• LARCHWOOD, Iowa (AP) -- It doesn't take long to get from Sioux Falls, S.D., to one of the biggest entertainment centers in the area in northwest Iowa.
• It's a quick eight miles from the city's edge on East 10th Street to the Grand Falls Casino Resort that operates on rich agricultural land where three states meet.
• But the projection that economic development will follow the gaming destination has proved a pokey process. Some observers of development say not much is happening outside of east-side Sioux Falls' commercial growth in the Dawley Farm area. But it eventually will.
• "I think that corridor is going to develop," Michael Bender, founder of Bender Commercial Real Estate Services, told the Argus Leader newspaper (http://argusne.ws/1bAjWi6 ). "Most things don't develop as quickly as they are hyped to develop."
• In its second full year of operation, Grand Falls has continued working on its overall site plan and will open an 18-hole golf course late next summer. The casino also is persistently fine-tuning its other entertainment choices, including bringing in national entertainment and concerts each month.
• Add in more houses being built on the eastern edge of Sioux Falls combined with planned construction of South Dakota Highway 100 and a general uptick in east-side development, and there will be enough activity to support business, Bender said.
• Sharon Haselhoff, general manager at Grand Falls, expects others to join her out among the cornfields and pastures along the Iowa border.
• With 22 acres of Lyon County farmland zoned commercial across the highway from the casino, Everett Kracht is a possible pioneer in development near Grand Falls. The 55-year-old retired Garretson, S.D., farmer plans to eventually develop the land with amenities that complement a casino.
• "We're a long ways away from setting stakes in the ground," he said.
• While Kracht isn't ready to talk about specifics, he said there is enough traffic at the casino and hundreds of employees working there who need services.
• "Anything that complements the casino and the resort area, we're going to be on top of that," he said.
• A couple of other businesses have chosen the area for growth, too.
• The Riviera by Rocco's, a venue for wedding receptions, corporate meetings and other events, is near the intersection of Highway 11 and 10th Street, close enough

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