The Modest Town Of Hoquiam Evaluates The Future And Takes To The Water
Oct 19th, 2010 Posted in investment | no comment »Towns sometimes seem to grow all on their own, to become their own people, so to speak, practically independent of the people living in them. This is of course only an illusion, but the way time and culture shape a town, especially a small one, says a lot about the culture at large, and about the people who are shaping it, day by day, through thousands and thousands of decisions large and small. Sometimes, though, it is necessary to make a decision on some big changes.
The town of Hoquiam, Washington, to take one entirely random example, is in the midst of making some definitive decisions about its future. Originally a logging and lumber town, the people of Hoquiam display their pride at their town’s history with logging competitions and fall parades, and with an event that gets international attention, Loggers’ Playday. So but the town isn’t all lumber and sawmills; so how to make the most of the city’s other attributes, particularly its natural ones?
Possibilities for Downtown Development
This growth would occur along the Hoquiam waterfront, the part of downtown running along the Hoquiam River. What to do with riverside property is a question many towns face, and for cities with developed waterfronts like San Antonio and Baltimore, the investment was met with great success. An underused area became, in a few years, a popular area full of restaurants and bars, hotels and shopping, entertainment of all kinds.
The Hoquiam waterfront hasn’t seen much action since its heyday in the 1980s, but now there is development interest, and so the community has to think seriously about what kind of town it may want to become. Development is obviously no guarantee of success, nor will it necessarily turn Hoquiam into a metropolis, but decisions need to be made collectively, because of course growth isn’t free — tax money is the ruche fertilizer for civic growth.
Getting Big
Another consideration worth a moment is Hoquiam’s relationship to Aberdeen, the larger city to the east. This relationship, like probably all neighboring towns, is one of friendly rivalry. And rivalry often does good things for innovation. Hoquiam is at the mouth of the river, right on Grays Harbor, so it has opportunities no other town in the area does.
But Hoquiam must proceed cautiously. It is interested in preserving its past, as is evident in the 2009 revitalization of its train depot. So it knows how to preserve and honor its past; now it must seriously consider how it wants to carry that history forward, what kind of city it wants to become.
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