What to Expect from City Garden: are Parks Downtown’s Next Silver Bullet?

The Washington Post has a story today titled "City parks, bringing urban centers back to life," featuring Detroit's Campus Martius, Houston's Discovery Green and City Garden in St. Louis. It seems that for some the search for a downtown silver bullet never ends. The author states that today's downtown parks are serving, "a role previously assigned to the '80s-era performing arts center and the '90s-era downtown sports venue."

This is very likely the expectation, or at least hope, of many. In St. Louis, downtown's savior was the Arch grounds, then the Gateway Mall, the Spanish Pavilion, a revitalized Union Station and St. Louis Center (and I'm sure I've missed a few). Now it's a better Gateway Mall, the renovated Peabody Opera House, a new baseball stadium and Ballpark Village. And if downtown parks are to be "charged with spurring development and creating downtowns that are places to live, not just work," St. Louis is about to see this effort writ large with the $300M+ redevelopment of the Arch grounds.