Markets and Livable Cities

What sells homes? What do the denizens of cities enjoy? Street Markets. Street markets are amenities that buoy the value of places, homes, neighborhoods and cities. Public entities make places more livable, make homes more attractive and make streets friendlier by creating street markets, or permitting those created privately to exist.

Think Los Angeles and you think cruising in your car down Sunset Boulevard. But even in LA people wish for walkable neighborhoods. A recent NYTimes article describes "A scruffy stretch [of street} known as Sunset Junction, bordering Silverlake" that has become "an appealing mix of low-key restaurants and eclectic shops that draw(s)...creative types with long mornings and limited incomes." This is just the "creative class" that contemporary cities need to attract "clean" industry and higher paying jobs. What attracts this type of citizen? The street market, is one of a variety of amenities that makes that "scruffy" street attractive. The farmers’ market that sets up every Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon (Sunset Boulevard between Edgecliffe Drive and Griffith Park Boulevard) provides food to the ethnic restaurants, interaction between neighbors and the opportunity for the people watching that is at the core of creative activities.

Besides places to go, people want homes to live in, homes that retain their value and that value is retained, even enhanced, with proximity to neighborhood amenities, like street markets! In Santa Fe, the South Capital neighborhood is gentrifying in part because of the urban renewal project in the area called the Railyard, where developers are locating "mixed use" commercial, arts and residential sites. Not surprisingly the Santa Fe Farmers Market is nearby. Cities large (New York) and smaller cities (Madison Wi) are creating new public markets in hopes of attracting the creative class, hi-tech jobs, and other amenities that make their cities more livable. Furthermore, location, location, location, is key to maintaining property values and the system of markets found in Chicago and other cities are testimony to government fulfilling multiple purposes by (again) adopting the street market as a tool of public policy.

The smart public servant creates markets as part of larger plans for livable and attractive places, anticipating the desires of the smart migrant or existing resident as well as the wishes of the smart business interested in relocating or remaining in the city.