Commercial decline isn't just a zoning/urbanism problem, it is also a governance problem. The cities that figure this out will be able to do everything else, and the ones that don't, won't.
I remember covering the opening of Pittsburgh Mills when it first opened more than 20 years ago, a project doomed to fail the day it opened. (A pink Lucky Strike bowling pin sent to me as a silly PR ploy sits on my shelf…the bowling alley crapped out soon after opening.) I did a story about how the township government decided to establish itself as a tenant within the mall itself: town hall in the mall. It was and is a pretty tiny community that only had a nominal physical presence before anyway and a staff of only a handful of people. Seems like a bit of a metaphor for everything you’ve explored in this generously comprehensive piece.
everything you wrote about here makes my DAMN BLOOD BOIL every day of my life. it's so transparently obvious what to do to improve life for everyone in cities and our systems ensure that's systematically impossible.
I remember covering the opening of Pittsburgh Mills when it first opened more than 20 years ago, a project doomed to fail the day it opened. (A pink Lucky Strike bowling pin sent to me as a silly PR ploy sits on my shelf…the bowling alley crapped out soon after opening.) I did a story about how the township government decided to establish itself as a tenant within the mall itself: town hall in the mall. It was and is a pretty tiny community that only had a nominal physical presence before anyway and a staff of only a handful of people. Seems like a bit of a metaphor for everything you’ve explored in this generously comprehensive piece.
In the appendix your link for Japan's Cabinet office for Urban Revitalization is broken. I think it should be this: https://www.chisou.go.jp/sousei/index.html
everything you wrote about here makes my DAMN BLOOD BOIL every day of my life. it's so transparently obvious what to do to improve life for everyone in cities and our systems ensure that's systematically impossible.