Trouble in River City: Kevin Klinkenberg on Why So Many Communities Are Struggling

Send us Fan Mail

If you’re like me, as you’ve driven along the Mississippi River, or even around the country, you’ve noticed communities that aren’t doing too well. Many of these are older urban areas, but I see plenty of small towns struggling, too. What’s going on? Isn’t this just the free market at work? To dig into this issue, I invited my brother, Kevin Klinkenberg, onto the podcast. Kevin is an architect and planner who has spent much of his career working to improve communities. In this episode, we talk about what makes cities and towns good places to live. Kevin describes the traditional way that cities and towns developed and how we upended all that in the United States. Kevin briefly details some of the policies that transformed development patterns and the consequences of those policies. We finish by looking at two Mississippi River towns—one that is doing well and one that isn’t. Kevin emphasizes that there are no silver bullets to magically turn places around, but communities aren’t helpless, either. 

In the Mississippi Minute, the American Queen has been in the news, but for all the wrong reasons. The company went bankrupt, and a rival bought their boats in the bankruptcy auction. Will the American Queen return to river cruising? We don’t know, yet, but you can let the company know you’d like to see that happen.