"Downtown things will be great when you're, downtown ..."

In 1965 British pop singer Petula Clark extolled downtown, where one could forget all her worries and woes.

Can things be that great again for downtowns? People in cities and towns throughout the region have not given up on the American tradition of downtown - but their way of looking at downtowns is evolving.

Downtowns were once the nexus of communities. That changed beginning in the 1970s and 1980s when retail shops moved to large shopping malls.

Downtown is rarely the place to go shopping anymore. Less than 10 percent of the 2,903 business licenses issued in Rogers in 2007 were for downtown businesses.

However, downtown is still the heart of most cities, said Ed Clifford, president and chief executive officer of the Bentonville-Bella Vista Chamber of Commerce. Downtown is the hub of Bentonville and no other place can serve that function, Clifford said.

Bentonville is also the county seat of Benton County and downtown is home to the Benton County Courthouse and most of the county's offices.

The same can be said of Fayetteville and its downtown, which is the county seat of Washington County and home to the Fayetteville Divisional Office of the U. S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas.

City government is located downtown in Rogers and Springdale and Benton County has opened an annex in downtown Rogers, which houses several satellite offices.

But a downtown needs more than government to keep it vital.

Marge Wolf said a downtown needs large employers, a way to put a lot of people downtown. People create a demand for certain services, said Wolf, executive director of Main Street Rogers.

Northwest Arkansas cities struggle to revitalize their downtowns with varying success. They must balance the past, present and future and find the money - public and private - to invest.

Wolf said it is important to keep downtowns because that's where the identity of the town is. It's history.

"Rogers' heritage and its character have been established by its downtown," said Bill Watkins, a member of the Main Street Rogers Economic Restructuring Committee. "If we forget that heritage, then it's just a spot in the road where we're trying to drag people to spend their money."

Full Story: http://www.nwaonline.net/articles/2007/12/31/downtown/large.txt