REGIONAL VISION

CONNECTING PEOPLE, PLACES, AND ORGANIZATIONS FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT

While the RVCCD planning effort was intended to assist the small rural communities in the River Valley Region, it quickly became clear that this effort needed a larger perspective to be successful. Fort Moore covers a huge area, with impacts across the landscape. The nature of the conservation efforts through the ACUB program highlight how the installation’s influence transcends local political boundaries. At the same time, this unique and valuable landscape is also a shared resource that the participating communities could utilize for their long-term economic prosperity. Addressing the impacts of these land acquisitions meant looking beyond individual communities and thinking about how the cities and counties could work together around shared goals to enhance their collective prospects.

Because the project’s focus was on the rural communities in the six-county study area, Columbus was not directly involved in this planning effort. The city is an essential part of any regional discussion, however, as it dominates the River Valley Region. Columbus is the third-biggest city in Georgia and a mid-sized city by national standards. With a population of more than 200,000 and a local gross domestic product of $16.5 billion, the lion’s share of people, jobs, and economic activity in this area are based in Columbus. Despite its relative size and importance, Columbus thrives not alone but as part of the regional context, and it is necessarily linked to its neighbors, depending on them for labor, infrastructure connections, environmental services, and other support.

“Hub and spoke” is a mental model used to describe a wide variety of situations in which a central element is linked to multiple smaller nodes that contribute to it and/or draw from it in some way. This hub-and-spoke concept is increasingly being used to describe models for rural development in a variety of contexts.

A key function of any hub is to connect people, places, and organizations in ways that promote rural development. While a “hub” is defined as “the central or main part of something where there is most activity,” understanding its “spokes,” or outward linkages in the local and regional economy, is equally important for understanding their wider roles in rural development. The hub-and-spoke concept is applicable to many activities related to the diverse social, cultural, health and well-being, economic, technological, and environmental needs of rural places.67

Columbus as a hub for the River Valley Region

In terms of economic development, Columbus is an obvious hub to which the surrounding rural communities contribute and from which they can draw for their collective and shared benefi t.

During the public input portion of this project, communities repeatedly expressed the desire to preserve their rural character and leverage their natural resources; thus, viewing Columbus as a hub for a regional tourism initiative is an opportunity to advance local economic development. As part of this study, UGA researchers analyzed the tourism and outdoor recreation economies in the Columbus metropolitan statistical area (MSA). Appendix A contains this analysis. Columbus currently annually generates approximately $1.1 billion in tourism-based economic activity.68 Despite the numerous attractions and amenities in the surrounding landscape and nearby towns, very little of that makes it way out to the rural communities. Over 90% of that economic activity is contained in Columbus; approximately 5% goes to Harris County; and the RVCCD counties account for between 1.4% and 0.1% each.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of visitors are passing through this rural landscape every year, either to get to Columbus or Fort Moore, or to visit the numerous state parks, WMAs, and other attractions within the study area. In addition, thousands of hunters and anglers also travel to this region seasonally, and many thousand more visitors pass through on their way to nearby attractions such as Plains, Georgia, Callaway Gardens, Warm Springs, or Selma, Alabama. Currently, the region’s rural areas offer only a limited number of lodging, dining, and shopping establishments. These travelers represent an economic opportunity for the rural communities in this region, and developing more options for these visitors to shop, eat, stay overnight, or otherwise spend money in these communities can help spur future economic growth.

Understanding and inventorying existing assets is a critical first step in promoting rural tourism and economic development.69 Therefore, the UGA team compiled a list of the identifiable attractions across the RVCCD region, many of which are highlighted in the Community Profiles section earlier in this document. An interactive regional asset map is available on the project website at www.rivervalleyccd.com.