Finally. A New Vision of Akron.

 

NOTE: Every once in a while, I post on a subject that doesn't directly relate to advertising, marketing, publishing or design. This is one of those times. Every once in a while, I'll touch on issues that are also close to my heart, like urban planning and design, architecture - and in this case, my hometown.

This is an exciting time to be living in Akron. If you’ve lived here all your life, like I have, you can just sense that we’re seeing the beginning of a new era—with a change in leadership, a change in attitude, and some other interesting changes that will help us as we move forward over the coming years.

I’ve mentioned to people that anyone who’s over 50 and lived in Akron most of their life carries a sort of burden. Many of us remember when downtown was a crowded and vibrant place, the rubber factories were going full tilt, and our neighborhoods were stable, attractive and strong. Nostalgia is a mixed bag, though. Memories of what used to be can make it hard to re-imagine something new.

If you lived through the 70’s and 80’s – it would have been easy to think that Akron’s day had come and gone.

We were no longer “The Rubber Capital of the World” – a burgeoning, prosperous industrial town that had actually been one of the fastest-growing cities in the world between 1914 and 1920. By the time Chrissie Hynde sang that her “city was gone,” she pretty much hit the nail on the head—both literally and figuratively.

As I said, having witnessed what this city was actually makes it a little harder to imagine now what it could be. My generation knows the city will never return as the kind of boom town it once was; we still tend to judge anything new that comes along by the standards and experiences of the past.

Yet there is a feeling that things are on the upswing.