Every Chronicle reader has gotten her single message. Rents are too high for stores to be profitable. Today's venture-funded downtown companies can pay any price short term. The shakeout of dot-coms has already begun. Gone are places to buy groceries, shoes, cars, clothes, luggage, books, hardware, paint, lumber, furniture, pets, fabrics, sewing machines, appliances, etc.
Retail shoppers are mainly female, but the new downtown is mainly male.
Commuters with no option other than driving are feeding meters in parking spaces that retail customers used. Street closures for festivals, construction, and movies further restrict both access and parking. Tourists are visiting less, since their preferred pastime is shopping. Downtown ought have the tax increment financing structure proposed when downtown was down and out. The excess tax money ought to go to subsidizing retail.