Is CDA an anomaly?

[pnwguy2]

Sorry, but Walmart, Safeway, Albertsons doesn't care how bucolic an area is. Population drives this pure and simple. You can’t put a lid on population growth. Either live with it or move further out.

[banjomike]

Originally Posted by pnwguy2

Sorry, but Walmart, Safeway, Albertsons doesn't care how bucolic an area is. Population drives this pure and simple. You can’t put a lid on population growth. Either live with it or move further out.

Yup.
It's ironic; 65 years ago, some of Albertson's earliest expansion from the company's mother store in Boise were into the smaller, bucolic towns.

The thought was to build one store large enough to serve several small towns that were all relatively close together.
The supermarket was the first food store that was large enough to do that, and the stores back then were 1/3 as large as they are now, or even smaller.

[nm9stheham]

Originally Posted by pnwguy2

Sorry, but Walmart, Safeway, Albertsons doesn't care how bucolic an area is. Population drives this pure and simple. You can’t put a lid on population growth. Either live with it or move further out.

That's right .... all the new people in the world gotta live somewhere. Nothing new or anomolous about this... it is just CDA's turn. Spokane had it's growth spurt. etc... and these changes are a lot more stark and 'explosive' in the West, as there as so many fewer cities/towns of any size, compared to the East. Until more 'regional trading centers' (in the economists' vernacular) get developed, this will continue.

Going 'out' is the personal solution if this is not your cup of tea, but many don't like the lack of convenient shopping and urban/suburban things like liots of restaurants, etc.

Plus searching for a job in a rural area is a very different process, and there is a lot more 'settling for what work is there at the time', or being independently employed... something with which most people are not comfortable. Those who want a high degree of security usually won't like rural living.

[Valley Native]

Originally Posted by apple92680

Kootenai County, Idaho is fast becoming Orange County, CA of the 1970s. Spokane County is like Los Angeles County at that same time. Both of them have all of the same hallmarks.

Spokane is the more "urban" and liberal bigger city, while Kootenai County is a provincial patchwork of rapidly growing suburbs with competing interests.

Instead of crossing over the once-infamous "Orange Curtain" at Buena Park, one now crosses the "Red Curtain" when leaving Liberty Lake, WA and entering Stateline, Idaho.

Sorry, but I don't see the comparison at all. Even in the 1970s, Los Angeles was a huge metropolis, an international destination, and had more population than Spokane will ever see in a millennia. Spokane is a mid sized city at best, and barely a blip on the national radar. Coeur d'Alene is nothing like Orange County. It's a tourist destination, but still a fairly small city, and it will always have plenty of wilderness & natural beauty in its surroundings. Unlike Orange County, which was non stop suburbia even as far back as the 1960s.

[Clark Fork Fantast]

Very interesting article about the real estate market in Kootenai CT:
https://bonnercountydailybee.com/new...te-market-snp/

In the four major areas — Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls, Hayden, and Rathdrum — the median sales price for a home has increased between 35% and 44% since 2020, Smock said. Notably, premier properties with price points in the millions have experienced record sales, jumping from 26 closed sales in 2019 to 24 in 2020, yet already at 144 so far this year — which isn't half over.
Today, Smock and other Realtors find that if a buyer isn't qualified to afford a $350,000 home, there is “nothing to buy.”
“That’s a really tough pill to swallow for a lot of individuals,” she said.
Smock noted that the increase isn’t driven by the real estate agent but by a lack of inventory and people who are willing to bid over the listed price.

[MaltCueOur]

I heard the world population will peak at 9 billion by 2050 and then start to decline, so stop worrying about the population density in Idaho. It'll never be a problem.

[Syringaloid]

Originally Posted by BostonJad

Listen I am not dissing the state just CDA and general artificial environments you find replicated in many parts of the country. I did find history and culture in Wallace ID and the towns nearby. Even in Spokane you'd find old buildings and neighborhoods seem to exhibit their own character like Browne's Addition and Garland District. In CDA its just soulless cul de sac developments.

It's been a while since I've been in CD'A, but I remember a quaint downtown with historic buildings and residential neighborhoods with historic homes that extended outwards from downtown.

It has been a small town for a long time, so you focused more on the growth than the history and character of the actual original town.

[volosong]

Originally Posted by Clark Fork Fantast

Very interesting article about the real estate market in Kootenai CT:
https://bonnercountydailybee.com/new...te-market-snp/

The dilemma with low inventory is that those who are already living here on the prairie do not want more housing to be built. They want to preserve the open space. As a member of the city council, it is a no-win situation for me. No easy answers. I probably won't run again when my term is up in two years.