Rockville Town Center is one of the few downtowns around here that a city built, condemned, and then knocked down on purpose. And then mostly did it again.
The first version was an enclosed Rockville mall. It failed, emptied out, and came down. The second is the open-air square that’s there now, the plaza and the clock tower and the winter ice rink.
In between, the heart of downtown was cleared and rebuilt almost from scratch. Most of what’s standing today is younger than the people walking through it…