Can a Green-Economy Boom Town Be Built to Last?

The race to make electric vehicles is turning some places into winners. Normal, Ill., is one of them. But it has seen good times go sour in the past.

NORMAL, Ill. — When he bought a construction contractor called Weber Electric in 2018, Josh Mosier inherited about 20 employees. By the end of the next year, he was up to about 100 employees. By the spring of 2021, the number was over 225. “Because of this boom,” said Mr. Mosier, whose company often works on large building projects, “we’ve grown exponentially.” The epicenter of that boom is an electric-vehicle maker named Rivian, which brought in Mr. Mosier’s company and others in the Normal, Ill., area to work on the city’s costliest construction project in decades: a massive auto plant.