More good news comes for downtown Portsmouth this past week. Due to expansion, DesktopStandard (nee Autoprof) is moving from upper Islington Street and NOT to Pease as had been previously expected. Instead, they will be setting up shop downtown in the old Bottomline building.

Not that I have anything against Pease per se, but it does my soul good to see that downtown is repopulating with technology companies. Back in the day (the e-Coast hey-day donchaknow), a friend of mine often said upon parting that he'd "see me around campus." He meant downtown Portsmouth, and Downtown really was like a campus. You'd pound away on your keyboard for a while, then you'd pop out to have a coffee and a cheese danish (mmmmm... marscapone!) on a bench in the sun, then later out for lunch at any of a dozen delicious eateries, then maybe head down to decks after work for a couple cold ones by the river. And all the while, you'd be bumping into your peers, colleagues, clients, and buddies. It was a real community of like-minded folks, interacting and sharing... cross-pollenating, if you will, like students and professors and hanging out on campus between classes. Good times, good stuff.

Interestingly, P-Herald reporter Adam Leech's hook for this story was that the Portsmouth Economic Development Council (EDC) has proposed a discount in the parking garage for companies leasing 25 spots or more. Apparently, this proposal was spurred entirely on DesktopStandard's interest in moving downtown. As you can tell from the above reminscing, I agree wholeheartedly with Portsmouth City Manager John Bohenko when he says, "That’s 40 people downtown that at lunch time go out and spend money in the downtown and after work, stay downtown to do some shopping." So any of you City Councilors reading, take note... This is an excellent example of a good local goverment doing good for business.