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New Construction Boosts Conway on Business Index

2 min read

New construction boosted Conway to near the top of the Arkansas Tech Business Index for April 2015.

The ATBI is a comprehensive measure of economic activity around Arkansas that includes a labor index, housing market index, construction index and retail sales index. The overall index is based around a rating of 100, indicating that a city is doing better than the state average from 2009 to the present.

The index is measured by the Arkansas Tech University College of Business and sponsored by Arvest Bank.

Thanks to roughly $10 million in residential construction permits and $4.5 million in commercial construction, Conway made the biggest jump in the latest index, which covers data for April.

Conway’s rating rose 1.73 points to 105.42, placing it just behind perennial leader Fort Smith at 105.96. Fort Smith’s April ranking was up from 111.84 in March, which topped the list; Conway rose from 103.49 and fourth place on the March index.

Tech has produced the index for the last 16 months, and Fort Smith has led it for 12 of them. But its position is being challenged by a new home construction boom in Conway.

“Construction permits increased from a reading of 97 in March to almost 115 in April for Conway,” said ATBI developer Marc Fusaro, associate professor of economics at Tech. “This was on the strength of residential construction permits of about $10 million. Commercial construction permits were also pretty high at $4.5 million.”

The full April 2015 ATBI:

  1. Fort Smith — 105.96
  2. Conway — 105.42
  3. Fayetteville — 105.25
  4. Springdale — 103.99
  5. Bentonville — 103.54
  6. Hot Springs — 101.54
  7. Jonesboro — 100.53
  8. Rogers — 99.65
  9. Mountain Home — 99.40
  10. Van Buren — 99.39
  11. Russellville — 99.02
  12. Searcy — 98.12
  13. Texarkana — 96.35
  14. El Dorado — 95.76
  15. West Memphis — 95.64
  16. North Little Rock — 95.37
  17. Little Rock — 94.74
  18. Pine Bluff — 93.03
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