Communities that stifle these retailers will lose consumer spending to competing retail centers in other towns. Many existing downtown retailers have become better merchants because the level of competition has increased. New businesses on the edge of town make a major investment in the community through their merchandise and personnel. In addition, there are lower cost location options for small start-up or existing business on the edge of town. Maintaining the status quo of an idealized version of the past ignores evolving consumer preferences, products, and technologies.
Sprawl is actually a way to keep communities alive.
In the final analysis, the real indicator of whether commercial sprawl negatively impacts a community resides with the community itself. If local residents indicate that retail sprawl development is a concern, then there are several things that can be done to shape the progress and reinforce the local community. Specifically, new store expansion can be encouraged that meets certain criteria in terms of location, size, and attractiveness, while minimizing negative environmental, cultural, scenic, fiscal, and economic effects. The better informed the public is concerning the advantages and disadvantages of sprawl development, the better choices they can make when deciding how they want their community to be. Addressing sprawl is a complicated task that asks many people, including business leaders, to challenge their ways of thinking.