Expert: Sioux Falls 'development sugar high' will cost city long-term

Outward growth in Sioux Falls and other communities is creating a “development sugar high” that will eventually lead to a financial drain on the city, an urban design expert told attendees of a Monday forum.

Charles Marohn was the keynote speaker at Community Matters!, an event hosted by Downtown Sioux Falls Inc. at the Icon Lounge.

The problem isn’t unique to Sioux Falls, said Marohn, a professional engineer who has helped analyze city growth patterns in towns across the United States.

“We’ve committed to stuff that’s making us poorer out on the edge,” Marohn said.

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Marohn is the Minnesota-based founder of StrongTowns.org. He started the website as a blog, but the organization has grown into a nonprofit and an online trove of information and data about urban design best practices, with members that include designers and public officials from across the United States.

He blamed a post-World War II mentality toward growth for a pattern of costly development that ignores future implications. Cities favor large-scale finished projects over more organic, incremental growth, he said.

In Sioux Falls and other communities, the trend has created large swaths of land on the outer edges of town filled with homes and businesses that cost more to serve than they pay out in taxes.

Adding subdivisions, giant retail centers or event centers away from the core creates additional maintenance and service costs that can last decades.

“We’ve framed these investments as growth. And from City Hall, we need to start framing it differently,” Marohn said. “We need to actually shift our culture.”

City Councilor Greg Neitzert participated in a roundtable discussion with Marohn and others after the presentation. He called the event thought-provoking and said it touched on some of his ongoing concerns.

"I've been concerned that the core is going to rot as we spread out so quickly," Neitzert said. "How do we prevent that?"

Marohn recommended cities start approaching growth with an investment model used by financial institutions. They should use the conservative approach used by banks or a strategic approach used by venture capital firms, Marohn said.

That means spending money closer to the core, where projects are more likely to pay a return on investment, or spending small, incremental amounts on projects that will pay back huge dividends if they succeed, and won’t break the bank if they fail.

Neitzert said he liked the idea of using smaller, less costly projects to address the city's needs.

"So often we focus on the big projects," Nietzert said.

Marohn highlighted some small roadway improvements he advocated for in his hometown of Brainerd, Minnesota, including chalking out narrower lanes to slow traffic in some areas and trimming trees at a park to reduce crime.

Instead of making top-down planning decisions, cities should give residents the ability to more freely influence growth in their own neighborhoods, he said.

“We want to allow neighborhoods to create their own positive feedback loops,” Marohn said.