To the editor:

I spent the first 25 years of my life in Lawrence and visit family there twice yearly. I can’t overstress the value of Lawrence’s downtown. Other than the university, it defines the city more than anything else. It’s what other cities wish they had. And it should be protected and made better through any legal avenues available, including the proposed historic district.

I live in a community that just allowed developers to build a shopping center in the center of town, and guess what it looks like? A modernized version of an old-fashioned, multistory downtown (to replace the one they tore down in the 1950s and ’60s … oops). In fact, these “lifestyle centers” are actually the hottest thing in retail real estate right now. Shoppers have voted with their pocketbooks: Rather than enclosed malls, they want to shop in an open-air district that resembles the downtown they remember from their hometowns (or saw in a movie).

I remember well the battles of the 1980s over saving downtown Lawrence from the “cornfield mall.” With enclosed malls in decline nationwide while both new and old downtowns are booming, Lawrencians should feel pretty vindicated that you held out against that mall developer 20 years ago. And if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then you should feel pretty flattered that billions of dollars are being spent elsewhere to create what you’ve had for 150 years.

Marc Coan,

Lake Oswego, Ore.