Energizing a sluggish town center

New Urban News Article with images and sidebar, 10/1/2009

Best-of-kind businesses are being enticed to a new Main Street in Habersham, South Carolina, that had previously failed to catch on.

Despite the worst economy in decades, developer Robert Turner this year has infused new life into the town center of Habersham, a 282-acre traditional neighborhood development in Beaufort County, South Carolina. Habersham’s progress indicates how a poorly performing center can in many cases be reenergized — by attracting the right kinds of businesses and activities.

The town center, three blocks of Main Street built between 2003 and 2007, had never matched the success achieved by Habersham’s residential areas.

Roughly 500 dwellings, including townhouses, flats, and detached houses, have been built and sold in Habersham as a whole, and Turner says “we’ve probably sold another 275 lots that are going to be built on.” But while residential areas flourished, the three-story buildings on Main Street — laid out to accommodate businesses on the ground floor and living quarters above — failed to attain much vitality. Of the first-floor spaces, Turner says, “Some of them were leased up, but they weren’t really what we wanted.”