ABSTRACT
Like other older port and manufacturing cities in all the Western nations, St. Louis has been looking for a new economic niche ever since the deindustrialization of the 1970s and early 1980s. In recent years other sectors have helped fill the void left by the manufacturing exodus; indeed, the economic makeup of St. Louis's economy has become, as a result, quite complex. Since the early 1990s the fastest-growing sectors of the city's economy have been in health services, communications, and technology-based industries. The effort to expand the center took almost ten years; during that time there were three mayoral elections, a changing cast of development and tourism officials, a high-profile war between the city and St. Louis County, and an upturn in the economy. Having built a world-class convention center and domed stadium, St. Louis had almost completed the ensemble of facilities that make up the tourism/entertainment infrastructure of contemporary.
