Uncontrolled Sprawl

To the Editor:

Thank goodness someone in a position of power finally said it, because I’ve been saying it for years but few listen to a business person who doesn’t have wealth or family connections.
I refer to Fargo City Commissioner Mike Williams’ statement in the HPR of September 18,2008, in which he wrote of the city, “I believe we need to encourage more development of property in our current footprint before expanding our boundaries prematurely.”
Amen.
Are Commissioner Williams and I the only ones who see the incredible number of unoccupied buildings in Fargo, especially in the downtown area? Does it make sense to everyone else that developers (backed by whose money?) in Southwest Fargo build a strip mall, get one restaurant in it, move a few blocks south, build another strip mall, get one business in it, move a couple blocks south?...
Other than the City of Fargo sucking up tax dollars, who can be gaining from this frenzy of building on what was, a year or two ago, farm land on the outskirts of town?
There is little sense of community here, or of neighborhoods, because one must drive all over creation to get what one wants or needs. What a waste of time, and gasoline. And what a strain on the public services required to support the sprawl.
Millions of dollars were spent on repairing Downtown streets and sidewalks. Wouldn’t it make some sense to make the existing business spaces more desirable by not spreading out into the country?
I don’t suggest we stop development, but there’s much that can be done “in our current footprint.”
For example, the building on the corner of 1st Ave N and 12th Street that B.D.S. Books moved into last year had sat empty for many years; now it’s completely remodeled, houses three businesses and has space for one more. The city gets more taxes, and the citizens get a used book store, a model airplane shop, and a custom sewing business within walking distance of Downtown.
Please ask Commissioner Williams to write more of his thoughts on what can be done to curtail the sprawl and work to fill in the empty buildings that already exist throughout Fargo (and Moorhead).

-Brad Stephenson
Fargo