I visited Downtown Palm Beach Gardens to see an art festival this past Sunday, where I took the photograph above. And granted, it does indeed function as a downtown, with shops and restaurants and beautiful landscaping, but let's call it what it is - it is an outdoor shopping mall, a center for retail and entertainment that has been around for over 70 years. Back in the 1960s, our extended family moved en masse to the Southern Suburbs of Chicago (land of the Pope!), and my grandparents on my mother's side moved to a townhouse in Park Forest, the centerpiece of which was Park Forest Plaza, a shopping center built in 1949. For many years, it was the only shopping center in the area, and so I spent a lot of time there. Park Forest Plaza also functioned like a downtown for that suburb, but nobody referred to it as downtown. It was what it was. In any case, Downtown Palm Beach Gardens seems to be a very popular, vibrant, and pleasant place to spend time, and so I guess they can call it whatever they want. But I grew up in Chicago, and back there, there is no doubt about what downtown looks like.
No comments:
Post a Comment