Urban Growth Management 219- The most certain process of change for small towns is that which effects the
demographic trend in the direction of school leaver out-migration and the in-
migration of older-aged unemployed and retiring residents. The net result is
an overall maturing of country town population structure, although the
retired sector is a consumer force (and a skill resource) in its own right.
Another low-income dependency group comprises solo-parenting and de-
institutionalized persons. They are attracted to small towns because of low
rents, the lower than large-town property prices, and low local property taxes.
Future population size is difficult to predict for small towns because the fertile
cohort is generally low.^38 Of course were a growth industry or a large service
facility to alight, a younger job-chasing population would spring back into
profile – but this possibility, as noted earlier, is unlikely. The overall popula-
tion size of small towns well away from metropolitan centres will not change
all that much, yet their age composition can be expected to vary as the out-
migration of younger people puts reduced-value residential properties on the
market, which may in turn be occupied by inward-bound low-income house-
holders. Small towns can be characterized as physically unchanging places,
prone to adverse variations of demographic composition; and it is their public
service base, rather than their commercial component, which is most fre-
quently in need of retention and refurbishment. - Low levels of economic activity and an unfavourable prospect for natural pop-
ulation replacement underscores changes in public services. Settler society
governments provide reduced public sector services in small towns, often cut
back without consultation or anything like an open assessment of the likely
impact. Rationalizations, as with the shrinking of rail networks, have poleaxed
many centres, although the abrupt withdrawal of the likes of a postal agency
can have equally devastating effects. Post offices and secondary schools come
top of the retention list, followed by the need to retain citizen advisory
services, banking outlets and medical clinics. These settlements offer a sense
of community, a slower and well-ordered pace, certainty and security, and a
clean environment – all desirable attributes beyond price. Small towns can
survive economic-base changes, they can cope with demographic-base
changes, but what shocks them to their foundations are draconian closures of
public sector services.
Small towns are not economically significant, although they are usually socially
viable on account of shared community knowledge, and to an impressive extent
they can be self-sufficient in providing kitchen crops and property maintenance.
This is not a case for denying them essential services (schools, clinics and the like)
on the grounds of their low capacity; yet it has to be recognized that commercial
and industrial regrowth for settlements beyond the magnetic pull of larger towns
and cities is unlikely.
There is something else, a grass-roots capability, which implies for small
towns a capacity to make something out of virtually nothing. This can also be
likened to middle-out growth. There are vacant buildings and affordable
services, and people with all manner of skills reside in these communities. The