When a major investment arrives in a city, almost all of us tend to look at the same things:
- How much will be invested.
- How many jobs it will create.
- How many people it will attract.
- What impact it could have on the area.
I've done it too.
But after many years evaluating locations and, above all, walking cities, I'm increasingly interested in something that doesn't always show up in the studies:
What's about to start being needed around it.
Because new infrastructure, a large real-estate project, a university, a hospital or a new workplace hub can transform an area's flows.
But generating flow doesn't necessarily mean generating value.
- A station can move thousands of people without getting them to stay in its surroundings.
- Hundreds of new homes can be built without enough services appearing for the people who will live there.
- A university, a hospital or a major workplace can generate thousands of daily trips while the streets around them remain barely active.
- A major investment can arrive in an area without transmitting a meaningful part of that value into the surrounding territory.
And this is exactly where, for those of us who invest, develop, design, operate or look for new locations, the way we read a place starts to change.
Because between a major investment and the creation of value around it, there's a chain we don't always manage to complete:
Flow → permanence → need → activity → consumption → new investment → value.
For me, there's one word in that chain that matters especially: need.
Because flow tells us how many people arrive or pass through a place. But understanding what those people will need can tell us something far more interesting about what could happen next.
And not all transformations generate the same needs.
- A university can generate demand for housing, food, mobility, services and gathering places.
- A hospital can activate pharmacies, food, lodging, professional services and activity at different hours.
- A new residential area can generate demand for education, health, everyday retail, dining, services and new logistics needs.
- A station can generate enormous flow, but if there's nothing around it to make people stay, much of that flow will simply keep moving.
This changes quite a bit how I look at a location.
Because I no longer try to see only what's being built.
I try to detect what's starting to change around it.
There are signals that often appear before the big projects do:
- Flows and schedules change.
- New small businesses appear.
- Some storefronts start to fill up.
- People start staying longer.
- Supply and delivery needs change.
- Interest starts growing in land or locations that previously went unnoticed.
On their own, they may tell us little.
But when several start appearing at the same time, they may be telling a different story about that place.
And maybe that's one of the biggest opportunities for those of us who invest, develop, design or operate in a city: learning to recognize that story while it's still forming.
That's why, faced with new infrastructure or a major investment, I now try to ask myself five questions:
- What new flows will it generate?
- Who will those people be, and at what hours will they arrive?
- What will they need before, during and after being there?
- What part of those needs still isn't being met?
- What's missing today that someone will probably have to solve tomorrow?
Because once that need becomes obvious to everyone, the market usually starts to see it too, and the price starts pricing it in.
For me, that's the difference between observing a transformation and learning to read it.
Anticipating doesn't just mean knowing what's going to be built. It means understanding what the city will need after that gets built.
And maybe that's why, while everyone is looking at the big project, the new station, the factory or the infrastructure, we should also learn to look outward.
To observe how people will move, where they'll stay, what they'll consume, what services they'll need, how that new activity will be supplied, and what connections will still be missing.
Because often what doesn't exist yet can end up being more important than what everyone is looking at today.
What transformation is happening in your city, and what need do you think the market still isn't seeing?
