Raub报告: The Austin-圣安东尼奥 Corridor

I think cities are like people in that each and every one of us has a unique personality, skills and experience. No two of us are alike, even brothers and sisters in the same family. How different is Dallas from Houston, albeit they are both large cities with close to 7 million populations and both in the great state of Texas? The Dallas bumper snicker says, “Keep Dallas Pretentious” while Houston is still the oil capital of the world with a huge manufacturing base. Now think of Austin and 圣安东尼奥 as sister cities along a short stretch of Interstate 35 joining Central Texas to South Texas. Austin is the super attractive, energetic and hip, but, well, unrepentantly weird. 然后, 圣安东尼奥, the other sister in the family, 是有吸引力的, but not quite as smart and hip, but with a very sweet, endearing traditional charm and very family oriented, and everyone likes her. Same family but different personalities. Can these two sisters ever really go into business together? 嗯.

大约在1980年, Mayor Cisneros tried very hard to attract a computer consortium to 圣安东尼奥 but we lost out to Austin. He then decided that Austin would win those competitions because of their high techness but 圣安东尼奥 could do the manufacturing and thus was born the concept of the Austin-圣安东尼奥 Corridor. A popular book of 1982, “Megatrends” by John Naisbitt, named the Austin-圣安东尼奥 Corridor as one of key growth areas of the United States. There is no questions both cities are booming and growing together. The mid-cites don’t like the idea, but Schertz-Cibolo-New Braunfels are northern 圣安东尼奥, at least as part of the Statistical Metropolitan Area and Buda-Kyle-San Marcos are southern Austin. The fresh water meets the salt water somewhere south of the Prime Outlet Malls and the Creekside Town Center. Can these two cities ever blend into one Megapolis? 谁知道?

A number of years ago I discussed with County Judge Nelson Wolf the possibility of the Florida Marlins relocating to 圣安东尼奥. One of his major points was that only if Austin joined with 圣安东尼奥 would we have the mass of population needed to engage the TV and Radio media needed to make it work, as the media drives the revenues. We have to compete with Houston and Dallas for a share of the Texas media pie and only together do we have the mass. Recently, Red McCombs said the same, when he rejected that 圣安东尼奥 should seek an AAA ball club. He was emphatic that SA and Austin needed to unite to bring in an MLB team instead of a lesser franchise. And then there is the discussion of a regional airport. Do we need a new one?

圣安东尼奥 lacks the direct connections and size, but Austin already has Bergstrom which is larger and can easily be expanded. Conclusion: we have a regional airport and it is already in Austin. Together, the Austin-圣安东尼奥 corridor could turn into something much more.

We like to trumpet that 圣安东尼奥 is the 7th largest U.S. city and by one measure of population that is true but, sorry, it is not meaningful. Austin is within a few years of passing 圣安东尼奥 in Metropolitan population, which counts all of the surrounding counties for both cities. 然后, there is the GDP measure of a city’s actual productivity, the total of our goods and services produced. 我们讲到哪里了?? Austin is #32 ($115B) and SA is #35 ($104.7B), with Sacramento and Nashville in between. Dallas is #5 ($504B) and Houston is #4 ($525B). SA不是在增长吗?? Yes, but Austin is growing a bit faster. And our traffic is better. So, like every member of a family, 圣安东尼奥 needs to be happy with who we are, to celebrate our unique talents, history and charm and to work hard to make our strengths even greater. Besides, I think being “weird” is highly overrated.