Editorial: Are we ready for this?

Friday, April 22, 2005 | 4:57 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION

April 23 - 24, 2004

In the 1990s, as Las Vegas waged a losing battle to keep up with growth, urban planners and elected officials would often ask defensively: "Who could have foreseen this? How could we have known?" Well, they won't have that excuse if their planning falls behind over the coming decades.

The U.S. Census Bureau on Friday released its projections on population growth. What it sees for Nevada -- a doubling of the population by 2030 -- should be fair warning to every leader in the state. The same headline we've been seeing for about the past 20 years -- "Nevada again fastest growing state" will be seen annually for at least the next 25 years. And most of the growth will be right here in Southern Nevada.

There's no time to waste in preparing for this growth, which, if anything, has been underestimated by the Census Bureau. In a mere 25 years, we'll need at least two times as many police and firefighters as we have now. We'll need double the amount of mass transit. We'll need twice the number of courtrooms, schools, parks, roads, homes ... in short, twice as much of practically everything. And it's certain we'll need to double our efforts on water conservation.

A task force on growth put together by Clark County just recently turned in its final report, which offered a generalized plan for meeting the needs ahead. We hope not too much time passes without some specific action. We've made progress over the past few years, but if we allow growth to get way ahead of us again, it won't be because we weren't given plenty of notice.