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I'm not talking about the rural areas and the state of rural KS is highly debatable. Sure there area few counties doing ok (Manhattan, a few meat packing counties and their influx of hispanics out west etc, but most of the counties in rural KS are are in a state of decline.
No, it's not just Manhattan and a few meat packing counties. Hays, Salina, Hutchinson, McPherson, Pittsburg, Newton, El Dorado, Wellington, Winfield, Halstead, Lindsborg, etc. are not Manhattan or meat packing counties. I will say it again because you CLEARLY are not reading what I am actually writing. All those cities are either growing or stable. None of them are in decline. You are just completely ignoring what I am saying and brushing it off as insignificant.
I also addressed the issue of the "most of the rural counties" being in decline, which is true because the counties were built so that a farmer could go to the county seat on horseback and return home before sundown. All those little county seat towns don't even have a reason to exist anymore, so they are naturally going to decline to fit today's technological realities. Their decline is a natural process every bit as "natural" as it was 100 years ago when those counties reached their peak population only because a farmer could only farm 160 acres with draft horses and 20 farm hands were needed on every farm. We don't have that economy anymore, so those places are naturally going to decline. When you look at the regional cities in Kansas, once again like Hays, Salina, Great Bend, Hutchinson, McPherson, Junction City, Emporia, Pittsburg, those are the places that are growing or stable. It would do you well to read "Cities on the Plains: The Evolution of Urban Kansas" by James Shortridge, a professor at KU. He explains all of this in the book.
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When it comes to the KC area (the primary area of KS which is roughly half the state's economy), the state only knows how to sprawl. How can you even dispute this? I mean the state has used hundreds of millions of dollars in incentives to develop rural Wyandotte County while the rest of the county basically sits and rots away. The state has also used a very large amount of incentives to develop lucrative suburban corridors like 135th, Renner, K-10, 119th, College Blvd etc. All while ignoring the part of KS that has the most potential to become an area that would be attractive to younger people and give the state an image besides farms and suburban sprawl.
Not true. Are you even aware of the Kansas Main Street program? Millions of dollars have gone into the development and revitalization of downtowns in Kansas from Hutchinson to Garden City to Coffeyville to Sterling to Parsons to McPherson. Once again, you are just ignorant of these realities. You know Johnson County and the immediate Kansas City area because you are from Kansas City, Missouri. That's all you know. You simply are not as informed or educated about the rest of Kansas. Wichita has been revitalizing their downtown for years. Lawrence's Massachusetts Street, where does that fit in with your view that all Kansas knows how to do is sprawl?
The state of Kansas does not sprawl any more than any other state. It has some suburban areas that are fast growing JUST LIKE EVERY OTHER STATE, but also has a large number of smaller towns and cities that have nice downtowns and other retail areas that are not sprawling. If you want to talk about sprawl, as far as I'm concerned Missouri sprawls a lot more than Kansas. Especially in the Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield/Branson, and the Lake of the Ozarks area.
It sucks that this forum is filled with people that either detest Kansas (GraniteStater) or are just very ignorant of Kansas (kcmo) or are bitter about Kansas for some reason (jbtornado) or people not from Kansas who don't do a good job of defending it or people from JoCo who barely defend the rest of the state and sometimes put down the rest of the state from their snobby JoCo perch.
I really don't care much about JoCo. I never have. I grew up in central Kansas. As far as I've always been concerned, JoCo might as well be in Missouri. I don't dislike it or like it. I'm neutral on it. It just happens to be technically within the borders of the state of Kansas due to geography. As far as being most important to Kansas, sure it's now the largest county by population. But personally I still think Wichita is a more important place in Kansas because Wichita has more manufacturing, more of a central downtown area, is the largest city in the state, is more centrally-located. So JoCo is important to Kansas, but it is not the only place or even the driver of what is happening in Kansas. There are a lot of places in Kansas that are doing well without being in any way connected with JoCo.
The only reason that I'm even bothering to respond to you is because you put this stuff out there and you have a huge audience here that wants to agree with you, and I am one of the only people that can counter what you are saying.
When I say "Kansas" I'm generically referring to Johnson and Wyandotte County. You are right, I'm no expert in outstate Kansas. I have been all over the state and am actually quite fond of the state in general. I have nothing against the entire state of Kansas. So know that when I say that KS does this or that, I'm mostly referring to the KS side of KC and any direction or help they get from Topeka.
I'm also not trying to win an argument that KS outside of KC is or is not doing well. I just said it was debatable. I posted population stats and the vast majority of the counties in KS are losing people. I have not fully analyzed that and don't plan to. You could be right, maybe small town KS is doing fine. A quick glance at the stats shows debatable data and they show that most of the growth that does occur and ultimately offsets the loss of people in the rest of the state, is in Johnson County.
Great Bend is not going after AMC. Neither is Wichita or Salina. But I still say "Kansas" is going after AMC because it's a coloborated effort between JoCo and Topeka, as well as Wyandotte now.
Lawrence is fine, but they act very independently from the rest of Kansas. I'm talking about Johnson County and Kansas City, KS here and if there was an example of a state that has totally turned its back on one of its major cities, it's Kansas and KCK.
And all that subsidized sprawl out by the speedway is hardly doing KCK much good. Bonner Springs may as well annex it so people stop calling it KCK.
When I look at this quote below, I see the KC area (JoCo basically) added 112k of the 119k new residents in KS when. But wait, Wichita and Mahattan added another 55k, so what's going on? The rest of the state is loosing A LOT of people. That's what's going on. But again, you may know more about it than me. I'll stick to the KC area. I'm fine with that.
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Originally Posted by kcmo
I got bored and came up with some interesting data. (this is all population change from 2000-2009 from the US census web site)
KANSAS:
First off, there are 105 counties in Kansas. Of those, a whopping 85 of those counties lost population between 2000 and 2009.
Of the counties that gained only six added more than 5000 new residents in nearly a decade. Nearly all of the counties that did add people added under 1000 residents.
Kansas counties gained 176,480 new residents from 2000-2009, but counties lost 57,483 for a net gain of only 118,997. So lets look at the counties that gained.
The Kansas side of the KC area added 111,767 residents (which includes Lawrence and a loss of 2,772 in Wyandotte County)
The Wichita MSA added 40,638 residents (which includes a loss of 2,459 in Sumner County)
Manhattan/Junction City area added 14,047 residents
Topeka area added 6,024 residents.
So this is where the new residents moved to.
KC area 66%
Wichita area 23%
Manhattan area 8%
Topeka area added 2%
The rest of KS added 1% of the new residents (mostly in a few counties, rural KS is a net loss and a pretty big one).
So basically, if you factor in losses in WyCo, nearly 70% of all new residents in the entire state of Kansas moved to Johnson County. One county. And that one county is nothing more than a suburb of a metro area anchored in Missouri.
Wichita holds its own and does well, the Manhattan area is doing ok. The rest of the state is typically losing people.
MISSOURI:
First off, there are 115 counties in Missouri. Of those, 53 counties lost population between 2000 and 2009.
Of the counties 62 that gained 18 added more than 5000 new residents in nearly a decade. Half the other remaining counties that added people added more than 1000 residents.
Missouri counties gained 429,940 new residents from 2000-2009, but counties lost 48,425 (St Louis County accounting for half of all of MO's loss) for a net gain of 381,515. So lets look at the counties that gained.
To keep things simple, I will only look at the primary urban counties in KC and StL, not the smaller rural counties around them, even though they are in the MSA. The numbers are not significant enough to mess with (although they are included in my state wide totals).
The Missouri side of the KC area added 127,497 residents (no counties on the MO side of KC is losing people)
The Missouri side of St Louis added 75,229 residents (which includes a loss of 24k in StL County)
Springfield area added 61,125 residents
Columbia area added 20,131 residents.
So this is where the new residents moved to.
KC area 34%
St Louis area 19%
Springfield area 16%
Columbia area added 6%
The rest of MO added 25% of the new residents. Nearly all the counties south of I-70 gained. Most of the counties north of I-70 lost.
Springfield is becoming a major player in Missouri. The metro area is catching up to Wichita.
StLouis is mostly "sprawling", growing (or migrating) west into west county and st charles county, but with little net regional gain.
KC is is growing at a modest, but steady pace across all the MO side counties while growth on the KS side of KC is almost entirely in one county.
So here is the bottom line.
MO and KS added (net gain) 500,512 residents between 2000 and 2009.
Of that, 239,264 chose the Kansas City area.
So the KC area accounts for 48% of all new residents in the states of MO and KS. Not bad!
You can't look at county population to analyze outstate Kansas. You have to look at CITY population. The city population of Hays, Salina, Great Bend, Garden City, Dodge City, Liberal, Hutchinson, Junction City, McPherson, Emporia, Pittsburg, Manhattan, Newton, El Dorado, Wichita, have not declined at all between 2000 and 2009. Most of those cities have grown and the ones that didn't grow remained stable and did not lose population. Those are the primary cities in "outstate Kansas". County population is a deceptive metric because the rural areas and small towns in those counties are losing people, which is a natural process that has been going on since the late 1800s when rural and small town Kansas reached its peak population, but the main regional cities in those counties are either growing or remaining stable.
Kansas is transitioning into a state dominated by about 20 regional cities, which is a natural response to today's economy and technology. Just as the development of the state into 105 small counties was the natural response to the economy and technology of the late 1800s. If the state of Kansas was settled today with today's technology, there would not be 105 counties. There would be about 20 counties, with a regional city in each region, and the surrounding areas would be entirely rural. So when you look at decline in population by county, it's a deceptive metric that doesn't tell you what is really going on. Most people don't understand this, so they mischaracterize a large part of the state as being in decline. When in fact it is more of an adjustment than a decline. And the proof of that adjustment is the fact that regional cities in those rural areas are either growing or remaining stable. I never said that those regional cities were adding more people than the suburban areas. I said that they were not in decline. I said that the characterization of the rest of Kansas outside of Johnson County as being in decline is not an accurate characterization. And yes, you and other people here were making that characterization. That was the reason that I made my comment in the first place.
You can't look at county population to analyze outstate Kansas. You have to look at CITY population. The city population of Hays, Salina, Great Bend, Garden City, Dodge City, Liberal, Hutchinson, Junction City, McPherson, Emporia, Pittsburg, Manhattan, Newton, El Dorado, Wichita, have not declined at all between 2000 and 2009. Most of those cities have grown and the ones that didn't grow remained stable and did not lose population. Those are the primary cities in "outstate Kansas". County population is a deceptive metric because the rural areas and small towns in those counties are losing people, which is a natural process that has been going on since the late 1800s when rural and small town Kansas reached its peak population, but the main regional cities in those counties are either growing or remaining stable.
Kansas is transitioning into a state dominated by about 20 regional cities, which is a natural response to today's economy and technology. Just as the development of the state into 105 small counties was the natural response to the economy and technology of the late 1800s. If the state of Kansas was settled today with today's technology, there would not be 105 counties. There would be about 20 counties, with a regional city in each region, and the surrounding areas would be entirely rural. So when you look at decline in population by county, it's a deceptive metric that doesn't tell you what is really going on. Most people don't understand this, so they mischaracterize a large part of the state as being in decline. When in fact it is more of an adjustment than a decline. And the proof of that adjustment is the fact that regional cities in those rural areas are either growing or remaining stable. I never said that those regional cities were adding more people than the suburban areas. I said that they were not in decline. I said that the characterization of the rest of Kansas outside of Johnson County as being in decline is not an accurate characterization. And yes, you and other people here were making that characterization. That was the reason that I made my comment in the first place.
If a county loses people does it really matter if a specific city inside that county is gaining? The end result is still the same. The county lost more people than whatever the cities gained. I'm sure there is some rural to town migration, but it's not enough to offset those that leave the county all together. People are migrating from rural KS to larger towns in KS, suburban Kansas City and out of state, but outside of JoCo and Wichita, the numbers are pretty rough. Despite examples of some towns doing ok and booming JoCo, the state generally loses more than it gains in rural areas. Much like the northern half of MO.
I understand where you are coming from though. It's not all bad news and there seems to be some towns in KS with strong economies.
All I'm interested in is why KS puts so much effort into subsidizing suburban sprawl, while KCK sits and rots away.
All I'm interested in is why KS puts so much effort into subsidizing suburban sprawl, while KCK sits and rots away.
Aside from gross overgeneralizations and unfounded opinions on this forum, I haven't seen any evidence that it does. How much state money actually goes into Johnson County vs. what goes into Wyandotte? Do you have any actual statistic for that or just your opinions? The KU Medical Center alone, which is very close to the urban core of KCK, probably gets more state money from Kansas than anything in Johnson County. And KU Med is every bit as "subsidized" by the state of Kansas as anything you will find.
From what I can tell, Johnson County grows not because of massive subsidies from the state of Kansas, but because of the city and county leaders in Johnson County, and because of the failures of the city of Kansas City, Missouri, which pushes the high-income growth over the state line into the more "desirable" suburbs of Johnson County. For the most part, I don't see the state of Kansas as having much to do with it.
Also from your comment earlier, I didn't get to it in my other comment, but I find it very convenient for you that you would characterize Lawrence as "acting very independently of the rest of Kansas", and yet continually characterize Johnson County as being very much wedded to and part of the rest of Kansas. Lawrence and KU is much more part of Kansas than Johnson County is. KU is the flagship state university in Kansas. There are large numbers of Kansans who have gone there as students or who have friends or family members who have gone there. It's the main university in the state. So Lawrence is a very important place for a lot of Kansans. Johnson County is just a KCMO suburb. Most people who live in JoCo are not even originally from Kansas.
This makes no sense to me. It's pretty easy to crush and recycle a car that's reached the end of it's lifeline. What exactly are you suggesting we do with older, inner ring suburbs and neighborhoods?
Nothing. To me, that's like asking what I suggest we do with old people.
Aging is a part of life for all things living or not. Some cities will get old and die - like the hundreds of ghost towns throughout the West, like Bodie, California that were once bustling mining towns with many thousands of residents. Others will survive and be rejuvenated along the way because of continued marketplace demand. For all we know, the land that Kansas City, MO sits upon today may be farm land 200 years from now. Would that be so bad?
The marketplace of the future holds the only answer to your question and that is the farthest thing from my control or concern.
Aside from gross overgeneralizations and unfounded opinions on this forum, I haven't seen any evidence that it does. How much state money actually goes into Johnson County vs. what goes into Wyandotte?
You are completely missing the point. It's not JoCo vs WyCo.
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Originally Posted by FreeStater
Do you have any actual statistic for that or just your opinions? The KU Medical Center alone, which is very close to the urban core of KCK, probably gets more state money from Kansas than anything in Johnson County. And KU Med is every bit as "subsidized" by the state of Kansas as anything you will find.
All that development by the speedway is heavily subsidized. It's Wyandotte County, but it's still subsidized greenfield sprawl while the built up part of KCK continues to deteriorate. Both WyCo and JoCo abuse the incentives. I have no problems with whatever subsidies that have been used for KU Med, if any. Actually, I would welcome more use of incentives to build up the KS side of state line near KU Med vs using them to build offices for Cerner or 2 million sq feet of retail space clear out by the speedway .
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Originally Posted by FreeStater
From what I can tell, Johnson County grows not because of massive subsidies from the state of Kansas, but because of the city and county leaders in Johnson County, and because of the failures of the city of Kansas City, Missouri, which pushes the high-income growth over the state line into the more "desirable" suburbs of Johnson County. For the most part, I don't see the state of Kansas as having much to do with it.
All you have to do is look at the AMC thread. AMC had no interest in Kansas till Kansas came to them willing to offer them a butload of cash. Kansas has to buy companies from KCMO. If JoCo were so desirable, KCMO companies would not have to be lured over with tens of millions of dollar in incentives.
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Originally Posted by FreeStater
Also from your comment earlier, I didn't get to it in my other comment, but I find it very convenient for you that you would characterize Lawrence as "acting very independently of the rest of Kansas", and yet continually characterize Johnson County as being very much wedded to and part of the rest of Kansas. Lawrence and KU is much more part of Kansas than Johnson County is. KU is the flagship state university in Kansas. There are large numbers of Kansans who have gone there as students or who have friends or family members who have gone there. It's the main university in the state. So Lawrence is a very important place for a lot of Kansans. Johnson County is just a KCMO suburb. Most people who live in JoCo are not even originally from Kansas.
The school's relationship with KS has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. The city of Lawrence is an island of liberalism in a very conservative state. Lawrence actually has an urban side of town with a "vibrant" downtown. The city is just not your typical KS town. Trust me, I know KU is part of KS, much of the population of KS is obsessed with the school.
I seriously doubt most people in JoCo are not from KS. It's probably at the receiving end of most of the losses in the rest of KS. Rural KS migrates to JoCo and contrary to popular believe in KS, there is very little migration of residents from KCMO to JoCo. It's probably pretty equal both ways actually and I would even be willing to bet that more people left JoCo for KCMO in the past decade than the other way around.
You are completely missing the point. It's not JoCo vs WyCo.
Oh, really?
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Originally Posted by kcmo All I'm interested in is why KS puts so much effort into subsidizing suburban sprawl, while KCK sits and rots away.
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I have no problems with whatever subsidies that have been used for KU Med, if any.
"If any"? The entire facility is a state subsidized facility. That was my point. You talk about how "the state of Kansas" doesn't invest in urban parts of KCK, but the KU med center is in an urban part of KCK and that is the state of Kansas' primary teaching hospital and medical college. And it is entirely "subsidized" by the state of Kansas, much more so than any of these "incentives" that you complain about, which are scraps compared to the amount of money that the state puts into KU Med.
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The school's relationship with KS has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. The city of Lawrence is an island of liberalism in a very conservative state. Lawrence actually has an urban side of town with a "vibrant" downtown. The city is just not your typical KS town.
No one said anything about liberalism until you brought it up. I've been talking about geography and economics. The city of Lawrence and the University of Kansas are tied together, and people who have a connection to the university also have a connection to Lawrence. You are trying to make Lawrence somehow not part of Kansas and minimize the fact that it is a very important place in Kansas.
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I seriously doubt most people in JoCo are not from KS. It's probably at the receiving end of most of the losses in the rest of KS. Rural KS migrates to JoCo and contrary to popular believe in KS, there is very little migration of residents from KCMO to JoCo. It's probably pretty equal both ways actually and I would even be willing to bet that more people left JoCo for KCMO in the past decade than the other way around.
This just shows how little you know. I've already had to correct you before on your inaccurate facts and figures about population and economic numbers in Kansas. According to Census figures from the year 2000, which is the most recent year for which data is available, only 34.8% of Johnson County residents were born in the state of Kansas. That was the second lowest percentage of born in state residents of any Kansas county. Nearly 2 out of every 3 Johnson County residents was not born in Kansas. And that was in 2000. It could even be less by now.
Just for comparison, these are the percentages of residents born in Kansas for these counties:
Percent of Persons Born in State of Residence: 2000
Census 2000 Summary File 3 (SF 3)
By far, Johnson County, Kansas has the lowest percentage of people born in state of any county in the KC metro area. The vast majority of people who live in Johnson County are not originally from Kansas.
For all we know, the land that Kansas City, MO sits upon today may be farm land 200 years from now. Would that be so bad?
Well this is clearly beside the point, but actually it would be terrible if in 200 years KCMO was a farm because all the dirt would be contaminated and the food would be full of toxins.
This is actually an issue with current urban farming, and it should be a reminder for anyone thinking of starting a backyard produce garden to have their soil tested.
But back on topic, your marketplace argument only works if the state was providing no subsidies for anyone anywhere. Instead, politics is creating an environment where a vast number of subsidies -- for businesses, for roads, for housing developers -- goes to one area and not another.
If you are against all those subsidies, and all those new roads being built for future growth, then your point of view is at least valid and fair (though i still wildly disagree with it on a fundamental level). Is that what you're saying?
Once again, aragx6, you say lots of true stuff. Living up to that moniker.
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