News

Most downtowns are built for commuters rather than residents. They forced out residents in favor of building higher cost commercial real estate. What residential buildings there is targets only the highest incomes. No surprise they are struggling.

We have a dramatic shortage of residential property. We have a dramatic oversupply of commercial property. IF ONLY THERE WAS A SOLUTION

After moving from the US to Europe there is something magical about walking around the city and town centers here. Not just the tourist traps like Rome and Paris but smaller towns and villages with tiny narrow streets lined with shops and restaurants and people walking around. So much better than the souless shells our downtowns have become in the US.

The 8000th "Covid killed cities" article, just shifting the goalposts and jumping around to different cities with different metrics out of context to make it seem worse than it is.

Makes sense. Downtowns are commercial districts with few, if any, residential buildings. Restaurants exist there to feed the various workers. Workers will shop after work or bring family/friends/dates to the area because it's something they know or are familiar with.

With WFH, no one has a reason to go to downtown. Cost of living increases already make them think twice about doing so.

All in all, we're seeing a shift from specifically zoned districts to mixed use downtowns. This means smaller stores, more walkable or mass transit focus. These cities will just need to incentivize conversion of these downtowns to include more residential structures.

Decades of rebuilding downtowns to accommodate vehicle traffic and commuters is the problem.

• people commuting from the Styx often do not reside within the same county they work in. County/City budget revenues decreased
• even if those residents happen to live in the same county or municipal area, cities were rebuilt to accommodate vehicle traffic. Highways cutting through urban cores. Areas where people once lived are replaced with parking lots/garages.
• city budgets further decimated by having to increase coverage of services (water, electric, sewage, …). Increased coverage requirement means new infrastructure. New infrastructure means more maintenance cost as the years progress. Also, first responders often stretched. Cities struggle to hire the correct amount of people to cover area
• poorly zoned cities with single use zoning are largely to blame as well. Many cities have dedicated commercial or residential only zones. Thus creating this strong coupling on vehicle commuters to come to office, spend money on lunch, then fuck off back to their shitty suburban home. If cities rezoned and allowed for more diverse zoning (mixed use, higher density). The problem of businesses that relied on commuters becomes a non-issue since that is largely replaced by walkin traffic.
• poorly designed cities replacing walkability with “vehicle accessibility”. This means the city has to maintain expensive road infrastructure. Also makes it very difficult to consider alternative forms of transportation to get to/from restaurants, entertainment, general living, grocery store.

Could probably use some more stadiums and parking lots.

That'll perk things up.

I can't afford food for myself, and every day gets worse and worse, I'm sure I'm not alone, this is what happens when you let the working class go so far down the hole all they can afford to do is work and sleep.

I have a strong hatred for how many storefronts are taken up by "antique shops" (i.e. dusty warehouses full of junk you couldn't give away) instead of actual businesses in the last two small towns I lived in. Makes it so you can't really get that much shopping done downtown.

Wait, is this another trick to make me go back to the office?

I use to go downtown somewhat often, but I don't have the money to do it these days.

In my small town (15K) in MA, we call it "uptown" and it's doing great!

Small theater with plenty of live events. Well used library. New brewpub in the old fire house. New sushi joint. Brand new ice cream shop. Small, but, functional dessert bakery, Pho shop, and soon a new butcher/seafood shop.

Throw in other restaurants, pizza joints, barber, salon, liquor store.

Plenty of people living right there also. It's a very successful New England "village". There's even a really nice band stand on the center park where they have all types of activities. Free concerts every Thursday night during Summer and Christmas caroling the Thursday before Christmas.

One of the most-striking experiences of my regional metro core's death throes was needing to pee but my train was delayed. Tried walking across the way to the local train station to use their facilities but the security guy they'd hired to keep the homeless out about fought me to keep me from using the restroom.

If you wonder why your city streets and transit zones smell like piss, it's because when you lock up your bathrooms to keep the homeless people away, they'll piss on your street

Poorly planned cities no surprises there.

How the fuck does this article define "downtown"? Can't find an explanation in it.