2009 Census estimates in, Atlanta drops in metro rankings (to live, suburbs)

[FlyiMetro]

Originally Posted by A&M Bulldawg

This is shocking! Fulton County is holding it down. Looks like Fulton County becoming more urbanized and dense due to people moving closer to Atlanta.

Always a postive thing in my book. Hopefully the metro can start building up instead of building out.

[Iconographer]

Originally Posted by FlyiMetro

Always a postive thing in my book. Hopefully the metro can start building up instead of building out.

That development has been underway for some time now.

[waronxmas]

Originally Posted by LovinDecatur

That development has been underway for some time now.

Sure has.

I'm on my break at work at the moment so I won't be able to give any numbers, but the latest census estimates puts the nail in the coffin of what has been a larger trend in development since the '01 recession. I call it the "Fifth Age of Atlanta".

For those who don't know, the first age of Atlanta occurred after the end of the Trail of Tears and lasted up until the Civil War.

The second age occurred during Reconstruction.

The third age occurred after Reconstruction and during the Industrialization of Atlanta and the end of the Railroad era in the late 40s.

Then the fourth age, or as I call it 'The Weird Years', lasted from the 1950s until the early 2000s and incorporated 3 eras: The Civil Rights Era, The Surbanization Era, and the Internationalization era. The last two running concurrently with each other for an unbelievable 50 years (Which is weird for Atlanta since we don't usually like the same thing for too long).

The signs of the Fifth Age began, and some demographers have already started picking up on this, at the end of the 2001 Recession/Dotcom bust. Since about 2005 or so, Fulton County has been the population leader in raw numbers for each year's population estimate up until the one released today. The inner counties of Gwinnett, Cobb, and Dekalb have been growing at a steady rate, but at a much smaller pace than in the 80s and 90s. If look closer at the numbers, and at the Census Community survey in 2007, the Fifth Age starts to make sense.

1. While Fulton has seen the largest numerical growth in population since 2000, going from about 800,000 to 1.1 million today, a little more than half of those people (140,000) moved to the City of Atlanta. That type of natural growth hasn't happened since the late 1940s. For the remaining half, about two-thirds moved to the North Fulton burbs, and the other third moved to the South Fulton burbs. In other words, the majority of Fulton's growth was directly attributed to the densification of the City of Atlanta.

2. About two-thirds of the people moving to Gwinnett and Dekalb is comprised entirely of international immigrants, the rest are transplants from other regions of the country. cobb has seen a similar trend, though at a smaller rate.

3. While a gawd awful amount of subdivisions were built in the suburbs during the 2000s, from what I can tell developers didn't gobble up new land in the same way they did in the 1990s. In others words, the suburbs densified as well and the nature of Atlanta's suburban sprawl as we knew it is over.

So the Fifth Age of Atlanta will initially be marked by:

1. The continued numerical growth and densification of the City of Atlanta and the rest of ITP.

2. The "Parisfication" of the suburbs. I can't find the article now, but there was a extremely interesting study done on this subject a year or two ago if you want to Google it.

3. The suburbs covering roughly the same land area they do today.

As for Clayton county losing population, I think that is really just anomaly directly attributed to the accreditation problems the school system has dealt with for the last few years. I wouldn't be surprised that if you looked at the drop in school enrollment there it would be roughly equal the number of families that have moved out.

[WilliamM]

Originally Posted by waronxmas

Sure has.

I'm on my break at work at the moment so I won't be able to give any numbers, but the latest census estimates puts the nail in the coffin of what has been a larger trend in development since the '01 recession. I call it the "Fifth Age of Atlanta".

For those who don't know, the first age of Atlanta occurred after the end of the Trail of Tears and lasted up until the Civil War.

The second age occurred during Reconstruction.

The third age occurred after Reconstruction and during the Industrialization of Atlanta and the end of the Railroad era in the late 40s.

Then the fourth age, or as I call it 'The Weird Years', lasted from the 1950s until the early 2000s and incorporated 3 eras: The Civil Rights Era, The Surbanization Era, and the Internationalization era. The last two running concurrently with each other for an unbelievable 50 years (Which is weird for Atlanta since we don't usually like the same thing for too long).

The signs of the Fifth Age began, and some demographers have already started picking up on this, at the end of the 2001 Recession/Dotcom bust. Since about 2005 or so, Fulton County has been the population leader in raw numbers for each year's population estimate up until the one released today. The inner counties of Gwinnett, Cobb, and Dekalb have been growing at a steady rate, but at a much smaller pace than in the 80s and 90s. If look closer at the numbers, and at the Census Community survey in 2007, the Fifth Age starts to make sense.

1. While Fulton has seen the largest numerical growth in population since 2000, going from about 800,000 to 1.1 million today, a little more than half of those people (140,000) moved to the City of Atlanta. That type of natural growth hasn't happened since the late 1940s. For the remaining half, about two-thirds moved to the North Fulton burbs, and the other third moved to the South Fulton burbs. In other words, the majority of Fulton's growth was directly attributed to the densification of the City of Atlanta.

2. About two-thirds of the people moving to Gwinnett and Dekalb is comprised entirely of international immigrants, the rest are transplants from other regions of the country. cobb has seen a similar trend, though at a smaller rate.

3. While a gawd awful amount of subdivisions were built in the suburbs during the 2000s, from what I can tell developers didn't gobble up new land in the same way they did in the 1990s. In others words, the suburbs densified as well and the nature of Atlanta's suburban sprawl as we knew it is over.

So the Fifth Age of Atlanta will initially be marked by:

1. The continued numerical growth and densification of the City of Atlanta and the rest of ITP.

2. The "Parisfication" of the suburbs. I can't find the article now, but there was a extremely interesting study done on this subject a year or two ago if you want to Google it.

3. The suburbs covering roughly the same land area they do today.

As for Clayton county losing population, I think that is really just anomaly directly attributed to the accreditation problems the school system has dealt with for the last few years. I wouldn't be surprised that if you looked at the drop in school enrollment there it would be roughly equal the number of families that have moved out.

Here's the link to the article. It's a bold argument and hard to dispute when you look at the reversal over the last 15 years in settlement patterns of immigrants and low-income groups. If the argument is right, the whole 'suburbanization' era of post-WW II American could in the long term turn out to have been a temporary phenomenon.

Trading Places | The New Republic

[grindin]

Interesting information about Domestic Migration in Atlanta from 2000 to 2007:

http://www.atlantaregional.com/File%..._Migration.pdf

1) In terms of Domestic Migration, more people moved out of DeKalb (326,591) than moved in (228,097). That's a net loss of 98,500. The vast majority are moving to Fulton County (104,240) or Gwinnett (102,775).

2) The vast majority of people moving to the Atlanta area hail from New York (56,000), Florida (47,000), and California (24,000)

3) The largest domestic outflow out of Georgia has been to Colorado

4) About 60,000 moved from Fulton to Clayton County during this time period. I wonder how much that correlates with the gentrification of Atlanta. At the same time, 38,306 moved from Clayton to Henry.

5) The largest net flow between two counties was Fulton to Dekalb (108,105).

6) About 17,409 moved from Gwinnett to Barrow.

7) Largest one-way flow occurred from Cobb to Paulding (34,367), but only 13,000 or so have moved from Paulding to Cobb

8) 35,886 have moved from Cobb to Cherokee.

[ericsonga]

Originally Posted by grindin

Interesting information about Domestic Migration in Atlanta from 2000 to 2007:

http://www.atlantaregional.com/File%..._Migration.pdf

1) In terms of Domestic Migration, more people moved out of DeKalb (326,591) than moved in (228,097). That's a net loss of 98,500. The vast majority are moving to Fulton County (104,240) or Gwinnett (102,775).

2) The vast majority of people moving to the Atlanta area hail from New York (56,000), Florida (47,000), and California (24,000)

3) The largest domestic outflow out of Georgia has been to Colorado

4) About 60,000 moved from Fulton to Clayton County during this time period. I wonder how much that correlates with the gentrification of Atlanta. At the same time, 38,306 moved from Clayton to Henry.

5) The largest net flow between two counties was Fulton to Dekalb (108,105).

6) About 17,409 moved from Gwinnett to Barrow.

7) Largest one-way flow occurred from Cobb to Paulding (34,367), but only 13,000 or so have moved from Paulding to Cobb

8) 35,886 have moved from Cobb to Cherokee.

Wow, what an amazing chart. Thanks for posting this!

What is really surprising is the amount of out-of-state moves that came to Gwinnett. The number of people moving here from NY, CA, NJ, and FL compared to the other counties was really shocking. I would have assumed that Fulton had more, apparently I was wrong, haha.

On a different note, I'm actually happy that Gwinnett isn't growing at the extreme pace of the past. I think it's giving us time to regroup and better plan for the future. The break-neck pace of development was overwhelming.

[grindin]

Originally Posted by ericsonga

Wow, what an amazing chart. Thanks for posting this!

What is really surprising is the amount of out-of-state moves that came to Gwinnett. The number of people moving here from NY, CA, NJ, and FL compared to the other counties was really shocking. I would have assumed that Fulton had more, apparently I was wrong, haha.

On a different note, I'm actually happy that Gwinnett isn't growing at the extreme pace of the past. I think it's giving us time to regroup and better plan for the future. The break-neck pace of development was overwhelming.

Yep, Gwinnett has always seemed like the "go-to" county for out-of-staters from those areas. It's always felt more like a suburb in Florida or Texas than a stereotypical Georgia suburb due to the demographics and pace of the county.

Particularly compared to Cobb County, which has undergone a tremendous amount of growth, but I always thought Cobb was more popular with people from other parts of the South or the Midwest, but the numbers from that chart proved me wrong.

[FlyiMetro]

It will be interesting what the traffic will be when Atlanta Metro hits Chicago Metro numbers. I am curious if the price of living would go up as well.

[FlyiMetro]

Originally Posted by TheLastStarfighter

If there's a metro which can move up within the top 3 before long, it's DFW. Even Houston/Chicago will take a back seat to them before too long. Give it 10 years..

Where does Dallas rank now?

[grindin]

Originally Posted by FlyiMetro

Where does Dallas rank now?

4th-Largest MSA, 7th-Largest CSA

And if Atlanta were to ever get as large as Chicago, I'd have to move. We simply don't have the transportation infrastructure to handle that many people.