Speaking of neighborhood commerical district revitalization ... in DC

Newton Theater, Brookland, Washington, DC, late 1930s.

Someone wrote this on a local e-list as part of a much larger entry, which also discussed NYC:

I'd like to object to bringing all these large scale, upscale destination shopping ideas to our 12th Street. 12th Street was never an H Street, the old Tivoli in Columbia Heights was not on 12th Street. I'm NOT saying not to revitalize H and Columbia the way they are; I think that's fine. They historically were THE places to go: to shop, eat, cut a rug.

I wrote this:

I suggest, in offering your experience in NYC, that you read chapter 1 of Steve Belmont's Cities in Full which compares Minneapolis and parts of Manhattan in great detail, as he operationalizes with numbers the points made by Jane Jacobs in Death and Life of Great American Cities.

Anyway, my opinion, and that is all it is*, albeit an informed one, is that in 2007, things are somewhat different than they were in 1937, when the Newton Theater was first opened to the public, and when people went to the movies 3 times/week so that there was much more frequent visitation in the commercial district, there was no television nor computers nor video games nor I-pods, there was still an extant railroad station in Brookland plus streetcar service, and where there was no such thing as any suburban shopping center in the region. Hechts 2nd and 3rd stores at Parkington (now Ballston) and Silver Spring, were not built until 1947 and 1949 respectively. Tysons Corner was but fields. Same with Montgomery Mall or Arundel Mills or Bowie Town Center. Not the Alexandria commercial district, or Bethesda, [n.b. and Clarendon which I forgot to list] but otherwise, nothing much outside of the District in terms of significant centers for retail commerce.

(* I actually argue that this is "the G-d's truth" based on my analysis and interpretation but not everyone agrees...)

Note that the amount of retail space per capita has increased 400% since 1960 and that the U.S. population has increased only by 100% (roughly) during that time period. Furthermore, DC's population has decreased by approximately 200,000 in that time frame. (It had decreased further but has increased some over the past 10 years.)

When I first moved to DC 20 years ago, there were three remaining local department stores (this after the closures of many others), plus local clothing chains like Raleighs and Britches, plus local office supply stores like Jacobs-Gardner and Ginns, there were still some Hot Shoppes, etc. And that is just in the last 20 years... Starbucks wasn't here. Cosi didn't exist as a company. Olsson's is still around despite the rise of B&N and Borders, etc... And most of the banks in the city were still based here or in Maryland.

The retail environment is much different today, and it is regional-national in terms of the major stores and the property developers, and also digital as Internet-based and catalog commerce take increasingly large shares of retail categories once believed to be immune.

To not respond to that competitive reality is shortsighted. That doesn't mean build a regional mall, but it probably means that people want more options beyond say some carryouts for food. Myself, I greatly appreciate Tropicana's caribbean food and the fact that Pizza Boli delivers late into the night. However, such offerings do not satisfy every segment.

But having or wanting more and better retail offerings and amenities doesn't mean Bethesda or U Street or H Street, it means more and better retail offerings and amenities tailored for your competitive position and opportunities within the regional retail landscape.

Most people don't care one way or the other--even though virtually everyone I've ever talked to says that they want more and expanded retail options and that they would prefer to shop locally. However, the reality is that people will continue to shop where they are most likely to be satisfied most often and where they are comfortable.

There is the Reilly Law of Retail Attraction, which describes this mathematically, but the simplest explanation is with transportation costs being roughly equal, people choose to shop where they find more and better stores, and better selection. (It's why clustering or agglomeration within categories is important. People want to compare and consider before choosing to buy.)

The best way to think about this is where do you shop for most of your items in these categories: unprepared foods; prepared foods for consumption at home, meals out, entertainment (movie, concerts, plays, other), gifts, hardware, coffee and quick service, books, housewares, prescription drugs, gasoline, car services, bicycles, etc.?

I wanted to do this as an exercise as part of the Brookland planning study (people put dots on a map of where they most frequently purchase from various retail sectors) but we didn't get to do it. But such an exercise communicates visually how people shop...

Another thing to think about is that women make upwards of 80% of all retail transactions and that women shop where they feel comfortable, well served, and safe. (See this article about the topic; I have others about bicycling and the quality of the environment in Bryant Park in NYC that make the same point.)

Women are more conscious of cleanliness, particularly of restrooms, compared to men, and of safety. In the long term, commercial districts (and I am making this point generally) will not succeed where women do not feel comfortable shopping.

At the Farmers Market a few weeks ago, someone was talking to me, commenting that the house with double lot next to her was on the market for $900,000 and that the person buying it would be demanding more and higher quality retail amenities. I said that this kind of preference (comparable to "we deserve x or y") doesn't matter. That retailers are concerned with broader demographics and frankly, the numbers of people and households with disposable income, and the stage of the household and how that impacts purchasing behaviors--i.e., new households buy more stuff, families with children, especially new children but certain kinds of stuff, higher income households buy more luxury and high cost goods, etc.
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Without considering the regional retail landscape, neighborhood commercial district revitalization is not possible. End of story.

And you have to respond to current conditions, not how things were 50 years ago. That doesn't mean ignore history. Anyone who knows me knows that local history and urban history infuses my perspective and my recommendations.

But times change and you must reflect this. As it is, I wonder about my old-fogeyness and whether or not I can be properly responsive to the interests and needs of other demographics, the different ways they consume information, and process experiences etc.

I have a presentation about this kind of stuff, in terms of the broader questions. It's a presentation I am pretty proud of, and I show it around, including at Brookland Main Street committee meetings. It started as a presentation I gave to the Clarendon Alliance last December. And I am going to give it in Takoma/Takoma Park next month (see the listing in the Upcoming calendar in the right sidebar for details).

Newton Theater, 2007.

Plus just to be competitive within the neighborhood, 12th Street needs to think about its future--as new residential and commercial development is coming to Monroe Street south of Catholic University, on the Brookland subway station grounds, and along the railroad tracks north and south of the Metro. Not to mention new housing on the St. Paul College campus (EYA), a hotel at Irving and Monroe Streets, and the AFRH and McMillan Reservoir developments along North Capitol Street.

And it is the job of a Main Street program to help push forward this kind of thinking...