Faux Suburban Downtowns Challenge Traditional City Centers

North of Dallas in the suburb of Plano, "Legacy Town Center is one of dozens of faux downtowns popping up across the country, from Kansas City to Washington, D.C., spurred by a demand for urban living scrubbed of the reality of city life. A careful mix of retail, residential and office space built with traditional materials such as stone and brick, Legacy looks like a city but has neither panhandlers nor potholes."

An increasing backlash against the sprawl typical of many growing urban areas coincided with the formation of the New Urbanism movement in the 1980s. Eventually, developers discovered that "it's much easier to make a fake city than it is to work on real downtowns with their patchwork landholdings and planning restrictions."

The suburban mixed-use concept "also attracted developers looking for alternatives to malls, a concept rapidly losing favor among shoppers. Only one mall has opened in 2006, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers, a New York City-based trade group. By contrast, more than 60 so-called lifestyle centers -- outdoor shopping areas with plazas, fountains and pedestrian streets -- are planned to open this year and next."

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