All years are a mix of good and bad, and the proportions can change with location. Even still, some years stand out, and this was one of them: In Western New York, it has been a remarkable year.

In the good way, or, as it’s known in these parts, the Pegula way.

The purchase of the Buffalo Bills by Terry and Kim Pegula wasn’t the most consequential story of the year, though it’s a part of that story. Nevertheless, and without question, the deal that put the Bills in the hands of the Pegulas was the most emotionally satisfying development in Western New York in 2014. With it, a worrisome and long-standing question was satisfactorily answered: What will happen to the team, adopted by the community and fully fused into its identity, when owner Ralph Wilson died?

The answer: It will stay in Western New York. The Buffalo Bills will remain the Buffalo Bills – and in that announcement, the team became an integral part of the story of this city’s economic and spiritual renewal.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="602"] Kim and Terry Pegula preserved a key piece of Western New York’s identity when they purchased the Buffalo Bills. James P. McCoy/Buffalo News file photo[/caption]

Buffalo’s startling rebound

That larger story is the towering event of 2014, though event is the wrong word. The year produced a percussive series of developments that sent the message: Buffalo is coming back, and the purchase of the Bills was only one part of that story.

In the private sector, other developments included the rapid construction and opening of HarborCenter, a project of the Pegulas whose initial phase was completed late this year. A hotel remains under construction.

The Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus continued its high-tech expansion, and not far away the Catholic Health System opened its new headquarters. Local development companies announced so many plans to convert old buildings to new uses that they almost didn’t qualify as news.

But it was with a dramatic push from the public sector that this year really took off. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s Buffalo Billion took on the shape of economic reality, as heavy equipment moved on to the site of the RiverBend project, preparing to construct what will be the largest solar panel factory in the Western Hemisphere.

Here. In Buffalo.

Downtown, Canalside’s development took a massive step forward with the opening of the state’s largest outdoor skating rink, constructed on a site once occupied by the Erie Canal and, later, War Memorial Auditorium. The Inner Harbor welcomed a new resident, a young girl with a shark’s head, while at the Outer Harbor, plans for a new park began taking shape.

Here. In Buffalo.

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The Buffalo News: Opinion: Happenings large and small gave us many reasons to remember 2014 as a remarkable year