Saturday, January 28, 2012

The Death Of The Small Town

I live in a small town. If it weren't for McDonald's, Subway and a few other eateries there would be nothing in Charleroi-On-Mon...well except for the drug dealers. There are plenty of those apparently.

We all have to have are Targets (Hey I do!), Walmarts (Not so much), and other huge shopping centers that make me full of rage every time I enter one, that all the little stores owned by everyday people disappear. That's damn frustrating. These stores aren't really a convenience. I know its been said before, but they are the killer of small businesses and small towns.

When I was growing up in the 80s our downtown was pretty awesome! We had Might's a magazine/newpaper store, Orange's (A gift shop/card store that just closed it's doors after 118 years), several clothing stores, loads of shoe stores, and a Murphy's 5 and 10.

Oh and Corning Glass Works was our main industry. Let's thank those silicone implants for the demise of Corning in Charleroi, shall we? They sold off their profitable glass works to World Kitchen so that they could settle the lawsuits from the wannabe big boobed bimbos and their damn implants.

Ho hum.

And from there on Charleroi-On-Mon faded...most of the store fronts are empty and when new business tries to come in.....it fails.

I think it is so sad that we have to drive miles out of our way anymore to do shopping. The only grocery store in town is Save-A-Lot, which while nice and budget friendly, doesn't work as a total go to for grocery needs.

At what point will people realize that we need towns to thrive? And we need businesses in our towns? Maybe when gas prices hit $5.00 and driving 5 or 10 miles to the nearest Walmart becomes too costly. What do you think?

2 comments:

rashbre said...

So right. It is a shame when all the life gets sucked out of city centres. We were visiting some friends last weaken, went to the town centre near where they lived and it was the same story as yours. And the plans to rejuvenate centres are being blocked now because of the economy.

Janelle said...

Connellsville is a great example of this, although it started to die with the steel industry.