Becoming What They Were By Becoming Something New

Historic towns present a challenge and an opportunity for urbanists

Every time I visit Flemington, things are a little different. It’s still the same town and the same surroundings and certainly the same county. If anything, I’m struck by how much things look the same when I get off one of the main roads—how little I’d be able to mark or measure the passage of time over years, even decades. But the pace of change, in th…