Who remembers when Gunbarrel Road in East Brainerd was a two-lane byway through cattle pastures with a few small houses here and there?
We do, and one doesn’t have to be very old to have that memory. Those were the days when folks were wondering why anyone would build the largest shopping mall in the state of Tennessee out in the middle of nowhere. Then in the blink of an eye, Hamilton Place Mall opened its doors to the public in August 1987 – nearly 34 years ago.
And who remembers the last time our city or county or state leaders suggested putting the brakes on growth, growth, growth?
That’s a tougher question since it’s a such a rare event.
So it was a bit of an eyebrow raiser last week when Hamilton County Mayor Jim Coppinger, who usually applauds new homes because “growth” boosts county property tax revenues without the pain of pushing a tax increase, acknowledged the obvious: