New Jersey Main Street Named One of the Best in the U.S.

There's such a charm and inviting feeling when it comes to being on a Main Street. A thriving Main Street is a place, but it's also a special feeling of community and being around people from your town. While a Main Street may seem like a location from the past, but in a time when people spend so much time online instead of with each other, the Main Street really takes on added importance. It's a place where you can see your neighbors, face to face, and enjoy each other's company. As it turns out, one New Jersey Main Street has made the cut for one of the best in the U.S.

The experts at Reader's Digest have put together a tally of the best Main Streets in America. "There's nothing better than strolling down a cute main street in a new town," they note, which is totally right. They add that, "It may seem like the quaint, charming American Main Street is a thing of the past," but that's not the reality, and there are still lots of beautiful Main Streets across the country.

So, which New Jersey Main Street was named one of the best in the country? It's the Ridgewood, New Jersey, Main Street, which Reader's Digest notes is in a family-friendly aera, complete with a movie theater, boutique shops and restaurants. "Some standout structures are the late-18th-century Archibald-Vroom House—the oldest building in the village—and the sprawling California Mission Revival-style train station, where commuters can get into midtown Manhattan within an hour," they add of this New Jersey spot.

Did you know that the Main Street, as we know it, hasn't been around too long? The Main Street in America has only been in existence for about a century. "In the 1920s, to invoke Main Street was to call up an image of the dullness of provincial life," What It Means to Be American notes, adding that by the time the 1930s rolled around, the "Main Street represented the bedrock of America's embattled democracy. For decades, Main Street stood for the local; today it's an importable model of planning and development that can be set up almost anywhere."

The Main Street in America means so much more than just a bunch of stories and buildings lined up on a street. The Main Street really brings together the idea of a loving community, where people from all over the area and different neighborhoods come together and socialize with each other on the street.