CHARLESTON — The downtown is dying because it is too popular.
Here I am, spending a couple of days in one of the Carolinas’ most picturesque and historically significant cities, and what I find on the front page of the local newspaper is a story that proves, once again, that as long as there are politicians and journalists, there will be major “problems” deserving of public-policy solutions.
Can downtown Charleston “survive”? the newspaper asked. “Trends threaten to drain life from heart of city,” the subhead warned.
But on this beautiful spring weekend, the historic downtown of Charleston, traditionally stretching south of Broad Street down to the Battery on the tip of the peninsula, was bustling. There were locals and tourists thronging Market Street, strolling past period homes and bed-and-breakfasts in amazement, pigging out on Lowcountry shrimp & grits, exploring antique shops and specialty stores, riding along in tour carriages behind well-bred horses, and buying frozen treats from a seemingly endless procession of what can only be described as Miss America finalists.
If this is a city that on the cusp of survival, with its life draining away, then I’d hate to see what people think of downtown Raleigh, Greensboro, or Charlotte on a late-April weekend.
The well-meaning folks quoted in the newspaper story about Charleston’s plight have found the proverbial dark lining in the silver cloud. What they are worried about is the lack of families living downtown with their children. Historic Charleston is such a popular destination that housing prices have been soaring. A relatively modest home south of Broad Street can cost upwards of a million dollars. You can understand why, because the mix of attractions, parks, restaurants, retail, and scenery would seem like paradise to many folks looking to retire or to buy that “perfect” home after the kids have grown up.
If you think about it, this section of Charleston combines many of the trendy concepts in local government and economic development right now: “Smart Growth” (houses are tightly packed and mixed use the norm), “heritage tourism” (if you don’t think historic Charleston is the epitome of a history-oriented tourist attraction, then we simply don’t speak the same language), and “historic preservation” (the city imposes a variety of strict codes to keep things looking like they do).
As it happens, this combination of amenities is clearly attractive to a significant clientele of current or potential homebuyers. As it also happens, they are not likely to have small children piled up in the back of the van headed to soccer practice or violin lessons. Most young families lack the income necessary to afford a home overlooking the Ashley or Cooper rivers (bonus points if you can guess the connection to the John Locke Foundation’s Monday luncheon club). And even if they did, they might not see the location as a practical one for their needs.
Growth activists should think carefully about what is going on in Charleston. I don’t really see what the big deal is — if young families live outside the downtown core but spend a lot of time visiting it, so be it — but those who see mixed-use, high density, and strict regulations on historic preservation and appearance as compatible with families and children are letting their dated dreams of a bygone era crowd out their common sense.
More generally, I was reminded that while I was headed to Charleston (to make a speech, or at least that was the excuse) a delegation of Raleigh-area officials was visiting Jacksonville, Florida to find out all the great things they were doing there that can be tried out back in the capital city. I welcome dynamic change and learning from others, but the more you travel the more you learn that pretty much every city’s downtown is “in trouble,” every place “lacks leadership,” every local political race is “too partisan and personal,” every community “needs better planning,” and so on.
Enough, already. City governments exist to perform basic public functions that cannot be performed by the residents themselves or in voluntary commerce, neighborhoods, and associations. They do not exist to develop land, decide a community’s industry mix, take money from movie-lovers to give to sports-lovers, or plan our lives for us. Otherwise, every “solution” will become another problem, the solving of which will cost us more money and more freedom.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and publisher of Carolina Journal.