With the ever increasing number of large outdoor retail complexes going up all over the United States, it would seem that the nation's historic downtowns are getting pushed by the wayside.

Even though these cookie cutter facilities are debuting faster than the latest book in the Tim La Haye and Jerry B. Jenkins "Left Behind" series, downtown areas seem to be getting a little more attention as the bland mega-center leaves people yearning for the good old quaintness of downtown.

The main consideration in re-development of these areas is historic preservation. As part of the National Trust for Historic Preservation's criteria for a certified National Main Street Community, a historic preservation ethic must be a part of the planning process. The guidelines state:

"Historic preservation is central to the Main Street program's purpose. The historic buildings and public spaces of a traditional commercial district enrich civic life and add value--on many levels-- to the community. Developing a historic preservation ethic is an ongoing process of education and discovery for a community and for a local Main Street program."

People seem to be coming back to downtowns slowly but surely. According to the 2000 Main Street Trends Survey, retail sales were up in 56 percent of the 200 historic Main Street communities surveyed. Crowds at downtown events grew 78 percent of the time. One disappointing trend that the survey pointed out was the closing of historic movie theaters, a product of the increased production in multi-plex theaters.

Attention to Detail

The Pearl Street design has contributed to an increase in business growth, with more than $60 million in new public and private investment in the city's center. Six additional blocks of Downtown La Crosse have been redesigned at a cost of approximately $150,000-per-block.

Walk through any downtown area and you will notice a tremendous attention to detail. From the buildings to the light posts to the tree grates, there are added touches everywhere. Most downtowns are unique, and take on the character of the surrounding people and city. Look closely at the light poles, bollards and benches and you will see ornamentation on many of these amenities. Plus, most of the amenities are reproductions of the originals that adorned the downtown streetscape so many years ago.

Walk around any outdoor retail center and you've got the same old blandness surrounded by the same "big box" retailers.

The Pearl Street Streetscape in La Crosse, Wis. was a key phase-one public improvement project in the City Vision 2000 Master Plan for Historic Downtown La Crosse. The project was intended to help breathe new life into a deteriorating and inactive downtown. By designing a new and attractive Pearl Street reminiscent of the streetscape's original character, the city hoped to create a vibrant setting for downtown business growth and revitalization, and to take advantage of the downtown's significant core of historic architecture.

"We used the University of Wisconsin at La Crosse's extensive archival and photographic library," said project designer Gil Jevne, ASLA, of Schreiber/Anderson Associates in Madison, Wis. "They had a lot of good pictures of old Downtown La Crosse with its original electric lights."

Jevne added that gas lights were the first to be used in Downtown La Crosse, but the design was going after the original Union Metal lights of the early 1900s.

Schreiber/Anderson Associates worked with Enterprise Lighting, a representative for Sun Valley Lighting. Sun Valley provided the lighting amenities and bollards for the area.

The historically accurate reproduction of the five light fixture now adorns Pearl Street, just as it did in the early 1900s. Sun Valley Lighting and Schreiber/Anderson Associates used the photographic archives of the University of Wisconsin at La Crosse as a guide to reproducing the orginal fixtures.

"We tried to create this family of amenities with historic period benches, bollards and bike racks," Jevne said. "We were going for a look from the 1920s. We've been finding that here in Wisconsin, most of these communities draw their influence from that period."

Because of the attention to detail, Jevne said there was several variations of the light before the exact fixture they were looking at in the archived pictures was created.

"It took the better part of a year to arrive at a drawing and conceptual design that met with (Schreiber/Anderson's) parameters and the original design of the project back at the turn of the century," said Jerry Roth, a representative for Enterprise Lighting. "There was photographs of the equipment on Pearl Street that were taken around the turn of the century and we blew the photographs up and basically created tooling from the photographs."

The fixtures on Pearl Street and the surrounding Downtown area, which is the largest such area in Wisconsin, includes a five light fixture that is a historically accurate reproduction of the fixtures originally in place nearly 100-years-ago. The fixture has a large globe in the middle surrounded by four smaller bulbs. The pole sits on a base that is embossed with a wreath design on all four sides. There are also bollards along the street that are

six-sided with a single ball atop the amenity.

The rest of Downtown features a one light fixture and a

22-foot fixture with a scrolled curved arm which has become the standard for the remaining La Crosse area to be revitalized.

La Crosse Sees the Benefits

Shops along Pearl Street, inspired by the restored historic flavor to the area have remodeled their store fronts to match the surrounding streetscape. Most of the community has drawn their influence from the early 1920s according to Landscape Architect Gil Jevne of Schreiber/Anderson Associates in Madison, Wis.

The first two blocks of Pearl Street were completed in 1995 and 1996. The city has since applied the design to six additional blocks at a cost of approximately $150,000-per-block. Similar design treatments have also been completed for historic Main Street. The Pearl Street design has been extremely successful, contributing to a significant increase in business growth, downtown traffic, in-fill developments, and Civic Center attendance, helping to spur on more than $60 million of new public and private investment in the city's center.

Inspired by the street's restored historic flavor, business and property owners have followed suit and enhanced the look of their buildings with facade remodeling, painting, new signage, and other improvements.

"When the 'tin men' came through and tried to modernize all the historic store fronts they said, 'you don't need all that stained glass, you need tin,'" Jevne said. "Now, it has all kind of snowballed with the city doing all of this historic streetscaping, and the business owners are following suit and they are discovering all of their original store front facades and beautifying their buildings."

This broader revitalization effort was recognized on national television when President Clinton, while campaigning in La Crosse and speaking from a Pearl Street podium, remarked about the city's "beautifully restored downtown."

The Pearl Street design is being extended to other downtown streets every year, creating an extensive and unique historic district that is now in its seventh phase of development.

"The Department of Transportation in Wisconsin loves the job so much they've actually thrown a pot full of money in to continue the lighting all the way to the Interstate," Roth said. "The City of Osh Kosh saw photographs of this project, and adopted it as their standard for the downtown of Osh Kosh because they loved it so much."