After leaving Las Vegas, go smaller to think big
What happened in Vegas … local leaders hope doesn’t stay there.
For 39 years, our business and community leaders have been taking annual JAX Chamber trips to other cities, checking out what they’re doing and, in the process, giving JAX columnists easy fodder.
This year more than 100 people headed to Las Vegas.
Sin City, The Strip. It’s almost too easy.
So while the fingers want to type the screenplay for “The Hangover 6: The JAX Wolfpack” — and wonder which local leader is Stu — I will resist. (Feel free to send me your suggestions, though.)
Instead, I’ll say that while some of the criticism of these trips is valid — how much of what happens elsewhere actually makes it back here? — there is value in local leaders thinking about what other cities are doing. Even Vegas.
I lived in Nevada for four years in childhood. My sister still lives in Reno. As is the case with pretty much every tourist destination (including much of Florida), there’s a lot more than the stereotypical image.
In theory, the trip to Vegas wasn’t to bring back casinos, mega-hotels and a faux Eiffel Tower. It was to look at the city’s automated transportation and Innovation District.
But this chamber trip — and the talk about a city with an innovation district — brought to mind a trip I did this summer to Winston-Salem, N.C., and a suggestion for future chamber trips.
Make the big annual trip to a smaller place.
If you look at the list of the 39 years, it’s full of cities with metro area populations larger than here. Denver, Toronto, Houston, Dallas, San Francisco, Boston, San Diego, Chicago, Philadelphia, Seattle, Minneapolis.
Yes, some of the trips have been to places that are closer in size to us (but still larger) like Nashville, Indianapolis and Cincinnati. The 2015 trip was to Oklahoma City, which is slightly smaller (but has done interesting things with its waterfront). In 2007, local leaders went to Charleston.
For the most part, they’ve headed to much larger cities. It’s human/civic nature. Bigger is better. Or is it?
I think it’s safe to say that while we sometimes complain about a small-town mentality, we don’t necessarily want to be like many big cities. We don’t want to grow just for the sake of growth. We don’t want to be Vegas.
If we stop and think about who we are and what we want to be, it makes sense to mix in trips to some cities that while smaller are evolving in big, relevant ways — like Winston-Salem (metro population 676,673).
I had never been to Winston-Salem before this summer. My daughter, Mia, spent a month in a theater camp at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. When we went to pick her up, I was surprised by what I found.
The huge brick smokestacks offer a reminder of the city’s tobacco past. They also have become a part of its renaissance.
Downtown feels both old and new, mixing the historic with the trendy, conservative roots with progressive changes.
We stayed in a 1920s building that has been converted to a boutique hotel. We walked to a few of the more than 100 restaurants and bars downtown. We weren’t alone.
It’s not just that with a vibrant arts and food scene, Winston-Salem has grown as a tourism destination. According to Downtown Winston-Salem, within a 1.25-mile radius there are: 27,295 employees, 14,763 residents and 13,518 church members. (In comparison, Jacksonville has about 6,000 residents in its sprawling downtown.)
It’s a Southern city, a place that, like Jacksonville, has grappled with what pieces of the past to preserve as it moves into the future. Across the street from our hotel, there was a 1905 monument honoring “Our Confederate Dead.” Nearby, there were storefronts with rainbow signs.
The biggest evolution is on the site of an R.J. Reynolds Tobacco plant, now home of the Wake Forest Innovation Quarter — one of the fastest growing innovation districts in the country.
“It’s been extremely gratifying to watch these old buildings bounce back to life,” Mayor Allen Joines told Winston-Salem Monthly in 2013. “It lets us preserve our city’s tobacco heritage while putting us on a path toward a knowledge-based future.”
Not that this is what stuck with me most.
One morning I drove to nearby Salem Lake and went for a long run a trail around the lake, veering onto a paved path along Salem Creek.
When I arrived at the park, the large parking lot was nearly full. Groups of runners were gathering. Mountain bikers rolled by. At a marina, people rented kayaks and launched fishing boats. It made me wish I had brought my paddleboard.
I’ve run in places all across America. For urban runs, this ranks right up there among the best.
Afterward, I wanted to see how Winston-Salem paid for the infrastructure, amenities and maintenance. Turns out the citizens voted to pay for it.
In 2014, voters passed a referendum with five separate bonds — including $30 million for parks and recreation. In 2018, they passed another major bond package that includes more park improvements.
It’s not just parks and greenways. In the last 15 years, citizens have voted to spend more money on libraries, transportation, bike-pedestrian improvements, housing improvements in low-income areas and — wait for it — schools.
In 2006, voters overwhelmingly approved a $250 million school bond, paying for construction of seven new schools and major renovations and technological upgrades across the district.
I know Winston-Salem still has many of the same issues as other cities. The New York Times recently did a story about how midsize cities struggle to compete with large ones — and highlighted Winston-Salem’s attempts to “lay a new foundation for prosperity.”
When local leaders leave town, they might want to bring home some ideas from Vegas.
They also might want to see if what happens in Winston-Salem ... is worth having happen here.
mwoods@jacksonville.com,
(904) 359-4212