This weekend they're having an arts festival downtown. Which is a pretty unusual setting since the downtown area is generally seen as degraded, polluted, noisy, and unsafe to be in.
But it all makes sense when you throw in a good amount of police to watch over, and some really good performers.
Downtown San Jose is a neat case study. Most people all over the world are born into ready-made cities, which had solved their major problems long before. San Jose hasn't. Running the city like it's still 1950 and ignoring basic urban infrastructure laws has made the downtown area... as many would put it... a polluted, stinking town.
Fortunately 10 years ago some people started thinking about that. And 5 years ago they finally got the nerve to do something. And since then, the city has been transforming itself, little by little.
It's something I see as kind of a privilege... getting to watch a run down urban center transform itself. It's the stuff you spend years reading about in urban design textbooks, but can never quite put your finger on it until you actually see it happen.
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