Another fantastic piece from the team at ST, the article by Asia dives into more of patterns across the Arkansas region with some data to boot, leveraging the ST Finance Decoder post 2015.
Fayetteville isn’t the only municipality under the microscope. “I was also shocked to see such a small town doing so well!” Caldwell said of nearby Siloam Springs, population 20,000. While he cautions that the overall data may hide nuances, he suspects the city’s performance is tied to its more compact footprint and downtown investments—traits that have helped it avoid the most costly liabilities of sprawl. Springdale’s results were a bit more sobering. “I was shocked to see how poorly Springdale was doing compared to other cities in Northwest Arkansas.”
This Strong Towns video is 2 years old but it explores how Fayetteville had to initially take ownership of its downtown once it lifted restrictive and costly parking mandates discussed in the article.