The development of a city is continually a touchy act, as much art as mercantilism. A town that has been constituted for one explanation may find the demand to research other options as times transform, which inescapably, of course, they do. How this township goes about remaking itself says a lot about how hardworking the township itself is, but it also serves as a reflection on us and our recent times.

Hoquiam, Washington is an interesting example of these changes. Hoquiam was to begin with a logging metropolitan, a bygone it recalls with an annual event — Loggers’ Playday. On top of that, there’s a logging rivalry and accompanying parade every fall. Although where some traditions are dateless, basic to the framework of a metropolitan’s culture, others have to be created anew.

Consider the Hoquiam waterfront. This stretch of city in the Hoquiam downtown has been underused since its previous heyday in the 1980s. Now that some development has taken an interest in it, there’s a possibility for it to become a much more colorful and vital part of the local community. It can’t be all logging contests and lumber festivals, after all.

There’s space on the Hoquiam waterfront for hotels and shops, the kind of commerce that makes a town a city — or at least a bigger town. A good waterfront area has done much for other cities, notably San Antonio and Baltimore. It creates a kind of city center with room for dining and shopping and entertainment. And of course there’s a natural feature that serves as built-in scenery, something to sit by while sipping drinks or having a bit of dinner.

Hoquiam has a good, and good-natured reason, to revitalize its waterfront. It has a bit of a rivalry with its neighbor and sister city Aberdeen, the larger town to its east. Often bigger cities get more tourism, more tax money, more opportunities, than the smaller neighbor nearby. Kind of like the older sibling who gets the new clothes and leaves the hand-me-downs for the younger kid. If Hoquiam could get organized and turn its downtown into a beautiful and usable waterfront district, it would have a good chance at showing its big brother next door what a real town is like.

That equipoise between custom and invention is an eminent one. But it’s needed to think about devising change to deflect stagnancy in a community. And as minor towns such as Hoquiam find this chance for development, they have to take a chance or two and rise.

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