There are a couple recent articles up at madison.com which have caught my eye. After reading them I decided that it's probably time to put the nails in the coffin of the Madison of yore. The city's center, at least.
Yesterday The Cap Times published an article called "Steakhouses sizzle on Madison's restaurant scene" which details the numerous steakhouses around town. I found this bit particularly interesting:
William Toomey, wine director at Fleming's, calls the steakhouse boom "the coming of age of Madison."
As the city grows, the wealthy population grows, he said. "It's a natural evolution."
The article was followed up today with this one that heralds the demise of Bennett's on Park Street, the centrally-located home of Smut'n'Eggs. The owner credits the smoking ban for his declining business.
This really encapsulates the downtown area for me. The zeitgeist of downtown now is best described by Ford Prefect – mostly harmless. That's my impression, anyway. It feels like the quirky and the colorful have been driven out to be replaced by the generic and the safe. Some pockets of local goodness remain, to be sure, but Madison has "come of age". More rich folks also means more poor folks. More wealth on the isthmus means less attention paid to the south side. More steakhouses and more crime.
I just have a hard time swallowing the notion that having enough rich people to support oodles of fancy steakhouses indicates a city "has come of age".
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