Quick Report on Chico Growth...

Well, as with any town, growth is inevitable. Chico has been growing quite rapidly since I arrived in August 1991. I believe we've tacked on about 40,000 people to the population in Chico and the surrounding areas and currently have about 105,000 people living in and around Chico. On top of numerous new shopping areas, a few new things have popped up around our house. One being the Butte College Chico Center and the other being the Holiday Inn Extended Stay, both within a mile of home. The Butte College Chico Center is on the other side of Hwy 99 and is actually kind of a nice building, if you consider nice something that distracts the view of the beautiful canyons nearby as nice. Anyway, it's a two story, 54,000 square-foot, $16.3 million center with 18 lecture-type classrooms with space to accommodate 1,000 students at any one time. I'll see if I can snap a few pics to post later.

The Holiday Inn, at least that's what I think it's supposed to be, is much closer to home at about .5 miles. It's situated next to the roller rink and mini-golf place, basically across from the Chico Enterprise Record (Chico ER is the local newspaper) building. More hotels in Chico are always needed as there isn't enough conference space for businesses nor rooms for parents of graduating students from Chico State. So this should really meet some of the needs of the local community. I'll also try to get some photos of this as well.

Oh, and just as a matter of fact, we have 36 coffee shops in Chico, 7 of which are StarBucks, amazing! That means about 1 coffee shop for every 2000 people living within the city limits. I think I'll have another espresso now.