PennDOT's Plan Will Threaten Our Small Towns

PennDOT's designation of Route 41 as a major truck route has destroyed the quality of life for businesses and residents in small towns along the road. As has happened in so many other places, PennDOT's planned 4-lane highway, with bypasses around small villages and towns, will encourage vehicles to speed past old communities, inflicting even more damage. PennDOT's new highway will facilitate sprawling development and stripmall retailing outside of town, putting these towns further at risk and voiding much of the effort that has been spent to revitalize them.

The Future of Small Towns is an Important Political Issue

The Pennsylvania Economy League's series, "IssuesPA" identified the decline of small towns and cities as an important issue in the current Governor's race:

Across Pennsylvania, cities and boroughs have struggled to survive amid changing land development patterns. As more people moved to the suburbs, our regional centers lost population, jobs, and tax base. Cities and boroughs, which in 1980 contained 52% of the state's population, only had 46% by 2000 - with a total loss of over 500,000 residents from our urbanized centers over 20 years.

During the 1990s, Pennsylvania's cities lost 4% of their population and our boroughs lost 2%. Meanwhile, our largely suburban townships grew 10%. We seem to be vacating the cores of our regions. These population shifts not only drain people, resources and vitality from our cities and towns, they also wipe out valuable open space and farmland. From 1982 to 1997, Pennsylvania consumed land at the 4th fastest rate among 13 competitor states — while we had the slowest population growth. See http://issuespa.org/issues/13

In recent years, many policy makers and citizens have recognized the value of Pennsylvania's many historic towns and small cities. Groups have organized, scores of programs have been developed and millions of dollars have been spent in an effort to reverse the decline of small towns and their Main Streets.

"...we must make our older core communities competitive with suburban developments. Combined with imaginative incentives to bring new life, growth and appeal to older communities, Pennsylvanian's can set about minimizing sprawl and - in the future we foresee - can pattern vigorous development in harmony with the careful use of natures resources." Report of the Pennsylvania 21st Century Commission

Recently, a diverse group of statewide policy organization formed The Coalition for Community Investment. Group describes itself as:

"...an alliance of statewide organizations with a strong interest in restoring and reinventing our central business districts, be they urban or rural, small or large, while simultaneously preserving our past and protecting our environment. This coalition includes the Pennsylvania Downtown Center, the Pennsylvania Environmental Council, Preservation Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Parks and Recreation Society, the Natural Lands Trust, the Pennsylvania Land Trust Association, the Pennsylvania Planning Association, the Pennsylvania Heritage Parks Association and 10,000 Friends of Pennsylvania. It was essentially this same group that worked so diligently on the Heritage-21 Funding Initiative, which eventually became the foundation for the State's Growing Greener initiatives. [see www.padowntown.org]

The group's publication, "Building on Our Legacy" points out:

"In countless communities around the country, the sterility and sameness of suburbia are attempting to be modified by transforming malls, usually in name only, in to "town centers." New suburban shopping complexes are today being designed not as the mega-malls of the past four decades, but as traditional neighborhood shopping districts. All of this is done to somehow connect us to that sense of place that we have spent so much time and so many resources systematically dismantling in our core cities and traditional neighborhood centers.

The non-profit organization, Project For Public Spaces, Inc., has researched and developed a workable model for defining the intangible components that people want in their communities, such as neighborliness, sustainability, attractiveness and accessibility.

But the list also includes items that may only be found in our established downtowns and traditional town centers; items such as a connection with the past, walkability, pride, and places that are real and unique. These elements transcend the variables of city size, income and race. They are elements that relate to the needs of the individual, the family, and the community.

The bond between the residents of this Commonwealth and those places they hold most dear was supported with the recent publication of the Pennsylvania Historic Preservation Plan. When asked why preservation was important, the top answer, from more than 50% of the respondents, was to "provide a sense of place." When asked what resources were most important to preserve, the top two answers were "historic neighborhoods, and main streets/downtowns."

Fortunately the process of authentic "place-making" or perhaps more appropriately "place-preservation and restoration" has been embraced by many cities and towns in the Commonwealth.

Our state government has developed many initiatives. The Pennsylvania Main Street Program, the Pennsylvania Community Revitalization Program (CRP), which is administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development provides grants, assistance and technical help for community revitalization and improvement projects.

CRP funds may be used for community revitalization and improvement projects that improve the stability of the community, promote economic development, improve existing and/or develop new civic, cultural, recreational and industrial facilities, assist business retention, expansion, creation or attraction, promote the creation of jobs and employment opportunities and enhance the health, welfare and quality of life of Pennsylvania citizens.

Since 1996, the Department of Community and Economic Development has channeled more than $38 million CRP dollars into revitalization projects in Chester County. This figure represents 11 % of the total $342,500,000 CRP commitment to community revitalization statewide from 1996 through 2001.

The following are some of the projects funded by the CRP in Chester County from 1996 through 2001.

• Street lights
• Little League Revitalization Projects
• Improvements to Little League Field
• Downtown housing projects
• Library expansion
• Land purchase
• Infrastructure improvement
• Police Station Renovation
• Preservation of Battlefield
• Traffic control
• Main Street Program
• Construction of Park Pavilion
• Standardization of fire hydrants
• Reconstruction of bridge
• YMCA community pool renovation
• Streambank restoration
• Installation of sediment and erosion control

These projects reflect a major commitment in public tax dollars to improve and maintain the quality of life in Chester County towns. S.A.V.E.'s solution will build on these efforts, not tear them down. S.A.V.E.'s solution will cost a fraction of the billions PennDOT plans to spend, would improve the quality of life, and give our older historic communities a real chance to grow and thrive.