The Myths that Challenge Us

Vital, active downtowns provide communities with a source of pride and a location for congregating socializing and dealing with community affairs. Towns without functioning downtowns become a collection of homes where people sleep, but who work, shop, socialize and seek entertainment elsewhere.

In many cases, common myths jeopardize constructive steps to revitalize. Myths include:

People should shop locally – for most merchants this is a hypocritical position since business owners rarely turn away non-local customers. And, concentrating on the “disloyalty” of local people diverts attention and energy away from the constructive task of learning about potential and current customers needs for services and products.

Lack of Parking is a Major Obstacle – while towns do need to provide adequate lighting, good signage and easy passage between street and business, the availability of parking is not the major reason malls and super stores have succeeded and downtowns have declined. According to downtown development consultant, Bert Stitt, “All the parking in the world will not by itself attract customers.”

Downtowns are made up of independent business people – while fiercely independent, main streets are usually populated by business owners that have put aside their individualism to work together for their shared interests. Cooperation, not independence, characterizes vital small town business districts. Examples include:

• coordination of store front restorations
• marketing strategies
• consistent hours of business
• pooling resources to afford consultants, renovations, employee training, and benefit programs

According to the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Main Street Approach model, revitalization involves the total image of downtown, based on a community’s uniqueness, historical preservation and a strong public and private local commitment. Underlying principles include:

• Downtown has declined over a long time and rebirth will also take time.
• A genuine public-private partnership must exist.
• Each community must commit it’s own time and resources to focus attention on downtown revitalization. No amount of outside dollars or technical assistance will create lasting improvement without a deep local commitment to the revitalization.
• Successful revitalization must be comprehensive, looking at all of the issues that contribute to decline.
• All efforts must be oriented to quality; downtown cannot be sold as a second-rate place to do business.
• Successful revitalization is action oriented. Planning is important, as are discussions, but these must lead to action to renew confidence.
• Effort must be made to change attitudes about downtown. Negative opinions must be turned around before positive change can occur.

A comprehensive strategy requires work in four areas:

Organization involves getting everyone working toward the same goal and assembling the resources – both financial and human – to implement revitalization program. A governing board and standing committees make up the fundamental organizational structure of the volunteer–driven program. Volunteers are coordinated and supported by a paid program director. This structure not only divides the workload and clearly delineates responsibilities, but also builds consensus and cooperation among the various stakeholders.

Promotion sells a positive image of the commercial district and encourages consumers and investors to live, work, shop, play and invest in the preservation area. By marketing a preservation area’s unique characteristics to residents, investors, business owners, and visitors, an effective promotional strategy forges a positive image through advertising, retail promotional activity, special events, and marketing campaigns carried out by local volunteers. These activities improve consumer and investor confidence in the effort and encourage commercial activity and investment in the revitalization.

Design means getting the preservation area into top physical shape. Capitalizing on its best assets – such as historic buildings and pedestrian–oriented streets – is just part of the story. An inviting atmosphere, created through attractive window displays, parking areas, building improvements, street furniture, signs, sidewalks, street lights, and landscaping, conveys a positive visual message about the commercial district and what it has to offer. Design activities also include instilling good maintenance practices in the commercial district, enhancing the physical appearance of the commercial district by rehabilitating historic buildings, encouraging appropriate new construction, developing sensitive design management systems, and long-term planning.

Economic Restructuring strengthens a community’s existing economic assets while expanding and diversifying its economic base. The revitalization program helps sharpen the competitiveness of existing business owners and recruits compatible new businesses and new economic uses to build a commercial district that responds to today’s consumers’ needs. Converting unused or underused commercial space into economically productive property also helps boost the profitability of the area.

The Main Street Approach points out that coincidentally, the four points outlined above correspond with the four forces of real estate value, which are social, political, physical, and economic.