2,360,867 (Pittsburgh, Beaver Falls, Beaver: good schools, calculator, live in)

[Aqua Teen Carl]

Originally Posted by escilade18

Population itself doesn't matter so much as number of households does. A family of seven living in a house pays as much in taxes as a single person living in the same house.

Yup, I think that's something that is usually ignored. According to the 2010 census there were 55,000 empty houses in Allegheny County and that's a lot of potential tax money that simply is not there. Now that certain parts of Pittsburgh have become attractive to young people with debt you are seeing more and more houses with multiple roommates. Plus with Pittsburgh attracting Asian workers who live with multiple people in small housing that adds more to the low household/high population issue.

I just think it's funny when people call suburban areas boring and soulless one day and rejoice when they get a population bump in another.

[sealie]

Originally Posted by Caladium

Exactly. Like it or not, jobs are in the Pittsburgh metro area now, not in Monongahela--so anyone moving into a town like that is likely to be commuting to the Burgh. And aren't long commutes supposed to be the sin of all soulless sins? Or was that last month's reason to bash the burbs. I lose track.

Depends who the preacher is and what the denomination. A week or so ago KingOfUm went off on the Googlers who pay big bucks for a shiny new apartment across the street when the could be driving 45 minutes from more-desirable Mt Lebanon instead.
You can't please all the holy men, easier to be an infidel.

[FreightTrainRunning]

Developing a place for new Pittsburghers:

If Pittsburgh wants to achieve Mayor Bill Peduto's goal of bringing 20,000 new residents to the city by the start of 2025, local stakeholders agree that the city needs to invest in both residential and infrastructure development to attract a more youthful population and to dissuade citizens from choosing or moving to the suburbs.

Aiming to bring thousands of new residents to Pittsburgh is no mean feat.The 2010 census saw our population drop by 8.52 percent. However, since 2005, population decline has been reversed, according to IRS data. In fact, according to 2012 estimates by the Census bureau, we're up .2 percent to 306,211 residents since 2010. The demographics of the new population are trending younger and tend to be more educated.

"We have a lot of elements that make that goal of attracting 20,000 new residents achievable," says Kevin Acklin, Peduto’s chief of staff and chief development officer, who is also chairman of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA). But, he adds, echoing a long-time Peduto theme, "it's clear to us that there are two Pittsburghs." While the administration will be supporting the neighborhoods already seeing growth in businesses and housing, he says, "there are entire neighborhoods of the city that haven't seen investment in 50 years.”

[Blackbeauty212]

Originally Posted by bradjl2009

Without a significant amount of new mid and high rise apartments, there's no way we will ever hit our old population high 650,000 and I'm fine with that. Considering how people live today I don't think the city could handle that population size.

Not without much more investment in Mass Transit infrastructure.... People complain about traffic now.

[Katarina Witt]

Originally Posted by Caladium

Yup. 70 years ago the population was much higher because it was made up of lots of families with 8-10 kids. There was still only one tax payer in that family, though. So you can't argue that more residents = more taxpayers. In an era when large families were common, more residents = more kids needing schools.

More important, the poster who thinks the infrastructure was designed for 700,000 doesn't realize it was also designed for an era when it wasn't all that common to own a car, and if you did have a car it was one vehicle per 10 people (since most of the population were the children of large families). Imagine what it would be like with today's demographics--more young single adults, each one driving a car, needing a parking space, etc.

The population of Pittsburgh was higher 70 years ago (1944) because of a robust steel industry. Pittsburgh's population actually peaked in 1950, at ~677,000 people. The MSA population then was 2,500,000. The MSA population hit 2,768,000 in 1960, though the city population had declined slightly (see Wiki link). So those years, it was likely suburbanization that effected the city's declining population. The MSA declined slightly in 1970, to 2,759,000, when the city population was just a little over 500,000. By 1980, MSA pop. was down to 2,651,000 and dropped steadily for the next 30 years. Meanwhile, the population of the US as a whole was growing. If Pittsburgh had kept up with the national rate of population growth, it would now have a metro of about 5 million.

Few families were having 8-10 kids in the 1950s when I was growing up, 2-4 was far more common. In fact, 8-10 was always an outlier. The generation preceding the Baby Boom was far smaller b/c the Depression and WW II kept birth rates down.

I do agree with the rest, most families didn't have a car or only had one. By the 50s, most families seemed to have at least one car. People also used far less electricity; we didn't have all these modern electrical appliances, and most families had only one TV. Homes had only one bathroom.


Pittsburgh - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pittsburgh metropolitan area - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[zman63]

So where does pittsburgh go from here? Does anybody expect this place to grow at a healthy pace economically and population wise given the recent trends?

The collapse of the steel industy appears that it may have halted this region for 50 to possibly 100 years. Too much ground needs to be made up. We went through a mass out migration. Now we appear headed to a mass dying off

[speagles84]

Originally Posted by zman63

So where does pittsburgh go from here? Does anybody expect this place to grow at a healthy pace economically and population wise given the recent trends?

The collapse of the steel industy appears that it may have halted this region for 50 to possibly 100 years. Too much ground needs to be made up. We went through a mass out migration. Now we appear headed to a mass dying off

What I don't understand why you think this is so bad? Allegheny county is growing, now one of the fastest in the state. Is that what you wanted? Sure it'd be great if the rest didn't have a slightly negative growth, but our core clearly is growing at a healthy rate now. Exploding cities have their own problems, probably more so than us.

[charisb]

Originally Posted by speagles84

What I don't understand why you think this is so bad? Allegheny county is growing, now one of the fastest in the state. Is that what you wanted? Sure it'd be great if the rest didn't have a slightly negative growth, but our core clearly is growing at a healthy rate now. Exploding cities have their own problems, probably more so than us.

Agreed. The rapid growth in cities out west and down south has not been without negative consequences. Some of us don't want that here. Lack of rapid growth does not spell doom.

[Caladium]

Originally Posted by Katiana

Few families were having 8-10 kids in the 1950s when I was growing up, 2-4 was far more common. In fact, 8-10 was always an outlier.

Really? Interesting how things are different in different parts of the country. 8-10 kids was common down here in Virginia, although I suppose 4-6 was probably more typical. There were also families with 2-4 but we always felt those were the smaller families in the neighborhood. I guess I just figured Pittsburgh would be the same since there were so many Irish catholic families up there. The Irish catholic factor is why people always said there were so many kids down my way.

[Caladium]

Originally Posted by zman63

Does anybody expect this place to grow at a healthy pace economically and population wise given the recent trends?

I do. In fact, that's what I think it is currently doing.