[nunez]

1000%.

Go to basically any downtown in any city that isn't one of the big ones. All of the buildings, street art, and street grid are frozen in the 70s, 80s, or 90s.

All of the "action" (if you can call it that) is either in a suburban town square (that's mostly an outdoor mall) or spread out throughout neighborhoods in the suburbs. And you can bet your ass you'll need a car to get to them.

Between COVID having decimated downtown small business and the push into the metaverse, things do not look good for town squares in general. I would love to see the resurgence of walkable suburbs that are small and self-supporting, but it seems like the general "we" wants bigger houses, more chains and more isolation.

[chrisco255]

This has been true for decades though, decades before Covid, shopping malls drew retail traffic away from downtowns followed by the growth of big box stores like Wal-Mart. Now, online competition from Amazon and ecommerce has put many malls on life support.