In the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election, there has been a renewed focus on the challenges of America’s rust belt -- that prostrate land between the Great Lakes and the upper Midwest, littered with shattered hopes and shuttered steel mills.
In particular, much attention has been paid to the socioeconomic problems facing sizeable cities like Cleveland and Detroit, which have been hammered by factory job losses, social decline and a ruinous opioid epidemic. But what about the smaller cities?
A new analysis shows more modest-sized towns like Lowell and Albany are home to unique challenges, yes, but also some exceptional opportunities. It’s a finding worth paying attention to, lest we fall victim to a set of false narratives ourselves.
“The important thing about this report is that it puts a focus on a different set of cities than the ones we hear the most about,” says Armando Carbonell, chair of the Department of Planning and Urban Form at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, which conducted the study. “It recognizes that they have very particular challenges and may need a specialized approach in order to have success.”
Some of them are meeting those challenges head-on and have a lot to show for it. They can tell us quite a bit about how to succeed in this often unforgiving land.
The entire analysis is available for download at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy’s website. City Lab also has an excellent write-up here.