Back in business

DOWN WHERE the waters run hot and the ponies fast, local officials have revealed that covid-19, as an economy buster at least, is behind us.

Tourism revenue in Hot Springs not only is back to pre-pandemic levels, it’s surpassed them. The Sentinel-Record reports that tourism dollars are up 2.4 percent from 2019 and hospitality tax revenue from restaurants and hotels up 30 percent. Garland County accounted for 10 percent of state tourism tax revenue last year.

This follows an 11 percent decrease for the quarantined 2020, remarkable numbers considering how bad they might have been.

Hot Springs has a way of attracting people, even during a pandemic when its popular convention center is closed for most of a year. There’s simply too much to do in those Ouachita nooks and crannies.

As Visit Hot Springs CEO and tourism guru Steve Arrison reminded the paper, Hot Springs is a tourism-based economy. Tourism drives the bus. And in 2020, the bus was parked.

But the tourism attractions are plentiful. For adults (Oaklawn, arts scene) and families (national park, the lakes). And who among us in central Arkansas hasn’t day-tripped down to The Pancake Shoppe on a Saturday morning to “fill up”?

As author and native son David Hill chronicles in his 2020 book “The Vapors: A Southern Family, the New York Mob, and the Rise and Fall of Hot Springs, America’s Forgotten Capital of Vice,” Hot Springs was the country’s pre-Vegas Las Vegas.

Somewhere out there, in an alternate universe not too far removed from our own, it stayed that way. Sighs of relief are audible from those grateful that such a scenario never played out. But having “Vegas, Ark.” was closer to playing out than many realize.

Plus, the old Chicago White Stockings (later Cubs) came to town in 1886 to rejuvenate in the healing waters and prepare for the season, and thus launched spring training as we now know it. Decades later, teams would move to Arizona or Florida for the warmer weather; the Ouachitas can remain nippy throughout the spring. But speaking of what-if’s . . . .

Hot Springs has done OK for itself despite those near-misses. Mr. Arrison credits the city for adapting, and he’s optimistic for a strong close to 2022.

The air somehow breathes a little different, and in a good way, in this small city of roughly 38,000 that punches very much above its weight class.