That has not been reality...I've seen small towns ruined in 10 yrs. I lived there and moved, never to return. It went from 10,000 cowboys and loggers to 160,000 metro out of state buyers buying and developing every piece of land.
The logging mill closed, and the land subdivided.
High taxes, new schools, shopping malls, new paved roads and parking lots...and heavy traffic congestion.
Deer herds decimated, their wintering grounds taken up by housing devisions just outside the normal city, along with shopping malls.
New hunting regulations, higher hunting and fishing fees, on limited resources, heavy regulations begin to arrive with the increase in population.
Politics always changed to the liberal side, with the influx of outsiders.
Reminds me of the Native Americans watching the white man move in.