A couple of blocks from my front door is a Main Street that is beginning to thrive again. Since we moved in there have been numerous restaurants and small shops (generally specialized and boutique-y things) that have opened, and we patronize them whenever possible, but also go to larger stores further away for things that our Main Street doesn't have, including to Wal Mart. I would buy local currency as a way of supporting my Main Street and encouraging people who don't live a block from it to do the same, but not as an anti-Wal-Mart statement.

OTOH, the people on my street are working hard to keep another development from happening. Right now my street ends at a state owned hospital center. A developer has bought up land adjacent to the hospital and wants the state to release some of its unused property for him to buy so that he can build one of these huge promenade-type districts anchored by a Target store and including a hotel, movie theater, shops and restaurants. To do this, the county/state would agree to build a new exit from the beltway that would go OVER the houses down the street and dump off into this proposed development, then to avoid having traffic backed up down at my end they'd make my end of the street (the end that turns onto our Main Street) a dead end. So the only access to my currently small little quiet street would be through a beltway exit or through a horrible shopping center, my neighbors would be living underneath a beltway exit ramp, and our thriving Main Street would be dealing with another level of competition that it likely couldn't handle.

So I'm not feeling very friendly towards huge chain stores and big box developments at the moment.

Sarah