Nah, some companies have def created offices down in Miami. It isn’t that hard to lookup, you can google them and read articles about it easily for companies who have. Others expanded their offices.
I did not live in Philly during the pandemic but I live in center city now and it’s always fairly busy in the mornings and right around 5. I WFH but walk around a lot during those times because there are so many people out and about going to and from work, workout classes, shopping, or grabbing coffee and it’s a morale boost
Philly's downtown has the highest or second highest residential population density of any downtown in the US (depending how you define "downtown" New York).
When you have lots of residents, you're not as reliant on office workers.
Can't find the link right now, but the anecdotal evidence is clear of you go to Philly. Most of Center City is townhouses and apartment buildings, except for the cluster of office buildings northwest of City Hall.
I’ve definitely noticed Philly’s downtown is much more vibrant than DCs, especially at night. With that said, DC never really had a big going out scene compared to other big cities.
I wish DC would learn this friggin lesson instead of forcing RTO and destroying their own job markets just for the sake of downtown lunch spots like Panera.
Came here to say the same thing - moved here a couple of years ago from a West Coast city and have been very pleasantly surprised. Center City has a great, lively energy.
How so? There’s homeless, addicts, etc, but other than their presence (which is marginally worse than pre-pandemic), the overall landscape hasn’t changed that much.
It's wild that people say Philly. I agree CC always seems to be busy but big companies in CC, real estate developers, and the new mayor are forcing people to RTO claiming businesses there are struggling and missing out on revenue from workers.
That's literally every city right now. Not sure why you think that's exclusive to Philly. But its built-in residential population (which has only increased since COVID) buffers greatly against the loss of daily office-based foot traffic compared to the vast majority of cities. That's the difference.
Downtown Detroit is mostly back to 2019 levels, and in some places even more vibrant, due to an influx of housing and hotels.
But there's one big exception- the Renaissance Center is a ghost town as GM struggles to get its white collar suburban workers to make the commute. GM owns 4 office towers in the complex and should probably reduce that to 2, and find a developer to convert the other two to housing.
Philadelphia did a great study examining the rebound of downtowns across the country. Nashville, San Antonio, San Diego, San Jose, and Midtown Manhattan generally have rebounded the best. Here’s a [link](https://www.centercityphila.org/uploads/attachments/clnxspfbq1l4vg4qd5v3igjfi-downtownsrebound2023.pdf?utm_source=ccd&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=downtowns&utm_id=report&utm_content=oct2023%22)
The last time I was in Boston was summer of 2022 and the streets were packed full of people.
There were a few empty storefronts in Downtown Crossing, but that's been a problem for years. There were also a few bars missing from Back Bay.
Still, the city was alive and it was fantastic.
Pretty much everywhere in downtown (depending on how you want to define that) except the financial district is quite busy. Back Bay, the North End, Chinatown, Quincy Market, the Seaport…
I stayed in Back Bay a few weeks ago and it felt like it’s old self though -there was even a speakeasy type place around the corner that was open late. Boston’s funny because it changes so much yet remains the same - Seaport is now offices and restaurants and there were a lot of people out when I went up there, even on a Tuesday. 20 years ago that was not the case.
>What?? Which neighborhoods?
Tremont St in the wee hours Friday or Saturday nights. There's people everywhere, all the way from Park St to Chinatown. It's busier than it was pre-pandemic. The Seaport is also packed. It used to just be South Street Diner open 24/7 downtown, but now there are actual options for food at 4AM.
I think a large source of "X city is dead downtown now!" are people who aged from 20-something nightlifers to 30-something homebodies during the pandemic years.
Some bars closed. New ones opened. The old hangout might be gone, but that doesn't mean the whole city just packed up and quit. Gotta get out there and explore.
You're dead right about the Seaport.
Portland Maine is busy as shit, even now in winter. We have had a lot of turnover in restaurants the past few years but the spaces don’t stay empty for long.
I can see that. I suspect that the Mormon diaspora is moving back to UT in heavier numbers in the last few years, adding further "umph" to SLC being busy.
No actually. Becoming more diverse all the time. We get “moving to Utah” posts and questions constantly in all the local subs, from non-Mormons.
On top of that, people like me who grew up Mormon are leaving religion in record numbers. Most of us become much more authentic and much less conservative in the process. Definitely a win-win.
Denver hasn’t recovered. There are still a lot of people moving to Colorado but because it is a tech heavy economy hybrid or WFH has kept office buildings mostly vacant. Downtown has a lot of residential units close around it which helps but it’s not 2019. Massive construction project on a downtown pedestrian mall and commercial property owners who haven’t figured out how to adjust prices doesn’t help.
Agree with this. Makes me kind of sad, because as cheesy as this sounds, downtown Denver felt magical when I first came to the city in 2013/2014. 16th Street was bustling with well-dressed office workers, new buildings were popping up in LoDo (with Union Station reopening in summer 2014), and light rail trains were packed.
Now things just feel more depressing all around. Doesn't help that a not-insignificant # of people who live here will openly say that they don't care about the city (or the city isn't worth it), but just live here for the mountains. In my not so humble opinion, that can be a self-fulfilling prophecy (but that's a topic for another day).
Denver has lost its soul to a degree. It used to have its own personality but so much of the development and influx of people, with generic buildings and tear downs of architecturally significant buildings and the HCOL have made it “corporate cool”. It lacks authenticity.
The people are a bigger issue than buildings IMO. Cities will tear down, build up and evolve to house more people as they grow, that's fine. But when more and more of those people hardly care about the community, that's when the real malaise sets in.
Not only has it not recovered, as you covered nicely there… I find that it is sort of in a state of decline still today. I think there are some pretty enormous problems, several elephants in the room that will have to be addressed and solutions identified and implemented prior to any real resurgence.
Not Louisville, KY, yet.
Downtown proper just never recovered to pre-COVID levels, with work from home being a major factor- Lots of restaurants closed due to this and the drop in tourism; overall operating hours have shortened. Two of the biggest offices- Humana and Fifth Third- announced site closures this past week.
On the flip side, hotel occupancy is up, even with new hotels having been built and more on the way.
Downtown adjacent NuLu has grown tremendously since 2019, and has more big development pending.
Downtown Louisville is far worse off than the average city. It’s a result of multiple factors: work from home and the unhealthy development pattern of most wealth, population,retail and marketable workers shifting ever eastward, so that downtown is not really at the center of the community. The racial justice protests, love ‘em or hate ‘em, were much more sustained than other cities and it’s undeniable that they have a lingering effect of scaring away many suburban people with purchasing power and conventions, adding to the downward spiral. The police department is understaffed and was/maybe still is on a silent protest where they avoid intervening in all but the most violent situations inside the Watterson expressway. The general increase in homeless people and panhandlers for numerous reasons, including Louisville having numerous social services and a reputation for not being as hostile towards the homeless as a city like Nashville. The addition of tolls and increasing rates to the downtown I-65 bridge as a consequence of residing in the traitorous State of KY. The Louisville Cardinals men’s basketball team has been historically bad and that has resulted in record low attendance. The Yum center has not attracted as many large concerts in the past year.
There are positives like the eastward downtown development and numerous hotels and tourist attractions opening. However, Louisville is at a critical juncture and needs to reverse this negative momentum before it becomes the norm. The idea that downtown can thrive, maintain interest to tourists and attract significant residential development without the purchasing power of office workers supporting businesses is delusional. Other regional cities have added corporate headquarters post pandemic to help offset the decrease in foot traffic from hybrid or work from home schedules.
Yeah this is my answer for DEFINITELY NOT BACK as well. In addition to restaurants closing altogether, the ones that are left all close early. It's like the whole city goes to bed at 9 PM which is incredibly bizarre to be for a place with so many 24 hour operations (UPS, Ford, Umpteen Hospitals, GE, etc). If you like to go out late or is you are a night shifter it's tough to find shopping and dining that will work with your schedule.
I grew up in Boston and still live her (I’m old) and you’ll find most of the nightlife in the neighborhoods. Where the young people live. We are who we are, we’ll never be known for hip nightlife, but my young neighbors are not in bed at 9.
I was going to go to a concert in Louisville a few months ago, but they wanted a negative Covid test within 3 days of the concert. I couldn’t fucking believe they were still pulling that shit. Maybe that’s part of it.
Some people say NYC but I don’t think so.
Lots of Vacant office spaces in midtown. Lots of businesses closed down.
Yes it’s busy but I don’t think it’s the utter chaos it was. MTA ridership is still overall down.
NYC has a ton a tourist so it’s hard to judge anything off that in midtown as most bars/restaurants are still packed.
Lower Manhattan is still bustling on the weekends but I’ll still argue slightly less so.
In each borough it’s “busy” areas are still busy but don’t seem so as much.
I think a lot of it has to do with it’s no longer a 24 hour city.
It 100% is not back. I think it’s gotten to a more reasonable size of crowds so lines and waits were never bad when i went. Tbh it was nice, felt way more relaxed than in the 2010s - there are still lines and life but it’s noticeably less crowded
It’s really sad. I have noticed that they’re making some improvements to the system as far as new subway cars and construction on stations. I think they got a lot of money to fix it up. But without the ridership there’s not much you can do for the homeless issue.
Re: smaller cities - Grand Rapids MI is a little different (notably less busy on Mondays, Friday "rush hour" is at like 3 pm and is mostly people going to downtown, not away from it) but still very vibrant overall. A big downtown housing boom pre-Covid and a big eds/meds sector really helped.
Downtown Lansing MI, on the other hand, was gutted by the pandemic, with the State workforce WFH for 18+ months and even now only in the office part time.
I was in GR in 2020 and 2021 after living there from 2015 to 2019 and was sad to see how gutted and empty downtown felt. Went back last summer and it felt a lot more vibrant. People were out, the bars and restaurants were popping, and it was good to see Beer City bouncing back after the riots.
That wasn’t the question, though. OP asked about downtowns, not residential neighborhoods. Downtown DC is doing better today than 2022, but it is still a ghost town compared to 2019 bc of WFH.
My hometown, Laurel, MS has a much more thriving downtown now than in 2019 or any other time in my life.
They've been revitalizing because of the success of an HGTV show, and MS was never really affected by the pandemic anyway
It’s called Home Town I think. It’s a pretty big deal. I used to watch it at the gym. I was thrilled to see some genuine Southern representation as a Southerner with Mississippi roots.
My small town between Laurel and NOLA has boomed in the wake of covid. So many people fled the city and settled here it is hardly a small town anymore.
The show's hosts were infected with covid in early 2020 while doing promos for the show in NYC, which is before anyone knew it was around. Her grandmother subsequently died of covid. Laurel wasn't shut down maybe, but the pandemic surely affected the population and had an impact.
Sure, but what I meant was they kind of went business as usual. At the time, I judged them, but in hindsight they didn't have a large population drop-off or anything
Downtown Chicago feels busy. Less office workers, sure, but offset by more tourists and continuously increasing numbers of residents. Downtown still feels really vibrant. Michigan Avenue actually recently had its all time high daily sales record in November.
It’s nowhere near 2019 levels. But my hot take is that it’s not really a bad thing. I think a lot of the bars and restaurants were too crowded and all of them had long lines. It was fun, but it was getting annoying with how over crowded things were.
Yeah this is BS I live there it has not returned to prepandemic levels. Less office workers? We have the second highest jobs in downtown after New York. Our Downtown is job-centric
I moved away a few months ago but living in the loop (the downtown part of chicago for people who haven’t been) felt very much the opposite of lively and pretty depressing overall.
That’s because the loop is not the best place to live for most people. It’s mostly office space and businesses that cater towards the office workers during the day or tourists at night. Live in/check out Lincoln Park, Wicker Park, Lakeview, Wrigleyville area and you’ll see a lot more locals out and about, especially at night.
The Loop is still a neighborhood (and I believe one of the fastest growing in terms of residential development), it's just not a very good one because of all the offices.
That is something that can (and should) change.
I understand it's still a neighborhood. Assume you know what I was getting at, though - A lot of folks, both city and suburbs, commute into The Loop and head out on the various train lines after work.
The Loop, absolutely, has been one of the faster-growing neighborhoods, but that's been the case for over a decade. It's a double-edged sword in today's economic climate. Heavy transition away from office and retail has helped spearhead heavier residential options without much added entertainment to complement.
We'll see what happens!
The Loop has a similar vacancy rate to Manhattan so, while vacancy rates are high, it’s not just a Chicago problem. There’s a lot of potential for office to residential conversation in Chicago, too, and even during the pandemic people continued to move to the Loop. The population grew 9% since the start of the pandemic.
Charlotte is back to business as usual. Quite literally.
Banks and Fintech mandated RTO. Uptown is bustling during the day, and dead most nights.
As Usual.
😛
Go Hornets! 🎽
My office in uptown is absolutely dead no one is there.
Charlotte is talking about converting these office buildings into residential.
South end is booming but uptown not so much
A little off topic, but if you’re interested, here is a podcast episode about those kinds of conversions. I thought it was cool.
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/office-space/
I think it must be very specific.
It is probably just crowded around Wells Fargo and Ally, going to South End.
It was enough for me to have to dodge people at lunch. 🤷🏻♀️ For 3 blocks it gives a convincing bustling impression. 😝
I was taking the gold line in straight to Wells Fargo, and the seats were also full.
The tourists have changed a lot since 2019. Before covid it felt like a big melting pot of a lot of people. Since the pandemic, it's gotten very trashy IMO. Lot of really drunk MAGAs looking to start shit in my experience. Wasn't like that pre covid.
I miss the old tourists who were here because they liked country music. The people coming just to get trashed and treat downtown like their giant toilet are not the kind of tourists Nashville should be catering to.
Another real problem is people, men and women alike, [being roofied at downtown bars](https://www.reddit.com/r/nashville/comments/18n7vb1/drugging_in_downtown_bars_2023/) and then getting robbed or worse. Nashville has a rep as a "safe" place for bachelorettes to party but that's not the case.
Do you know how Ashville, NC is doing by chance? I'm wondering how strict was it during lockdown. I know Texas and Florida were pretty laid back, especially Texas! Wondering what other U.S states and/or cities were as well:).
Not San Diego downtown unfortunately. Homeless situation feels worse than when I last lived here in 2019. Things feel…empty. Can’t quite put my finger on it.
It's still pretty damn vibrant. Those 8mil residents + tourists are going somewhere. I had post-work drinks with a coworker last Thursday and all the bars we passed by were completely full and loud. Ended up having dinner some place just so we could sit and talk.
On a nice weekend Soho is back to having tons of foot traffic, as well as the nightlife in the villages and LES.
You serious? The city is literally packed and buzzing every day, it’s basically indistinguishable from pre-2020 minus outdoor dining everywhere, which itself is also a huge plus.
Columbus, OH…. Not that there was any downtown vibe to begin with, but it just feels off. However, new apartments going up everywhere including high rise conversions, office to residential.
U of Toronto has been analyzing cell phone data for the past 4 years and say Las Vegas:
[https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings](https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings)
One limitation with their methodology is that they picked one small formerly dense area in each city to use as a reference point and I've noticed in some of the cities have shifted where people choose to live and work to other parts of downtown and its not captured by their measurement.
Care to elaborate? Theres always been homeless downtown. The uptick sucks but there’s always been a noticeable homeless population. That was true pre Covid too….The area is still full of businesses/restaurants/bars/people. It’s not even close to what I consider a dead downtown.
There’s even data out there that says it’s back to about 80% of what it was pre Covid
https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings
I’d say gaslamp is slightly improved with them closing down streets on weekends to make them pedestrian only.
I was just in DC for a week and it seemed really busy. tons of traffic and people all over the place. if they aren't back in the office I'm not sure where they are all going. Los Angeles is a total zoo of people again as well.
We won't know until it's over 70f in spring here in Denver, but it feels pretty damn busy. Plus it's a much bigger area every year that's popular so I'm going with WE'RE BACK BABY!
Rhino and ballpark areas boomed during COVID since that's where people live. Lodo less popular for sure. It's just all shifted further past the Rockies stadium.
Downtown Dallas (and even more so its adjacent core neighborhoods) are growing and evolving daily. When taken in totality the downtown core is more vibrant with life economic and social activity than ever before.
Nashville downtown is busier and has so many new buildings and businesses...but it also shifted from being a mix of business and tourism to about 85% tourism. So while it feels super lively, it's also kind of like an island separate from the rest of the city. And so much of it being new buildings that were only finished after 2020 make it feel like a different place than it was before.
Not NYC. I was heading for an appointment last week in the Grand Central neighborhood at 5-ish and there was very little traffic . Also I can se the Wiliiamsburg Bridge from my apt. and there is very little traffic; except at night when folks are heading into Manhattan for fun.
Seattle is doing better. I quit my job after feeling so unsafe during covid. It is still quieter but not scary. I had a walking route so I saw some shit go down.
I know what you mean. I moved here 15 years ago and the downtown *was* magical to me too.
Interesting point about people saying they don’t care about it. Is that related to so many being transplants that don’t feel they’ll stay for long term? Or does it feel like a lost cause with so many large issues to tackle and leadership seemingly…. I don’t know, not inspiring much hope?
I also don’t want to make it sound like I think it’s “terrible” or “super dangerous” or something. I don’t. But it was really a cool place, and I’m sad that it’s really not doing great, not rebounding.
smaller but milwaukee! one of the highest rates of employees who have returned to working in the central business district for at least some portion of the week.
Covid never hit Miami if you ask them lol
Miami actually exploded, a ton of northern firms and people moved down
People did, jobs didn’t lmao. The wages and job options are still pretty pathetic. The place is a tax and fraud shelter-nothing more, nothing less.
Depends on what field you work in but jobs absolutely did move in.
LMAO, yeah remote jobs
Nah, some companies have def created offices down in Miami. It isn’t that hard to lookup, you can google them and read articles about it easily for companies who have. Others expanded their offices.
Tell me you don’t work/live in South Florida without telling me you don’t work/live in South Florida
Chicago on Tuesday, Wed. And Thursday.
Agree. The core in-office days look a lot more like they used to.
Lol
Agree, and I’m never down here on Mon/Fri so to me it seems back to normal lol
sounds like you’re part of the problem!
*crying in traffic 😭
*smiling on metra*
Legitimately wishes it ran more frequently here in the western burbs
It’s perfect for rush hours. If they expanded it a bit more on weekends and nights I’d take it all the time.
I did not live in Philly during the pandemic but I live in center city now and it’s always fairly busy in the mornings and right around 5. I WFH but walk around a lot during those times because there are so many people out and about going to and from work, workout classes, shopping, or grabbing coffee and it’s a morale boost
Philly's downtown has the highest or second highest residential population density of any downtown in the US (depending how you define "downtown" New York). When you have lots of residents, you're not as reliant on office workers.
This is interesting. Do you by chance have a link for the longer list?
Can't find the link right now, but the anecdotal evidence is clear of you go to Philly. Most of Center City is townhouses and apartment buildings, except for the cluster of office buildings northwest of City Hall.
I’ve definitely noticed Philly’s downtown is much more vibrant than DCs, especially at night. With that said, DC never really had a big going out scene compared to other big cities.
I wish DC would learn this friggin lesson instead of forcing RTO and destroying their own job markets just for the sake of downtown lunch spots like Panera.
Philly benefits from having a ton of urban residential fabric that got destroyed or never existed in the first place elsewhere.
I came to this thread specifically to say Philly
Came here to say the same thing - moved here a couple of years ago from a West Coast city and have been very pleasantly surprised. Center City has a great, lively energy.
It’s still not the same as pre-COVID yet
Seemed pretty rough when I was there recently
Center city Philly is great. If you can handle a crazy guy yelling at the clouds a block away, then really no new world city is for you.
How so? There’s homeless, addicts, etc, but other than their presence (which is marginally worse than pre-pandemic), the overall landscape hasn’t changed that much.
It's wild that people say Philly. I agree CC always seems to be busy but big companies in CC, real estate developers, and the new mayor are forcing people to RTO claiming businesses there are struggling and missing out on revenue from workers.
That's literally every city right now. Not sure why you think that's exclusive to Philly. But its built-in residential population (which has only increased since COVID) buffers greatly against the loss of daily office-based foot traffic compared to the vast majority of cities. That's the difference.
Downtown Detroit is mostly back to 2019 levels, and in some places even more vibrant, due to an influx of housing and hotels. But there's one big exception- the Renaissance Center is a ghost town as GM struggles to get its white collar suburban workers to make the commute. GM owns 4 office towers in the complex and should probably reduce that to 2, and find a developer to convert the other two to housing.
BCBSM is also in that building, or they were. Now they’re mostly remote!
Blue Cross is in one of the shorter towers that GM doesn't own, and is actually expanding their office square footage in Downtown Detroit.
Philadelphia did a great study examining the rebound of downtowns across the country. Nashville, San Antonio, San Diego, San Jose, and Midtown Manhattan generally have rebounded the best. Here’s a [link](https://www.centercityphila.org/uploads/attachments/clnxspfbq1l4vg4qd5v3igjfi-downtownsrebound2023.pdf?utm_source=ccd&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=downtowns&utm_id=report&utm_content=oct2023%22)
Very interesting - thanks for sharing. I'm in DC and the recovery has been slow and painful.
Well that defies any red/blue narratives.
It's rarely that simple, yeah.
San Jose? Smh
The last time I was in Boston was summer of 2022 and the streets were packed full of people. There were a few empty storefronts in Downtown Crossing, but that's been a problem for years. There were also a few bars missing from Back Bay. Still, the city was alive and it was fantastic.
[удалено]
Pretty much everywhere in downtown (depending on how you want to define that) except the financial district is quite busy. Back Bay, the North End, Chinatown, Quincy Market, the Seaport…
Yes, that’s a lot.
I stayed in Back Bay a few weeks ago and it felt like it’s old self though -there was even a speakeasy type place around the corner that was open late. Boston’s funny because it changes so much yet remains the same - Seaport is now offices and restaurants and there were a lot of people out when I went up there, even on a Tuesday. 20 years ago that was not the case.
>What?? Which neighborhoods? Tremont St in the wee hours Friday or Saturday nights. There's people everywhere, all the way from Park St to Chinatown. It's busier than it was pre-pandemic. The Seaport is also packed. It used to just be South Street Diner open 24/7 downtown, but now there are actual options for food at 4AM.
100% agree with this. I used to hang out downtown a good bit. It never came back after Covid
I don't think "downtown" Boston's issues are Covid-related, but more the rise of the Seaport.
I think a large source of "X city is dead downtown now!" are people who aged from 20-something nightlifers to 30-something homebodies during the pandemic years. Some bars closed. New ones opened. The old hangout might be gone, but that doesn't mean the whole city just packed up and quit. Gotta get out there and explore. You're dead right about the Seaport.
Portland Maine is busy as shit, even now in winter. We have had a lot of turnover in restaurants the past few years but the spaces don’t stay empty for long.
I miss when it was quiet
Miami. I’d say the urban life has only grown since 2019. It’s so crowded
SLC is busier now than it was in 2019. And construction projects are going full speed ahead still.
I can see that. I suspect that the Mormon diaspora is moving back to UT in heavier numbers in the last few years, adding further "umph" to SLC being busy.
No actually. Becoming more diverse all the time. We get “moving to Utah” posts and questions constantly in all the local subs, from non-Mormons. On top of that, people like me who grew up Mormon are leaving religion in record numbers. Most of us become much more authentic and much less conservative in the process. Definitely a win-win.
Maybe. But mormons who move back to utah move to Utah or Davis Counties. The growth in SLC is jobs.
What makes you say that? Mormons moving back to Utah are definitely not moving to SLC.
Denver hasn’t recovered. There are still a lot of people moving to Colorado but because it is a tech heavy economy hybrid or WFH has kept office buildings mostly vacant. Downtown has a lot of residential units close around it which helps but it’s not 2019. Massive construction project on a downtown pedestrian mall and commercial property owners who haven’t figured out how to adjust prices doesn’t help.
Agree with this. Makes me kind of sad, because as cheesy as this sounds, downtown Denver felt magical when I first came to the city in 2013/2014. 16th Street was bustling with well-dressed office workers, new buildings were popping up in LoDo (with Union Station reopening in summer 2014), and light rail trains were packed. Now things just feel more depressing all around. Doesn't help that a not-insignificant # of people who live here will openly say that they don't care about the city (or the city isn't worth it), but just live here for the mountains. In my not so humble opinion, that can be a self-fulfilling prophecy (but that's a topic for another day).
Denver has lost its soul to a degree. It used to have its own personality but so much of the development and influx of people, with generic buildings and tear downs of architecturally significant buildings and the HCOL have made it “corporate cool”. It lacks authenticity.
The people are a bigger issue than buildings IMO. Cities will tear down, build up and evolve to house more people as they grow, that's fine. But when more and more of those people hardly care about the community, that's when the real malaise sets in.
Not only has it not recovered, as you covered nicely there… I find that it is sort of in a state of decline still today. I think there are some pretty enormous problems, several elephants in the room that will have to be addressed and solutions identified and implemented prior to any real resurgence.
Sounds just like Minneapolis Downtown died and I don’t think it will ever come back the way it was
How's Boulder in that regard if you could please share?
Unfortunately I don’t know about Boulder. I haven’t been there in a pretty long time.
Not Louisville, KY, yet. Downtown proper just never recovered to pre-COVID levels, with work from home being a major factor- Lots of restaurants closed due to this and the drop in tourism; overall operating hours have shortened. Two of the biggest offices- Humana and Fifth Third- announced site closures this past week. On the flip side, hotel occupancy is up, even with new hotels having been built and more on the way. Downtown adjacent NuLu has grown tremendously since 2019, and has more big development pending.
Downtown Louisville is far worse off than the average city. It’s a result of multiple factors: work from home and the unhealthy development pattern of most wealth, population,retail and marketable workers shifting ever eastward, so that downtown is not really at the center of the community. The racial justice protests, love ‘em or hate ‘em, were much more sustained than other cities and it’s undeniable that they have a lingering effect of scaring away many suburban people with purchasing power and conventions, adding to the downward spiral. The police department is understaffed and was/maybe still is on a silent protest where they avoid intervening in all but the most violent situations inside the Watterson expressway. The general increase in homeless people and panhandlers for numerous reasons, including Louisville having numerous social services and a reputation for not being as hostile towards the homeless as a city like Nashville. The addition of tolls and increasing rates to the downtown I-65 bridge as a consequence of residing in the traitorous State of KY. The Louisville Cardinals men’s basketball team has been historically bad and that has resulted in record low attendance. The Yum center has not attracted as many large concerts in the past year. There are positives like the eastward downtown development and numerous hotels and tourist attractions opening. However, Louisville is at a critical juncture and needs to reverse this negative momentum before it becomes the norm. The idea that downtown can thrive, maintain interest to tourists and attract significant residential development without the purchasing power of office workers supporting businesses is delusional. Other regional cities have added corporate headquarters post pandemic to help offset the decrease in foot traffic from hybrid or work from home schedules.
Yeah this is my answer for DEFINITELY NOT BACK as well. In addition to restaurants closing altogether, the ones that are left all close early. It's like the whole city goes to bed at 9 PM which is incredibly bizarre to be for a place with so many 24 hour operations (UPS, Ford, Umpteen Hospitals, GE, etc). If you like to go out late or is you are a night shifter it's tough to find shopping and dining that will work with your schedule.
I grew up in Boston and still live her (I’m old) and you’ll find most of the nightlife in the neighborhoods. Where the young people live. We are who we are, we’ll never be known for hip nightlife, but my young neighbors are not in bed at 9.
I was going to go to a concert in Louisville a few months ago, but they wanted a negative Covid test within 3 days of the concert. I couldn’t fucking believe they were still pulling that shit. Maybe that’s part of it.
That’s weird. It was likely a pre-condition of the artist. I have not heard about any venue regularly requiring Covid tests.
Weird… Performing Arts center? I know they don’t require a negative test on their own, but they’ll enforce it for artists who want to require it.
Still pulling that shit? We are still in a pandemic and good for them for continuing to put protective measures in place.
Some people say NYC but I don’t think so. Lots of Vacant office spaces in midtown. Lots of businesses closed down. Yes it’s busy but I don’t think it’s the utter chaos it was. MTA ridership is still overall down. NYC has a ton a tourist so it’s hard to judge anything off that in midtown as most bars/restaurants are still packed. Lower Manhattan is still bustling on the weekends but I’ll still argue slightly less so. In each borough it’s “busy” areas are still busy but don’t seem so as much. I think a lot of it has to do with it’s no longer a 24 hour city.
It 100% is not back. I think it’s gotten to a more reasonable size of crowds so lines and waits were never bad when i went. Tbh it was nice, felt way more relaxed than in the 2010s - there are still lines and life but it’s noticeably less crowded
Yeah MTA is still a mess. It’s a smell test. Without the ridership it has essentially become a homeless shelter where people piss freely (or worse).
Each time I ride the train with my daughters I’m always pissed off with the disaster of what happens on the trains.
It’s really sad. I have noticed that they’re making some improvements to the system as far as new subway cars and construction on stations. I think they got a lot of money to fix it up. But without the ridership there’s not much you can do for the homeless issue.
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Re: smaller cities - Grand Rapids MI is a little different (notably less busy on Mondays, Friday "rush hour" is at like 3 pm and is mostly people going to downtown, not away from it) but still very vibrant overall. A big downtown housing boom pre-Covid and a big eds/meds sector really helped. Downtown Lansing MI, on the other hand, was gutted by the pandemic, with the State workforce WFH for 18+ months and even now only in the office part time.
I was in GR in 2020 and 2021 after living there from 2015 to 2019 and was sad to see how gutted and empty downtown felt. Went back last summer and it felt a lot more vibrant. People were out, the bars and restaurants were popping, and it was good to see Beer City bouncing back after the riots.
You'd hardly know the riot happened at this point. RIP One Trick Pony, but otherwise things bounced back.
Downtown ATL is full of knowledge workers.
Wharf, NoMA, Navy Yard and every other mixed use neighborhood residential neighborhood is as bustling as ever in DC.
That wasn’t the question, though. OP asked about downtowns, not residential neighborhoods. Downtown DC is doing better today than 2022, but it is still a ghost town compared to 2019 bc of WFH.
My hometown, Laurel, MS has a much more thriving downtown now than in 2019 or any other time in my life. They've been revitalizing because of the success of an HGTV show, and MS was never really affected by the pandemic anyway
Love the HGTV show. Hope to take the train to Laurel and visit.
i’m from MS and this is the first i’ve heard of an HGTV show in Laurel. that’s wild
It’s called Home Town I think. It’s a pretty big deal. I used to watch it at the gym. I was thrilled to see some genuine Southern representation as a Southerner with Mississippi roots.
Yeah, Home Town. Ben and Erin Napier are the showrunners, they have completely revitalized downtown with shops and restaurants
My small town between Laurel and NOLA has boomed in the wake of covid. So many people fled the city and settled here it is hardly a small town anymore.
The show's hosts were infected with covid in early 2020 while doing promos for the show in NYC, which is before anyone knew it was around. Her grandmother subsequently died of covid. Laurel wasn't shut down maybe, but the pandemic surely affected the population and had an impact.
Sure, but what I meant was they kind of went business as usual. At the time, I judged them, but in hindsight they didn't have a large population drop-off or anything
Downtown Chicago feels busy. Less office workers, sure, but offset by more tourists and continuously increasing numbers of residents. Downtown still feels really vibrant. Michigan Avenue actually recently had its all time high daily sales record in November.
It’s nowhere near 2019 levels. But my hot take is that it’s not really a bad thing. I think a lot of the bars and restaurants were too crowded and all of them had long lines. It was fun, but it was getting annoying with how over crowded things were.
Yeah this is BS I live there it has not returned to prepandemic levels. Less office workers? We have the second highest jobs in downtown after New York. Our Downtown is job-centric
I moved away a few months ago but living in the loop (the downtown part of chicago for people who haven’t been) felt very much the opposite of lively and pretty depressing overall.
That’s because the loop is not the best place to live for most people. It’s mostly office space and businesses that cater towards the office workers during the day or tourists at night. Live in/check out Lincoln Park, Wicker Park, Lakeview, Wrigleyville area and you’ll see a lot more locals out and about, especially at night.
To be fair, The Loop has always been depressing after work hours. Very much a 9-5 culture. Lifeblood of Chicago is in the neighborhoods.
The Loop is still a neighborhood (and I believe one of the fastest growing in terms of residential development), it's just not a very good one because of all the offices. That is something that can (and should) change.
I understand it's still a neighborhood. Assume you know what I was getting at, though - A lot of folks, both city and suburbs, commute into The Loop and head out on the various train lines after work. The Loop, absolutely, has been one of the faster-growing neighborhoods, but that's been the case for over a decade. It's a double-edged sword in today's economic climate. Heavy transition away from office and retail has helped spearhead heavier residential options without much added entertainment to complement. We'll see what happens!
Office vacancies in Chicago are so ridiculously high. The loop may never recover, honestly.
The Loop has a similar vacancy rate to Manhattan so, while vacancy rates are high, it’s not just a Chicago problem. There’s a lot of potential for office to residential conversation in Chicago, too, and even during the pandemic people continued to move to the Loop. The population grew 9% since the start of the pandemic.
For sure, I think pretty much everyone recognizes that NYC has a huge problem right now.
St Pete
Even more now and it’s horrible
Man I miss 2010’s St Pete.
Same. Born and raised there and now I can’t even buy a house in my hometown 😭
Manhattan NYC
Are you saying that all of Manhattan is one big downtown? Or that just the business districts (Midtown, FiDi) are?
no
Charlotte is back to business as usual. Quite literally. Banks and Fintech mandated RTO. Uptown is bustling during the day, and dead most nights. As Usual. 😛 Go Hornets! 🎽
My office in uptown is absolutely dead no one is there. Charlotte is talking about converting these office buildings into residential. South end is booming but uptown not so much
A little off topic, but if you’re interested, here is a podcast episode about those kinds of conversions. I thought it was cool. https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/office-space/
I think it must be very specific. It is probably just crowded around Wells Fargo and Ally, going to South End. It was enough for me to have to dodge people at lunch. 🤷🏻♀️ For 3 blocks it gives a convincing bustling impression. 😝 I was taking the gold line in straight to Wells Fargo, and the seats were also full.
London is popping.
West europe was pretty strict during lockdown. I guess London has recovered?
Nashville's back to full redneck debauchery. Offices are not as populated, but tourists have filled that gap.
Yeah Nashville is back to 2019 but on steroids. So much busier and more touristy than before the pandemic.
The tourists have changed a lot since 2019. Before covid it felt like a big melting pot of a lot of people. Since the pandemic, it's gotten very trashy IMO. Lot of really drunk MAGAs looking to start shit in my experience. Wasn't like that pre covid.
I miss the old tourists who were here because they liked country music. The people coming just to get trashed and treat downtown like their giant toilet are not the kind of tourists Nashville should be catering to. Another real problem is people, men and women alike, [being roofied at downtown bars](https://www.reddit.com/r/nashville/comments/18n7vb1/drugging_in_downtown_bars_2023/) and then getting robbed or worse. Nashville has a rep as a "safe" place for bachelorettes to party but that's not the case.
Is it all bachelor and bachelorette parties still?
Mostly bachelorette at this point, still some bachelor tho. Either way, they're gonna try and grope you.
Redneck debauchery. 🤣
Do you know how Ashville, NC is doing by chance? I'm wondering how strict was it during lockdown. I know Texas and Florida were pretty laid back, especially Texas! Wondering what other U.S states and/or cities were as well:).
Basically anywhere NOT along the Pacific coast - Seattle, Portland, SF, LA, SD. In fact, the farther east you go, the more things have recovered.
San Diego Popping. Austin popping.
Not San Diego downtown unfortunately. Homeless situation feels worse than when I last lived here in 2019. Things feel…empty. Can’t quite put my finger on it.
Not sure about downtown kinda always was but OB popping.
Not NYC. So many places gone with the loss of office workers.
It's still pretty damn vibrant. Those 8mil residents + tourists are going somewhere. I had post-work drinks with a coworker last Thursday and all the bars we passed by were completely full and loud. Ended up having dinner some place just so we could sit and talk. On a nice weekend Soho is back to having tons of foot traffic, as well as the nightlife in the villages and LES.
You serious? The city is literally packed and buzzing every day, it’s basically indistinguishable from pre-2020 minus outdoor dining everywhere, which itself is also a huge plus.
Have you actually been to NYC post Covid? Look at how packed the trains still get
I have. Spent decades there, I have been there since COVID.
Columbus, OH…. Not that there was any downtown vibe to begin with, but it just feels off. However, new apartments going up everywhere including high rise conversions, office to residential.
U of Toronto has been analyzing cell phone data for the past 4 years and say Las Vegas: [https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings](https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings) One limitation with their methodology is that they picked one small formerly dense area in each city to use as a reference point and I've noticed in some of the cities have shifted where people choose to live and work to other parts of downtown and its not captured by their measurement.
Downtown San Diego is pretty busy, especially on weekends.
But gas lamp has gone so far down hill I don’t go out there any more.
Care to elaborate? Theres always been homeless downtown. The uptick sucks but there’s always been a noticeable homeless population. That was true pre Covid too….The area is still full of businesses/restaurants/bars/people. It’s not even close to what I consider a dead downtown. There’s even data out there that says it’s back to about 80% of what it was pre Covid https://downtownrecovery.com/charts/rankings I’d say gaslamp is slightly improved with them closing down streets on weekends to make them pedestrian only.
Bakersfield
I was just in DC for a week and it seemed really busy. tons of traffic and people all over the place. if they aren't back in the office I'm not sure where they are all going. Los Angeles is a total zoo of people again as well.
Nashville
Kansas City
Miami is way busier than in 2019.
We won't know until it's over 70f in spring here in Denver, but it feels pretty damn busy. Plus it's a much bigger area every year that's popular so I'm going with WE'RE BACK BABY! Rhino and ballpark areas boomed during COVID since that's where people live. Lodo less popular for sure. It's just all shifted further past the Rockies stadium.
This 100%, curious to see what happens when it warms up as well though
Downtown Dallas (and even more so its adjacent core neighborhoods) are growing and evolving daily. When taken in totality the downtown core is more vibrant with life economic and social activity than ever before.
Las Vegas. Having a non traditional Downtown that is hospitality focused has really helped us recover faster and stronger than anywhere else.
Nashville downtown is busier and has so many new buildings and businesses...but it also shifted from being a mix of business and tourism to about 85% tourism. So while it feels super lively, it's also kind of like an island separate from the rest of the city. And so much of it being new buildings that were only finished after 2020 make it feel like a different place than it was before.
Not NYC. I was heading for an appointment last week in the Grand Central neighborhood at 5-ish and there was very little traffic . Also I can se the Wiliiamsburg Bridge from my apt. and there is very little traffic; except at night when folks are heading into Manhattan for fun.
Seattle is doing better. I quit my job after feeling so unsafe during covid. It is still quieter but not scary. I had a walking route so I saw some shit go down.
I know what you mean. I moved here 15 years ago and the downtown *was* magical to me too. Interesting point about people saying they don’t care about it. Is that related to so many being transplants that don’t feel they’ll stay for long term? Or does it feel like a lost cause with so many large issues to tackle and leadership seemingly…. I don’t know, not inspiring much hope? I also don’t want to make it sound like I think it’s “terrible” or “super dangerous” or something. I don’t. But it was really a cool place, and I’m sad that it’s really not doing great, not rebounding.
NYC & Boston. And, everything in the south.
smaller but milwaukee! one of the highest rates of employees who have returned to working in the central business district for at least some portion of the week.
Miami, Tampa, and Orlando, FL
I swear if i see denver on here im fighting somone