'Hey There Delilah' by Plain White T's is playing. The only reason I know this song exists is because A and I were riding in her car. It came on and I mentioned that I liked it well enough. Apparently she doesn't because it was overplayed. I wouldn't know, I don't listen to the radio much.
I was looking through some pictures that I took around Wichita last fall and two came to my attention more now then when I first took them. The first one is of Carlton school. It was this huge school. Two stories, all brick, and intimidating. Imagine being a second grader and your mom drops you off for your first day of school and here is this monstrous, almost demonic, looking building. You'd shit a brick. Anyway, it's gone now. They tore it down. And it good reason. It was abandoned, homeless people were using for a place to sleep (which I guess is too bad they tore it down, now they need somewhere else to sleep), it was grafettied all around. The second picture I took was of the old McClellan building. There are some businesses that still use the building, but for the most part it is empty. And it is a lovely looking building. If I owned a business, I would want it to be in a building like this one. It just has an old time feel about it. 
The point to this all is that as the urban sprawl occurs, more and more old buildings in downtown are left abandoned or practically empty. Why would anyone want to pave over an open field, or tear down some trees, to construct new office buildings when there are some right downtown? I know that in any big city (even though some don't consider Wichita a big city, this opinion still applies) has a hard time getting businesses to stay in the downtown area. People don't want to drive around there and don't want to deal with all the bad things that are down there. Drugs, homeless, the misfortunate are all black eyes to downtown, any downtown. But how do you deal with those situations? They are always going to be there. Do you just ignore them and go about your business?
The point to this all is that as the urban sprawl occurs, more and more old buildings in downtown are left abandoned or practically empty. Why would anyone want to pave over an open field, or tear down some trees, to construct new office buildings when there are some right downtown? I know that in any big city (even though some don't consider Wichita a big city, this opinion still applies) has a hard time getting businesses to stay in the downtown area. People don't want to drive around there and don't want to deal with all the bad things that are down there. Drugs, homeless, the misfortunate are all black eyes to downtown, any downtown. But how do you deal with those situations? They are always going to be there. Do you just ignore them and go about your business? It is an unnecessary evil, urban decay, but it is also inevitable. The majority wants to look the other way while the minority struggles with trying to save that which was condemned. An ugly business it is.
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