If rising gas prices truly force residents to consider shopping closer to home, those businesses will come.
Just as those businesses left when we all began to turn to shopping malls.
6 comments:
Tom,
Chuck Lagasse has addressed this several times. This was the theme many of our interviews revolved around. As he pointed out, if the downtown had little grocery stores, drug stores or stores that carry the things people go to megastores for, for the most part, they would not use them.
The Beineke/Lagasse philosophy was that people will go to big grocery stores or pharmacies or megastores or malls for the convenience of being able to get everything at one-stop shopping or to save money.
I think downtowns like Malden's prove that.
To keep the downtown alive in the era of big box stores Beineke and Lagasse felt the way to do that was with speciality stores.
It appears they were correct.
That being said, they always craved small downtown specialty grocery stores like you might find on Charles Street in Boston. They felt such stores would make it easier and more attracive to have a vibrant downtown people lived in as well as worked in.
All this comes with the price of change be it good or bad.
Listening to Sgt. Peter Finnegan of the NPD tell it one day, he hates the new downtown because it's not the downtown he grew up with. He wants those old shops back but even admitted he'd still probably shop at WalMart or Target or Home Depot.
I love downtown as well. It's not perfect, but as you pointed out it seems to be a lot better than it was thirty years ago. It's historic vibe and great architecture really make it stand out. I was just thinking about how much money I spend downtown myself. I rent office space, I buy coffee almost every day, frequent the restaurants, buy greeting cards, and too much Gram's Ice Cream. I'm doing my share to keep downtown buzzing!
One way to make downtown more livable is to literally have more people living there by encouraging new residential units above stores, maybe short term rentals like on Market St., or even new mid-rise construction condos or rentals on streets at the edges of downtown, etc.
I'm guessing a hundred or so more people living in downtown might make a real difference especially in the winter months to the activity of stores whose product mix would shift to cater to them.
But Tom, Charles St. also has a pharmacy, a dry cleaners and a laundramat (not to mention a dozen or so antique shops). I don't even know where there's a dry cleaner in Newburyport. And that's a wealthy neighborhood, not the whole city.
An enduring presence in downtown Malden is the CVS (if it's still there) - and the McDonald's. And a dozen or so nail and/or hair salons.
They have the same battles there as we do here, only without the Karp factor.
Anonymous, Malden has all that, and more. There are apts. above the storefronts and a huge apt. building across the street from the T station (which has a waiting list).
I frequent the locally owned Dry Cleaners to the right of Shaws.
Thanks! but you have to drive to all those places (I have to anyway). If you're talking Boston/Charles St., I did not have to own a car the entire 20 years I lived there. I mean, all those types of places were within walking distance. The city is set up to direct resident customers out of downtown. I'm assuming that was deliberate.
Look at the main street of Melrose: restaurants, drugstore(s), coffee places, dry cleaners - everything in 2 or 3 blocks, with a nice free parking lot behind it all, out of sight.
And the Square One Mall is only a few miles down the road. How does Melrose do it?
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