Rockville Town Square Featured By Reuters
Aug 3, 2010 13:57 - 2 Comments
Town Square fountain (photo by Eric Jensen)
A number of Rockville Central readers have shared a terrific Reuters piece that takes a close look at Rockville Town Square in the context of the “smart growth” movement:
[S]ome experts in the real estate business believe that in the future, more and more of us will be going back to places like the revamped Rockville — quite happily, in fact. . . .
15 years ago, Rockville convened hearings and forums to discuss its lackluster downtown, deciding in the end to replace it with a town square lined with shops, restaurants and apartments, all steps away from a subway station. . . .
The citizenry wanted vibrant street life both for the fun of it, and to attract business. So far, it’s worked. . . . Rockville’s renaissance over the past four years shows how the shift toward urban-style living has reached the suburbs. And urban planners insist the trend has legs.
Dubbed “smart growth,” the movement favors the development of a mix of housing and businesses in and near existing cities. At the same time, it discourages the Topsy-like growth of peripheral suburbs, known disparagingly as “sprawl.”
Go here to read the whole piece. Whatever your view of smart growth, the article is quite interesting.
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Jim Chung of Reach Advisors, quoted in the Reuters piece, did a great deal of work for my former employer, the American Association of Museums. I think very highly of his stuff.
A better version of the article can be found here:
http://graphics.thomsonreuters.com/F/07/Rockville.pdf
And a great study on the tax revenue advantages of New Urban designs like RTS can be found here:
http://citiwire.net/post/2133/
The charts are really eye-opening:
https://www.box.net/shared/o4a47iy5th