Speaking about public-private partnerships, [Tom] Walton said, “I don’t have the foggiest idea how directionally which way they’re going to go all the time, but when you bring people together, you figure it out. And when you find the common thread, then it actually builds momentum and takes off.”
Before a crowd of more than 100 people at the Helmerich Research Center at Oklahoma State University-Tulsa, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson signed a memo of understanding, agreeing to position the two-state region as a national hub of advanced mobility (AM), which includes drones, electric and autonomous vehicles, battery manufacturing, and transportation and logistics solutions.
Arkansas entrepreneurs are making a bold claim to be a global giant in next generation transportation, including flying cars, driverless vehicles, and drones. This claim follows Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson’s recent announcement to create the Arkansas Council on Future Mobility, an advisory board committed to attracting businesses, startups, innovators, and creators.
Rather than describing us as “the next Austin,” the Walton brothers painted a picture of a place that’s to middle America what Colorado is to the American West–a less crowded state that offers abundant outdoor recreational opportunities, an emphasis on the arts and fine, reasonably priced cuisine. Such a lifestyle not only attracts visitors, it also attracts smart, talented new residents.
Ambitious young college graduates are looking for an affordable home base where they can build their families and careers. Here’s a place that may not (yet) be on their list: Arkansas. For the past decade, coastal metros like New York and San Francisco dominated the landscape for the upwardly mobile, but the main story became how to cope with the high cost of living in those cities. One solution was to move into lower-cost neighborhoods, further pushing up rents and home prices. Others moved to lower-cost metros that shared some of the characteristics of those high-cost places; Austin, Texas, was one of the biggest beneficiaries of that trend.
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