Reader's View: Duluth needs to ride the train to the future

Far away, in a mystical country, there is a beautiful old town called Fuluth. In this town, there is a beautiful, old, 10-story skyscraper that’s at half occupancy. It turns out this skyscraper doesn’t have an elevator.
I asked the owner why he doesn’t install one.
“Cor,” he said, “it’s expensive. And anyway, nobody round here minds going up and down them stairs.”
Then the owner put on his hat and went to Finneapolis to look for people to rent space in his beautiful building. Alas! All the modern companies laughed at him because, unlike some Fuluthians, they didn’t want to go up and down stairs. They knew there were other fine buildings in the world with elevators.
Now, I’m not saying Fuluth is anything like Duluth. However, it turns out Duluth is a beautiful old city that’s not at full occupancy. And it turns out, this city doesn’t have a train.
I asked the city why they don’t install one.
“Cor,” they said, “it’s expensive. Besides, everybody here is used to driving up and down them roads, so it doesn’t matter.”
And then they went to Minneapolis to look for cool companies and people who would want to move to their city. But no one took the offer seriously. City-dwellers don’t want to be disconnected from the wider world.
Friends, we live here, so we know Duluth is the absolute center of the world. Yet, perhaps, it’s true that for fancy, sophisticated folk, Duluth can seem small and in an out-of-the-way part of the world. And if it seems like Fuluthians should install elevators to catch up with the times, perhaps Duluthians should build trains to catch the future. And who knows? Fuluthians might even like riding an elevator.
Hadrian DeMaioribus
Duluth