How the Bypass Changed Downtown Rockford Forever

Interstate 90's 1950s construction routed traffic around, not through, downtown Rockford, badly damaging its recovery chances. 1960s urban renewal aimed to remodel downtown into a "modern metropolis" and lure commerce back, including a State Street pedestrian mall — but its western portion reopened to traffic in 1984, and the mall was fully dismantled by 2009. A theater near Court House Square was demolished in 1986 for a parking garage. Combined with manufacturing collapse, unemployment reached 25.5% by January 1983. A 1986 preservation task force eventually led to 44 buildings being listed as the West Downtown Rockford Historic District in 2007