A huge amount of Government money has gone into infrastructure for Pikeville, KY. There was the Pikeville Cut-Through, finished in 1987, where the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers moved the river to a more convenient location.[1] That also got the town a superhighway connection with two interchanges. There's the East Kentucky Expo Center [2], which has only two events, wrestling and a beer fest, scheduled for the rest of the year. There's the University of Pikeville, with 2,300 students. There's the Pikeville Medical Center, an 11-story hospital with a 10-story parking garage and 3,200 employees. There's a large, modern high school with a swimming pool. It has 2,300 students, so it must be drawing from a larger area than the town. There's a downtown multistory car park connected by a sky bridge to part of the University of Pikeville.

All this in a town of only 7,000 people.

Population is increasing slowly; it's not a dying town. The town itself never had heavy industry; the mines were elsewhere. It's a service center for central Appalachia. Population within 20 miles is 110,000. The town's problem is that the area it services is losing population.

If you wanted to locate there, the local mall has about 30,000 square feet available. No coffee shop in the mall, but the mall has a supermarket-sized Texas Roadhouse. Eat more beef. AT&T offers 45mbps Internet in most of the downtown area.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pikeville_Cut-Through [2] http://eastkyexpo.com/AllEvents.html