BEST URBAN SHOPPING AREA
Shopping in the suburbs involves driving to a mall or strip center. Once there, you plunks down your money and you drive home with the goods. There?s no civic component to the experience, because you?re never in a public place.
You can import the concept of a mall into a walkable city, and it works surprisingly well if connected at both ends, as in the case of Copley Place/Prudential Mall. In this case, it functions as a street, providing a way to get from one place to another; it?s a shortcut from Back Bay to the South End.
Cambridgeside Galleria, by contrast, is an isolated destination. Like its cousins in the suburbs, it?s not urban.
Here?s a list of ten places to shop in urban Boston. By any criteria you choose, pick the three you think are best. (And tell us why.)
Newbury Street
Harvard Square
Charles Street
Quincy Market
Downtown Crossing
Hanover Street
Copley Place/Prudential Mall
Coolidge Corner
Boylston Street, Back Bay
Harvard Street, Allston
Shopping in the suburbs involves driving to a mall or strip center. Once there, you plunks down your money and you drive home with the goods. There?s no civic component to the experience, because you?re never in a public place.
You can import the concept of a mall into a walkable city, and it works surprisingly well if connected at both ends, as in the case of Copley Place/Prudential Mall. In this case, it functions as a street, providing a way to get from one place to another; it?s a shortcut from Back Bay to the South End.
Cambridgeside Galleria, by contrast, is an isolated destination. Like its cousins in the suburbs, it?s not urban.
Here?s a list of ten places to shop in urban Boston. By any criteria you choose, pick the three you think are best. (And tell us why.)
Newbury Street
Harvard Square
Charles Street
Quincy Market
Downtown Crossing
Hanover Street
Copley Place/Prudential Mall
Coolidge Corner
Boylston Street, Back Bay
Harvard Street, Allston