&gt;<i>If people in a community have to drive three hours for food, then there will be enough demand that someone will open a grocery store. When there&#x27;s an economic vacuum left by a closing superstore, other, possibly smaller, stores will come back and fill it. It&#x27;s simple economics.</i><p>Real life doesn&#x27;t always play out like simple (simplistic) economics.<p>E.g. sometimes nobody will do the investment to build one for years.<p>Or it will much smaller and more expensive that a Walmart, but enough to stiffle anybody opening a competitor.