Quote:
Originally Posted by ardecila
I'm sure the State Street interests fretted when Mag Mile exploded after WW2. But they were right to do so! The next few decades were indeed a dark time for State, with porno theaters and wig shops replacing the movie palaces and fine shopping/dining that used to be there, and crime spiking. Not a place you wanted to hang out at night... It didn't start to rebound as a theatre district and a mid-market shopping area until the 90s.
The speed of change today is concerning too. The rise of Mag Mile took 50 years. Fulton Market has taken only 10. What is the city's holistic strategy for downtown? It needs to have one, that addresses growth in Fulton Market AND the future of older areas like the Loop and Mag Mile without letting runaway speculation create a vacuum in those areas. The city's last plan, the Central Area Plan, was created in 2003 and last updated in 2009. Nowhere did it even anticipate the growth of Fulton Market as a new hub for office, retail, or residential.
Our situation is not really comparable to other cities either. We finally posted a slight growth in 2020 census, but if you take off the booster glasses, the best you can say is that our population is stagnant. To some extent the physical growth can be supported by a dramatic rise in incomes, but other aspects of urban growth really do require an increase in warm bodies. So what does that mean for downtown? Are we building a downtown that's too big for our population to support, and if so, will all the resulting vacancies, or less-intense land uses, erode the hustle/bustle and vitality?
|
I don't see the comparison.
State St decline was due to suburbanization and the city's overall decline.
Mag Mile was a touted shopping district that would cater to surburbanites who wanted a clean, safe place to shop and where they could park their cars. Prior to the 2000s, River North and Streeterville were
full of parking lots where all those beige towers are now.
Today, the city isn't in overall decline. The downtown area is growing fast, in a way that never happened in the latter 20th century. So there is opportunity to grow or sustain 2 districts.
Also, Mag Mile and West Loop aren't necessarily competing in the same space. Mag Mile is flagship retail. West Loop/Fulton is boutique and bar/restaurant oriented.
I don't see Fulton or Randolph suddenly becoming a
new Mag Mile. It's not even trying to be. It's more mixed up and eclectic, whereas Mag Mile is truly a devoted shopping boulevard, through and through, the way State St was. That's why Mag Mile usurped State St.
But again, I don't envision the same thing happening here...