Capacity Challenge: Business leaders rank infrastructure as a top need

Most business leaders who participated in Springfield Business Journal’s 2025 Economic Growth Series survey agreed infrastructure was the top development need impacting Springfield’s success.

In a question that asked, “What development do you believe is most needed for Springfield to remain competitive in the next five years?” infrastructure topped the list at 76%.

In the 2025 survey, 63% of business leaders named infrastructure investment as the top government action they want to see – up from 46% last year.

It’s worth asking, however: What is infrastructure? The answer is broad – but possibly very specific in the minds of individual survey respondents. Respondents came from various sectors of the area economy, from construction (15%) to banking (5%) to nonprofits (9%). Were all respondents picturing the same thing when they ranked infrastructure as the highest priority for government action?

For the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which leads the nation’s disaster responses and coordinates funding and technical assistance to rebuild infrastructure, the term is wide ranging. On FEMA’s website, the definition includes roads, highways and bridges; public transportation; maritime facilities; railroads; freight facilities; electrical transmission facilities; other utilities; broadband; and buildings and real property.

Complicating matters further is the existence of soft infrastructure – those services needed to maintain social standards, including education, health care, finance and communication, and even government, law enforcement and emergency services.

Survey respondents agree: The Springfield area needs it if it is to remain competitive.

Aging facilities
Brett Foster, Springfield’s assistant director of Public Works, emphasizes functionality when it comes to infrastructure.

“When people talk about infrastructure, they’re referring to the full system that keeps a city functioning – reliable streets and intersections, predictable traffic flow, stormwater, water and wastewater systems and the utilities that support growth,” he says in an email interview.

Foster notes that much of Springfield’s “core system” is over 100 years old: “It’s still serving us well,” he says, “but it’s under tremendous strain and will need improvement as growth continues to occur.”

Foster says residents and businesses want streets that are attractive and have the right feel. For neighborhoods, that might mean having designs that fit their settings. For business corridors, it can refer to visually appealing street sections that support access and visibility for commercial use.

He adds that Springfield is growing, but the street network is not expanding significantly – meaning the city must be smart about how it manages what it has.

“Our arterial streets are the lifeblood of the city – they carry workers, customers, goods and services every day,” Foster says. “Making targeted investments in these corridors is how we stay competitive, improve safety and support business movement.”

Business leaders understand that all of these systems impact their ability to attract workers, move products and make plans, he says.

“Businesses know that the condition and capacity of our infrastructure are tied to the city’s economic success,” he says.

Preparing a path
Few businesses are as knee-deep in hard infrastructure as local logistics company The Erlen Group. In an interview with SBJ earlier this year about its forthcoming 186-acre Moon Light industrial park, Bob Newell, vice president for development, reflected on the exponential value of infrastructure investment. BNSF Railway Co. certification and ready availability of utilities made the site shovel-ready for industry.

“We hope this gives city leaders the ammunition they need to go after development,” he said in a previous article.

And in May, SBJ reported on commercial development – specifically a 70,000-square foot MHC Kenworth trucking shop and showroom – in the works near Buc-ee’s travel center in northeast Springfield. An infrastructure investment by Buc-ee’s allowed the city to extend water, sewer and three-phase power across Interstate 44 while also improving roads to open up about 1,000 acres to development, and MHC Kenworth jumped on the opportunity to expand there from its smaller existing site on East Kearney Street.

Dwayne Fulk, president and CEO of City Utilities of Springfield, says the main issue for businesses is a desire for ready accessibility and reliable affordability where utility infrastructure is concerned.

“The city and the region are doing pretty well, but we can always do better,” Fulk says.

CU collaborates with regional economic partners, from the Springfield Regional Economic Partnership to Leaders for Ozarks Regional Evolvement, to stay informed and nimble, according to Fulk.

“Our goal is to be ready,” Fulk says.

He gave three examples: a water pumping station now being completed on the southeast side of the city, the Hunt Branch sewer expansion and the addition of 36 megawatts of battery storage to meet rising demand.

Fulk says CU strives to move at the speed of business.

“The business community is not patient, and they shouldn’t be,” he says. “We’re always trying to improve.”

Dean Thompson, CU’s vice president and chief economic development officer, says the biggest challenge is to stay ahead of development.

“We really don’t know exactly how things are going to develop,” he says.

Thompson says there is a very short window of time to work with when an area is targeted for development. It takes years to make ready for it, he says, citing the recently approved reallocation of water from Stockton Lake, in the works since 2003. The reallocation will provide an additional 38 million gallons of water per day throughout the region, according to past SBJ reporting.

“There’s a long lead time on some of our infrastructure,” Thompson says. “We have to be prepared to maneuver.”

Thompson says the utility expansion that accompanied Buc-ee’s is a good example of how the utility looks at what-ifs.

“We didn’t put pipe under I-44 for today; we put it in for the future,” he says. “We weren’t able to respond to Buc-ee’s because of here and now, but because somebody 10 years ago planned on water and gas and what routes we take to get it across I-44.”

Growing need
Kristen Haseltine, president and CEO of Show Me Christian County, describes southwest Missouri as a powerhouse.

“It’s an engine for the whole state,” she says. “We’ve had a lot of success at the state level since COVID.”

Success brings its own challenges, according to Haseltine, who says growth provides some pinch points for Nixa, Ozark and five other communities in Christian County. Sewer capacity is one area of need, and one for which the community of Clever passed a bond. Its project is nearly complete, she says.

“We’ve had such fast growth that the revenue that we need to keep up with infrastructure is not allowing us to put in place all the infrastructure that’s currently needed,” she says.

Haseltine says most people immediately think of roads when the word infrastructure is uttered, but she notes other considerations, like public amenities, education and health care services, are also a need.

“Infrastructure can also be trails – maybe that’s how people perceive it,” she says. “Amenities impact quality of life and help to attract workforce.”

Meeting growth
Bruce Adib-Yazdi, an architect with Vecino Design LLC and a member of Springfield City Council, breaks down infrastructure into six categories.

There’s transportation, including roads, bridges, sidewalks, airports and rail; utilities and public works, which these days is seen to include telecommunications and internet; civic and institutional infrastructure, like government offices, schools, hospitals, libraries and public buildings; environmental or green infrastructure, like parks, trails and stormwater retention; housing and social infrastructure, including considerations like workforce housing and even homeless services; and economic infrastructure, like industrial parks, business incubators and – yes – convention centers.

“In order for a city to thrive and do better, you have to have all of them,” he says.

Adib-Yazdi says planning for each category has to get down to the nitty-gritty.

“If you want wider streets or more traffic lanes, the moment you create them, you create opportunities for more traffic and less opportunities for bikes,” he says. “You can’t pick one. If you’re getting storm sewers, you’re tearing up the road, so you’re going to put in other utilities.”

Grant Avenue Parkway is an example where redesigning a road and providing multimodal transportation lanes also created zones where city residents wanted development to happen. That meant the city had to incentivize development, which is a type of soft infrastructure.

Adib-Yazdi says he often studies other cities to see what they’re doing right and what cautionary tales they may have to offer.

Centerton, a town in northwest Arkansas, offers the latter, he says: Recently, they put a moratorium on new construction permits because they lacked sewer capacity. The Arkansas Advocate reported in June that the state Department of Health had not approved a Centerton building project since May 2024, and in a December 2024 letter they said the department would not approve additional projects that would increase the flow of wastewater to a treatment plant unless additional capacity is added.

It’s important to be proactive, according to Adib-Yazdi.

“At some point you have to think far ahead to meet growth, not just respond to it,” he says.