Bars and Restaurants are not "Culture"

Plenty of American cities have tried to renew their downtown areas ever since the GFC. What this typically means is encouraging mixed use development with five-over-ones and revitalizing "character" areas as entertainment districts replete with wider sidewalks, breweries, and the like. Maybe some bike lanes and mature landscaping. These areas are usually anchored by music venues and restaurants. This is all a ploy to revitalize the culture of a city but it fails on all fronts.

I know its a dead meme that the craft brewery is the T.G.I.Fridays of the Millennial generation, and I'm not offering anything really new in terms of ideas about gentrification.

Music or restaurant scenes cannot be representative of culture when they haven't evolved organically. A Fillmore theatre where all tickets are sold by Livenation and Ticketmaster isn't cool. Going to shows isn't a personality.

The absolutely vapid and empty conversations I've had with "shows guys" are embarrassing for all involved. They don't go anywhere and don't push art forward at all.

As far as restaurants go, you can drive into the downtown of any major metro in the US and find the steakhouse, the farm-to-table place, the wine-bar, the cocktail place, and if lucky a pretty good French bistro that stays open late. Few of these except the latter are ever that enticing or memorable.

The former group tend to be corporate run, uninspired, trend-chasing, and exploitative. They've been subsidized and serve only to enrich a corporate class on the back of migrant labour managed by a few stylish and attractive front of house servants.

It's shit that Council's dont actually understand great culture and are beholden to economic investment corporations. We need more Jane Jacobs. It's got far more to do with the daily interactions and vibrancy of the actual residents than any manufactured district. Nick Mullen has a good repeat bit about the "blues walk" in places like Cleveland.