International songwriters and artists on their way to one of the world’s biggest folk music events will be among those taking part in two House of Songs Ozarks shows in Northwest Arkansas this month.
A Feb. 11 performance will be from 3 to 6 p.m. at Record, an events venue at 104 Southwest A Street in downtown Bentonville. Fayetteville’s Dickson Street Pub will be the location of a show from 7 to 9 p.m. on Feb. 12. The bar is located at 303 W. Dickson St.
The Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport broke its record for the number of passengers boarding flights for the fourth year in a row.
The airport announced its record enplanements on Tuesday, saying 2017 saw 725,284 passengers depart from XNA. That was a 3.7 percent increase over 2016, and it was the first time the airport eclipsed 700,000.
Northwest Arkansas’ steady economic performance in 2017 should continue this year “so long as the national economy holds up,” a University of Arkansas economist predicts.
Mervin Jebaraj, the director of the University of Arkansas Center for Business and Economic Research, predicted the solid year at Business Forecast 2018, an annual luncheon organized by the center. The event’s keynote speaker was Michael Milken, chairman of the Milken Institute.
The Milken Institute earlier today returned Northwest Arkansas to its Top 25 Best-Performing Cities, releasing a report that showed the strength of the region’s economy compared to all the nation’s metropolitan statistical areas.
People in most regions would be ecstatic to pull off a year as good as 2017, but Northwest Arkansas is used to being exceptional.
Year 2017 had the added pressure of followed two impressive years. Year 2015 brought the opening of Scott Family Amazeum, major highway construction and the start of the Brightwater Culinary School. Year 2016 saw massive hospital expansions, record enrollment at the University of Arkansas and the finishing of a major Walton Arts Center expansion.
The fact is 2017 did just fine. Northwest Arkansas saw just as many projects get finished up as it did announcements of things to come, and it’s nice to have lots of both.