[urbanactivistTX]

I'm sure this has happened to everyone. You're traveling somewhere and you notice a town that you had never been to, or maybe went to once or twice. You stop in, walk around, and realize that the town is a total sleeper... so much potential, and yet downtown is just dead as a doornail. You begin to wonder "what happened? Can this wonderful town ever be restored to its former glory??"

[urbanactivistTX]

Can't edit the thread name... but I meant to say "dying downtowns" as opposed to "small downtowns"

Anyway, one of my personal favorites... Helena/West Helena, Arkansas. At one time, it was a metro area of over 50,000 people. Today, both cities have been combined into one town of just over 15,000. It was an epicenter of blues and jazz, and major industrial town for the Delta region.

Here are some found photos of Helena...

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2016/1507425071_909ec70449.jpg?v=0
From Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/eurekajunebug/1507425071/

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3098/2594614328_357ebc0fce.jpg?v=0
From Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdtreat/2594614328/

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3034/2593785693_2282928f89.jpg?v=0
From Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdtreat/2593785693/

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3188/2593815585_162a90801f.jpg?v=0
From Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdtreat/2593815585/in/set-72157605706356900/

http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A9G_bDu5taBI6fAAS1yjzbkF/SIG=124s347te/EXP=1218578233/**http%3A//www.bluefrontbluesroom.org/Helena_web.jpg
http://www.bluefrontbluesroom.org/Helena.htm

[Thundertubs]

Troy, NY - That town is beautiful and largely intact (no expressway or parking lot dead zones around downtown, a seamless neighborhood-to-CBD transition). Nothing big will happen in Troy or anywhere else in Upstate NY until the taxes and cost of running a business go way down. I'd call Troy one of the biggest sleepers in the northeast, but unfortunately it is trapped in a horrid business climate.

Quincy, IL has a beautiful but dead downtown as well. Erie, PA and Scranton, PA also caught my fancy. Springfield and Aurora, IL have great looking downtowns that could use more life.

I'm trying to think of more small-city downtowns in the midwest that haven't been bulldozed by 50%, but I'm struggling.

[austlar1]

Texarkana

[MolsonExport]

http://www.photoscanada.com/gallery/albums/stratford_ontario/Stratford_03.jpg
source: http://www.photoscanada.com/gallery/slideshow.php?set_albumName=stratford_ontario

Stratford (Ontario, pop ~31,000) has a very nice compact downtown that is thriving, on account of the world famous Stratford Shakespeare festival.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b2/Stratford15.jpg
Source: Wikipedia

[urbanactivistTX]

Texarkana

Texarkana is growing.... it's just that the downtown is dead. But they have some pretty aggresive plans for it. They're building a few grocery stores and residential out of a couple of old warehouses in downtown. Should be pretty interesting in about 5 years.

[mhays]

One of the great things about growing land-restricted cities is that growth is pushed inward, and downtowns tend to be a lot healthier...particularly if there's active encouragement of growth in downtowns. This has caused great things in most of the large and small downtowns in Washington and Oregon. Of course there's a long, long way to go in some cases.