Montgomery’s Momentum 2040 proposal tests whether fiscal discipline, public projects and quality of life can reshape the city’s economic future.
By Frank Robinson, Director of Economic Development for the City of Montgomery
Before the transformation, there was a decision.
For generations, the basic premise of economic development was straightforward: create jobs, and people will follow. Communities built industrial sites, extended roads and utilities, offered incentives and recruited companies. Employers arrived, jobs were created, families moved in, and the tax base grew.
Business recruitment still matters. Montgomery continues to compete aggressively for companies, jobs and investment.
But today, it is no longer enough.
Employers need talent, and talent has choices. Families consider housing, schools, safety and amenities alongside employment opportunities. Young professionals have more choices about where they establish their careers and lives.
Increasingly, jobs can follow people. That shift has profound implications.
People are asking: Can I build a life here? Can I afford to live here? Is downtown alive? Are there restaurants, parks, entertainment, arts and culture? Is there housing I want? Are there things for my family to do?
And perhaps most importantly: Do I want to stay here?
Those are economic development questions now.
Communities that understand this shift recognize that roads, utilities, and industrial sites still matter. But so does housing, parks, entertainment, cultural institutions, vibrant downtowns and public spaces.
Some of America’s most compelling urban transformations show us what can happen when cities make those investments. Today, we see the finished product. We do not see the uncertainty that existed beforehand.
Before the transformation, there was a decision.
QUALITY OF PLACE IS ECONOMIC INFRASTRUCTURE
Oklahoma City’s transformation did not begin with a splashy corporate relocation announcement. It began with an uncomfortable realization: the city itself wasn’t competitive.
In 1993, residents approved a temporary one-cent sales tax to finance the original Metropolitan Area Projects, or MAPS. About $350 million went toward projects including a downtown ballpark, convention center improvements, the Bricktown Canal, improvements along the Oklahoma River, a new library, and cultural and recreational facilities.
It was a significant bet residents made on their city.
Over the decades that followed, voters continued investing in parks, trails, transportation, sports facilities, convention infrastructure and public spaces. Since 1993, Oklahoma City leaders have placed 15 major capital-investment tax initiatives before voters.
Their record: 15-0. Those commitments total nearly $10 billion.
When Mayor David Holt was born in 1979, Oklahoma City was America’s 37th-largest city. Today, it is the 20th-largest.
Oklahoma City didn’t abandon business recruitment. It turned itself into a city that businesses and people wanted to choose.
WHEN QUALITY OF LIFE BECOMES ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Greenville, South Carolina’s success was not inevitable. One of its defining decisions was to remove a functioning four-lane bridge that obscured a 60-foot waterfall in the heart of downtown.
It was a decision few traditional economic development plans would recommend. But the bridge came down, and Falls Park, with its iconic Liberty Bridge, opened in 2004.
The market responded. Research from the Urban Land Institute found that approximately 75 percent of downtown Greenville’s investment occurred after the park opened.
What had been hidden beneath transportation infrastructure became one of the city’s defining public spaces and a centerpiece of its downtown.
Chattanooga’s transformation tells a similar story, but on a different scale.
In the 1980s, Chattanooga struggled with industrial decline, population loss and a downtown disconnected from one of its greatest natural assets: the Tennessee River.
The Tennessee Aquarium opened in 1992 as part of an effort to reconnect the city with its riverfront. More than 1.5 million visitors passed through its doors in its first year.
But the aquarium wasn’t the entire economic development strategy. It became a catalyst. Public spaces followed. The riverfront expanded. The Walnut Street Bridge became a pedestrian destination. Hotels, restaurants, museums, entertainment and residential development grew around a revitalized downtown that increasingly invited people to walk, gather, visit and stay.
By 2012, more than $2 billion had been invested in downtown Chattanooga. Today, the Tennessee Aquarium estimates it generates approximately $187 million in annual regional economic impact, supports more than 1,500 jobs, and helps generate approximately $9 million in local tax revenue.
Neither Greenville’s park nor Chattanooga’s aquarium fits neatly into the traditional economic development playbook. Yet both helped change how residents, visitors and investors viewed those cities.
That is the nature of catalytic investment. The question isn’t simply: “What will this project directly produce?”
Sometimes the more important question is: “What could this investment cause to happen around it?”
FISCAL DISCIPLINE CREATES THE CAPACITY TO INVEST
There is an Alabama example unfolding today.
For years, Mobile wrestled with its aging Civic Center until leaders decided demolition and construction of a new arena was the best path forward.
Mobile is investing approximately $300 million in a new arena not simply to replace its aging Civic Center, but to anchor continued investment in a larger downtown entertainment district on the 22-acre site.
In March 2025, Mobile went to the bond market for $250 million to help finance it. That number gets attention. But another number matters just as much.
Before making this investment, Mobile spent years reducing legacy debt by more than $200 million while building reserves and maintaining strong credit ratings.
Mobile didn’t choose between fiscal responsibility and investment. Fiscal responsibility created the capacity to invest.
That distinction matters.
Will every expectation for Mobile’s investment be realized? Time will tell. That’s precisely the point.
Greenville couldn’t know exactly what Falls Park would become. Chattanooga couldn’t guarantee what would follow the aquarium. Oklahoma City couldn’t know what three decades of MAPS investments would ultimately produce.
Transformational investments are made before transformation makes them look obvious.
Before the transformation, there was a decision.