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Wilmington, DE built its Market Street pedestrian mall in the mid-70's and tore it up (made it 2-way driveable again) around 1990. Cumberland, MD is tearing up its Baltimore Street mall. I mentioned both on https://www.city-data.com/forum/mary...os-cons-2.html .
What happened to outdoor downtown pedestrian malls in the USA? I know they've always been big in Europe but in the States (dunno about Canada), meh.
Unless you're in NYC people in the US don't like to shop and then schlep their bags of purchases on a bike or on foot. It's usually too far and too inconvenient for most. Most want to drive and conveniently park. Even smaller cities in the US have given up on the pedestrian mall.
Why in the kittens would I want to walk in the rain, sleet, snow, the heat and humidity of summer, be forced into inefficient linear navigation, only to be panhandled by every low life loser in existence every 15 feet? Because that is what pedestrian malls amount to.
Give me a nice heated and air conditioned enclosed mall that limits my exposure to the dregs of society, allows me to navigate efficiently in 3 dimensions, and has a nice current directory of shops and stores that allows me to effectively plan my shopping excursion. If I want I can enjoy a soda without some annoying pigeon bothering me or some alleged homeless person asking me for change.
Pedestrian malls are for bunch of bicycling woke losers who can't tell if somebody is attracted to them and develop a series of unfulfilled crushes because they are too afraid to interact with people through some other than an app on their smart phone or some elderly hippies trying to relive the 60s and 70s. So yeah, in Ashville NC.
Last edited by PossumMan; 11-05-2023 at 08:44 PM..
One example I can think of is Church Street in Burlington, VT. It use to be very nice, but now it's not a very pleasant place to be. A lot of the high end stores have bounced because of the crime and homeless issues in downtown Burlington.
I like the concept, but it's not very convenient for everyday life in a car crazy country. At least in the majority of US cities.
Yeah, well, let's compare, say, London vs. Boston or Phoenix.
Winter: London is oh so cold at 40F with fog. Meantime, in Boston they've just finished clearing 2 feet of snow from the latest noreaster and the high for today will be 7F. But that's OK, tomorrow they're forecasting another foot. And winds from 20-40 mph.
Summer: London's having an 'orrible heat wave at 80F. Meantime, in Phoenix, temps at ground level are rapidly approaching the temp of the sun's surface, and there's no shade.
Where would you like to walk around outdoors, and where would you really really prefer to be inside a big building with HVAC?
Very few Western Europeans have even the faintest CLUE about what weather extremes in the US consist of.
My impression of the pedestrian mall is that it was a fad in the 70s, a last ditch effort to save what was left of the traditional downtown shopping district, by restricting access by cars, and making them more like the newly popular indoor malls, at the time. People obviously weren't ready for that, and they generally didn't work.
It seems like a slightly altered concept is becoming popular again, but geared more toward outdoor dining and entertainment, and not blocking automobile access to major thoroughfares. Cleveland's popular E. 4th Street comes to mind. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_4...eet_(Cleveland)
Give me a nice heated and air conditioned enclosed mall that limits my exposure to the dregs of society [including] some alleged homeless person asking me for change.
C-D'ers, do European pedestrian malls act as magnets for panhandlers and other bums?
One example I can think of is Church Street in Burlington, VT. It use to be very nice, but now it's not a very pleasant place to be. A lot of the high end stores have bounced because of the crime and homeless issues in downtown Burlington.
I like the concept, but it's not very convenient for everyday life in a car crazy country. At least in the majority of US cities.
Ithaca NY also has the Ithaca Commons in its Downtown. Kalamazoo MI and Jay Street in Schenectady NY also come to mind.
C-D'ers, do European pedestrian malls act as magnets for panhandlers and other bums?
The one great thing about the pedestrian commercial zones (they are not really "malls") in many cities in Europe is there are often excellent street musicians (aka "buskers") that perform. In the nice weather season, restaurants and cafes put out the tables and chairs and they fill up with people during the day and evening. If you are in Dresden, Germany you might luck out and pass by Vince Van Hessen busking in the old town, maybe in front of the statue of Martin Luther where I first heard him over 5 years ago.
C-D'ers, do European pedestrian malls act as magnets for panhandlers and other bums?
They absolutely do. Sure, there's street musicians, too. But definitely beggars and bums too. Groups of teenage runaways and junkies. It was a common sight even 20-30 years ago in the big cities. And those 'pedestrian malls' tend to be built around big department stores, movie theaters and the like, so beggars (and pickpockets) know there'd be lots of people with cash (Europeans much more likely at this point to carry cash than Americans as the credit card lifestyle hasn't really taken over to the same extent in general).
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