To the editor:
We went for a Sunday afternoon drive to Cabot today. Did a little Sunday evening shopping too.
And we have some bad news for old-time Jacksonville residents who are used to Jacksonville having more residents than little Cabot.
We hope it’s not news to Jacksonville’s mayor and city council, but it sure looks like the Cabot area is well on its way to passing Jacksonville in population in the near future.
To this Jacksonville resident, our city seems more compact, and only now starting to spread out.
Everyone knows Jacksonville’s business district: the triangle consisting of the Main Street, North First Street and access roads of U.S. Hwy 67/167.
Want to be amazed at a city’s growth?
Just take a trip to the first Cabot exit and travel down Hwy. 321 to Hwy. 89, up Hwy. 89 to the new high school, take a short run down Hwy 32, then back to Hwy. 89 and downtown, Hwy. 89 back to Wal-Mart and on to Hwy. 5, and then back to U.S. 67/167.
New subdivisions and businesses are popping up all over the place.
And, that growth stretches from Greystone to Ward, Austin, and all around Cabot.
Cabot has an excellent new bowling alley along with Funtastics game center.
Home-grown business and franchise-businesses seem to be all over the place.
The new Wal-Mart Su-percenter, Home Depot, Walgreens, Kroger, K-mart, Colton’s Steak House, an Italian place in the bowling alley, and Dixie Cafe are just a few of the interesting places to check out.
All Cabot appears to need is its own central state government complex with offices for the welfare department, revenue office and unemployment office.
As an outsider, the only things holding Cabot back appear to be a lack of four- and five-lane roads to handle all the traffic jams, and a lack of diversity in shoppers and employees.
The big corporations and franchises might just have to recruit workers from Jacksonville if someone ever files an Equal Opportunity Commission complaint about diversity in employment in Cabot.
If you’re unemployed in Jacksonville, you might want to take a trip up to Cabot to what may be your Land of Opportunity!
Name Withheld
Jacksonville
