This story from Stateline/Pew Charitable Trusts about disappearing rural grocery stores is mostly about areas with lower population density than Iowa, but there’s some Iowa stuff in here. An important quote comes from Drake University’s Jennifer Zwagerman:
“How do you get people to rural communities? Well, you have to offer them the services and benefits they need to live there,” Zwagerman said. “The flipside is how do you offer services of that kind? You have to have people to support them.”
The only issue that compares with “services and benefits”, of course, is JOBS, either in that community or a 45-minute radius. No available jobs means no additional working-age adults means no more small hospitals with maternity care.
In a not-unrelated story, Traer’s supermarket was put up for sale in August.