Restaurant Growth in Lawrence, Kansas, 1950 to 2007

Abstract

Data gathered from city and telephone directories provide a frame for understanding changes in types of restaurants and their geographic patterns in a Midwestern university town. I display this information using GIS at ten-year intervals and add a personal dimension via interviews with longtime community members and restaurant owners. Population increase and a general trend of eating outside the home explain the general restaurant growth. Through time, diversity in ethnic restaurants increases and chain establishments expand rapidly. Restaurants always have been concentrated along or near arterial streets. Most were at downtown locations in the 1950s. Then came a move toward the periphery followed by a recent revival of the central business district. Changes in Kansas liquor laws in 1987 that allowed establishments to sell liquor by-the-drink and proprietors to open microbreweries bolstered the local restaurant business.