COMMERCE IN THE TIME OF CORONAVIRUS -- Part 14

Main Streets, Business Improvement Districts and Downtowns Lead the Way

Charles Marohn is the Founder and President of Strong Towns, a non-profit making communities across the United States and Canada financially strong and resilient, and the author of Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity.

“What the current crisis is exposing is not, as some commentators have suggested, some previously unknown flaw in the traditional development pattern that humans have used for thousands of years (and that has endured many infectious disease outbreaks). 

If anything, it is more likely to reveal the extreme fragility of the modern suburban experiment, and the financialized economy on which it depends,” said Marohn, an advocate of compact development.

The engineer and land planner, said when a local restaurant with a local landlord and a much more local supply chain cannot pay rent, it is in the interest of everyone involved to work it out. 

He said national chains that are announcing they cannot pay rent, “sets off a much more disruptive cascade of events that wipes out investors and jeopardizes bond markets.”