I'm sorry, but where are the people who think that nice downtowns aren't the result of long-term planning and hard work by city officials? I'm genuinely curious

I'm sorry, but where are the people who think that nice downtowns aren't the result of long-term planning and hard work by city officials? I'm genuinely curious, as this is not something I am accustomed to hearing. Whenever the conversation of a nice downtown comes up, it's almost always accompanied by conversation about the planning and execution that must have happened to make it that way.