Building a better life in the Parkland By Victoria Kemper
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ron, Madison, St. Francois, Ste. Genevieve and Washington Counties all add different growth opportunities for the Parkland. Each county works both together and on their own to bring businesses into the area and improve the quality of life for those who call it home. The success of one only helps lift the others.
Iron County The most recent project in Iron County has been the Shepard Mountain Bike Park which hosted the Big Mountain Enduro, April 30 to May 2. “Everybody was freaking out about it because we were just getting the park open and then we have to put on this big race,” Arcadia Valley Tourism Committee member and owner of the Fort Davidson Café Chuck Correll said. “But it all went very well. The riders are just ecstatic about the park.” Correll said they are still collecting numbers to determine the economic impact the race had to the area but he knows his restaurant, on the outskirts in Pilot Knob, had a really good weekend. 10 | ParklandLiving | June 2021
Missouri Cobalt is another area of interest in Madison County. The old lead mine was reopened as a cobalt mine in 2018 and has been ramping up ever since. The location is the largest near term primary cobalt reserve in North America.
“We already have new businesses that are opening as a result of the park,” Correll said. “We have a restaurant that is going to be opening soon in downtown Ironton. People are snapping at rental properties down here like candy.” Correll said as far as he knows tickets to the top of the mountain have continued to sell out. He said they are working on a proposal for a phase two expansion of the park which would include a more efficient solution for getting people to the top of the mountain. “I think we are going to see people relocating down to the Valley and operating their businesses out of the home, as a result of the park,” Correll said. “This was one of the things that we discovered as we were doing our original business case. “We looked at a lot of the parks that had been built in the last 10 or 15 years. They get the riders, that’s all great, they get tourists and all that but what they really said that the key economic impact was people relocating to their area because of lifestyle.” Correll said, the influx of people
looking for homes increased the property values, and in turn increased the tax base. “We would love to see growth,” Correll said. “That is the whole emphasis on all of this but we don’t want to lose our quaintness. That will be the balancing act for the next five to 10 years.
Madison County Recently Madison County has been looking toward the future and its youth with the development of the new Sports Complex located out Commercial Drive. “The new complex has two softball fields and one baseball field and it has already been excavated to add two more fields in the future,” Madison County Commissioner Larry Kemp said. “These are nice fields. “The facility will be good enough to where our local high school teams can host conference or district tournaments. It’s even good enough for a state tournament.” Kemp said traveling teams in the
