Independent Hampden Pt II

Well, since I wrote that first pre-rant, I've talked to a lot more people that actually live in Hampden, gotten a number of very thoughtful comments (including the one from Benn Ray), and have done virtually no follow-up research, because I've been busy, OK?

Anyway. Here's my take on the original article.

The first couple paragraphs are about how much the Avenue and Hampden have changed since 2001, and how much more vibrant they both are now than they were. This I have never disputed; I've watched it happen, although never as a resident, since the early '90s. What I have disputed is the unquestioning manner in which this is seen as an absolute good; while I think it IS a good, overall, any process of rehabilitation necessarily displaces those that could not afford to move away during the decline. Sometimes it compensates them for their patience and they can finally get to live somewhere pleasant, and sometimes they have no stake, and are therefore just kicked out. In either case, the biggest concern is that the character of the area is basically guaranteed to change. Again, I believe this is a good thing in Hampden, because the character of the area used to be pretty much desolation and poverty. That doesn't mean I like cutesy faux nostalgia for the working class and handmade goods, but given the alternative, I certainly prefer it.

When a compact area becomes successful in this manner, however, eventually the bigger players will take notice, and the prospect of chains (or simply better-heeled entrepreneurs) considering moving in is very real. What I am putting forth, as a nearly objective party (ie: an occasional Hampden visitor/customer, not a tenant, business owner, or property owner), is that progress hardly ever pleases all those affected. For those that love the predictability of chains, seeing a few national chains on the prowl is a sign of hope, not terror. For those that have lived in Hampden for decades, the chains may be no better nor worse than the current crop of non-residents moving in and changing things. Again, on balance, I prefer smaller businesses, I prefer landlords that are more interested in what their tenants contribute to the community than in whether they can handle a rent increase, and I prefer residents that shop responsibly and not solely for convenience.

But you know what? I don't get to decide how people live their lives, and I wouldn't want to, anyway; for every case of a greedy landlord shafting his tenants for a small profit bump, there's one who is raising the rent to save up for lead abatement. I do feel for those who would get pinched by rising rents, but I also feel for those who wanted their neighborhoods to remain the way they were. Making an effort to understand others doesn't mean you have to agree with them, it simply means you're trying to get the facts.

When I first read the article, this sort of passage was the sort of thing I most viscerally responded to:

The storefronts, for the most part, are populated by local entrepreneurial endeavors as opposed to national chain stores that are the hallmark of many successful urban neighborhoods—there are no Starbucks Coffees, no Barnes and Noble Booksellers, no Panera Breads. And some of the street’s merchants, including Ray and Whang, are trying to ensure that it stays that way.

See, the problem is not that Ray and Whang are trying to ensure that it stays that way, it's that these are not the sort of businesses that are looking at The Avenue. Barnes and Noble, for one, will never open another store that is less than 25-30,000 square feet, which I suspect is bigger than most of the Avenue. Starbucks could fit themselves in, but why bother, when they could go somewhere closer to a main street and a reliable customer base. If Starbucks were to go in on the Avenue, it would be because they were wanted. Regardless of Benn's personal (and somewhat overstated) dislike of Starbucks' signature roasting style, plenty of people like it, and they don't do so just to piss off smaller roasters. When it was announced that Starbucks' coffee was going to available in the new break room at my work, everyone cheered; this is not to say that no one there doesn't like it, just that plenty of people do. If you can envision someone that prefers a darker roast (like, say, me) then you should be able to envision someone that enjoys Starbucks. Griping about their style doesn't really gain much of anything; it's personal preference, and by implying that it is unacceptable, one insults the personal taste of everyone that likes it. Oh yeah, and Panera won't go in there, either.

Next up is the idea that San Francisco's code that requires any company with more than 10 locations to get special permission (although permission from who, it does not say; Benn has gone into more detail on his site); it's been my experience that community involvement does not necessarily effectively involve the community, although this is a separate problem for which I have no solution; you can't force people to vote, and you can't always accomodate everyone's schedules to solicit feedback. I don't necessarily think this is a bad plan; any time community involvement is advocated, I support it, because actually involving a diverse sample of the community would be great. I just think we need to be cognizant of the reason why representative democracy is a good idea, is all. Also, the 11+ restriction is necessarily arbitrary, as is Benn's 16+ restriction. Both run the risk of seeming deliberately selected to keep certain companies out and grandfather in companies that might reasonably be excluded (I am referring to things like Royal Farms and Bank of America here). More importantly, what happens when Starbucks comes up for discussion and everyone votes it in? Is that the end of it?

Quizno's is next mentioned; I have lived on both sides of the Read/Chase/Park/Howard intersection, where a Quizno's has recently gone in. The intersection is very busy and difficult to cross at rush hour. What's more, most residences are several blocks away, and the surrounding streets are uninviting to pedestrians. Across Howard is Maryland General Hospital, which presents a blocks-long blank wall to the sidewalk. On the same side of Howard is Antique Row, which is often mostly closed. Before the Quizno's, there were long periods of vacancy, and for many months there was a hair salon. I don't know exactly when or why it closed, but it's not unforgiveable to assume it was due to lack of business. A lunch/dinner sandwich store is the IDEAL tenant for a place like this, and given the inherent riskiness of the location, a franchise of a national chain is about the only sort of business that can contemplate taking it on. The idea that people who want to patronize chains should "go to the mall" is abhorrent to me. Frankly, NO ONE should go to the mall. Our culture should reject malls, and strip malls, and big box plazas, and should stop patronizing shitty places just because they're cheaper or easier. But it's not going to happen unless we are realistic about WHY it happens, and about what is appealing to people about these places, which is, in a word, convenience. Never mind the fact that spending hours driving to and around malls for parking is anything but convenient, never mind that big box stores achieve their low prices by fucking their employees and gutting the American manufacturing industry, never mind that strip malls are hideous and awkward, PEOPLE GO TO THEM ALL THE TIME. People buy houses to live near them, people are overjoyed when new ones are built, and people do their best to ignore any reasonable thought that might make them feel guilty about going to them.

This segues nicely into another observation of mine, which is that smug superior consumer choices are the province of the well-off. If you have the money and the reliable car and the free time and the daycare and whatever else you need to toodle up to Towson and go to Trader Joes and buy your organic nut clusters that you could easily have bought at the organic grocery on Preston Street in Mount Vernon, fine. Most people don't. Don't get me started on freakin' Wegman's in Hunt Valley, either. Here's the thing: poor people don't get to make these choices, and people who CAN make these choices need to understand that. This is all I'm saying. The problem with democracy is that people only hear the part about their ideas being represented; they conveniently ignore the part about trying to do what's best for society as a whole, because that sometimes requires putting the community's needs ahead of yours, and sometimes requires putting the needs of those not at the table, on the table.

Look, I'm not saying I want every store on 36th street to be replaced by its chain equivalent, I'm just saying everyone needs to stop being so defensive and selfish and to stop rationalizing so hard that their heads explode. I find that I've kind of lost the will to rehash this particular issue any further, because I don't feel like anyone's really listening. If we're going to talk about something useful, it needs to involve a real issue, it needs to involve everyone affected, at least in theory, and it needs to be considered within the larger framework of the city and the state. The best thing I've ever heard planned by the State of Maryland was the greater Baltimore Region Transit Plan, which would accept the fact that people like malls, and would use the malls as anchors for radial transit lines from Security to Golden Ring via Canton and Fells Point, from White Marsh and Hunt Valley and Owings Mills through downtown to Arundel Mills, and so on. As you can see from the map, it's been pretty well scaled back under Ehrlich, who is much more interested in bulldozing a road from 29 to 270. But this is the sort of thing we need to be doing, not squabbling over four more-or-less fully developed blocks of Hampden. If you start from the position that people like chains, and that you don't want them displacing businesses on 36th street, then think of an underdeveloped part of the surrounding area and propose that they go there. People respond to deals that benefit them, much less so to deals which benefit only those proposing them.

I very much support Benn's right to pursue his plan, and I am always impressed by someone who has the follow-through to be that active. I just wish he and others like him would take on issues that could really accomplish something important. I mean no offense at all by suggesting that Independent Hampden isn't important; I think that Atomic Books and the other successful businesses have accomplished something to be proud of, and I think that they will continue to be successful. If they're not, however, it will be because no one has made any effort to integrate what they've accomplished into the surroundings and into the city as a whole. And that would be a shame.