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The Census 2020 is taking place currently. The US population will be around 330 million people. Here are some states on prior decades.
Year 2000 around 282 million
Year 2010 around 309 million
Year 2020 around 330 million
That is just under 50 million more people in just 20 years.
This census article has US population growth projection to cross 400 million people by 2060. https://www.census.gov/content/dam/C...o/p25-1144.pdf
2030 --- 355M
2040 --- 373M
2050 --- 389M
2060 --- 404M
That is about over 70 million projected new people in America.
Reading all these forum threads about how some cities are booming and some not so much, as well as, how there is massive migration patterns to from northern states southern and western states/cities. 2000-2020 population growth actually shocked me because I never gave it much thought. I did expect more people each decade but reading these forum threads, I just though people are just moving from one state to another state which is why some states lose population and others gain so many and their large cities boom and suburbs sprawl. Also rural area populations are shrinking as they move to cities/suburbs. What I didn't factor in is in additional 20+million additional people each decade.
So which cities in the next 40 years will absorb all the new people living in America? Can these cities actually handle additional people for housing, schools, traffic congestion, public transit? What will the cities look like?
One thing that's surprised me a little about academic projections of US metro population growth, as climate change really sets in, is that it's not so much cities in southern latitudes that people will be leaving, but specifically cities close to the coast. So people will be moving out of cities like Miami, Charleston, LA, and Houston and into cities like Dallas, Atlanta, Nashville, and Phoenix.
One thing that's surprised me a little about academic projections of US metro population growth, as climate change really sets in, is that it's not so much cities in southern latitudes that people will be leaving, but specifically cities close to the coast. So people will be moving out of cities like Miami, Charleston, LA, and Houston and into cities like Dallas, Atlanta, Nashville, and Phoenix.
LA isn't really at sea level... I don't think water or heat issues would be any more problematic than Phoenix...
I lived in Los Angeles County most of my life
In 1990
LA City - 3.4M
LA County - 8.9M
2020
LA City - 4M
LA Count -10M
LA is known for being a huge population county/city but looking at stats, It barely grew in 30 years relative to the 80million US population difference from 1990-2020. Sure the surrounding counties adding millions, as many people from LA county moved to neighboring counties. But at the same time, sprawl has caused serious issues especially traffic congestion. LA area has a lot of wide freeways and a lot of wide roadways to handle regional wide but it is really tough but not apocalyptic, yet.
Let's say LA county absorbs 1 million people per decade, what will it look like? That is tough to imagine because so much new construction with mid-rises and high-rises have been built the past decade alone, yet the population hasn't grown as much. This is mainly because the immigrant concentrated areas usually pack many people in a smaller apartment/house but as housing costs skyrocket, many of these areas get depopulated and replaced with more affluent singles/couples/small families. Many of the new high-rises and mid-rises will often have singles/couple/roommates OR absentee residents who maybe live in other countries and are part timers. So adding 1 million new people by 2030, there will likely be 100+ high-rise buildings in and 500+ mid-rise buildings primarily in the central core of LA County from Santa Monica - Downtown LA and denser cities like Long Beach, Pasadena, Glendale, etc. LA will have some conflicts from residents wanting to keep their low density neighborhoods, thus the new housing will be built along main corridors and specific areas like Downtown LA (replacing the industrial districts/parking lots), Hollywood, East Hollywood, Koreatown (replacing strip malls). Unsure of other areas because they are highly developed already. Santa Monica limits new construction to mid-rises and so much of Santa Monica is developed except for the closing airport. I dont see Beverly Hills building much. Pasadena is similar to SM in that they only build mid-rises. Glendale City has built out most of its central parking areas. Streets of Vermont Ave, Santa Monica Blvd, Sunset Blvd, Venice, La Brea have a lot of potential. A lot of LA has old neighborhoods with fantastic architecture styles. I cant imagine bulldozing these areas to make new dense housing. So it is tough to change many LA low rise areas. I think some of the low rise areas will likely built some ADU aka granny flats in backyards to take in a lot people. Also some housing will allow small lot townhouse style homes on single family lot but keeping the buildings under 3 levels. LA county is building out its public transit system but by 2030 it isn't significantly built out. The purple line will be open by 2028, regional connector, crenshaw line for sure, too. Now sure if most of the 1 million will take public transit if it doesnt connect to most places, so people will still likely own a car or use uber/lyft if that exists. Overall most neighborhoods will likely be more walkable with more public transit options as roads will likely make bus only lanes on major corridors.
One thing that's surprised me a little about academic projections of US metro population growth, as climate change really sets in, is that it's not so much cities in southern latitudes that people will be leaving, but specifically cities close to the coast. So people will be moving out of cities like Miami, Charleston, LA, and Houston and into cities like Dallas, Atlanta, Nashville, and Phoenix.
I don't think LA is a great example, since unlike the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts, elevation go up prety quickly on the West Coast. In places like downtown Santa Monica and LAX, that are literally right across the street from the beach, you are already more than 100 ft above sea level. There are a few beach side neighborhoods with lower elevations (MDR, Venice, parts of Long Beach), but probably 99+% of the LA metro will be fine. The bigger threat to LA is drought and heat waves, but that will likely be issues in all the cities you cite as not having climate change issues.
As for the underlying assumptions the OP relies on for continued growth, I'm more pessimistic than I would have been a few years ago. Those numbers above were looking at trends before 2017 and extrapolating them forward. I think the 2020 Census numbers are going to be lower than most would have predicted a few years ago. Some of it will be due to the extra challenges with counting people this year, partially due to coronavirus, and partially due to political goals. Immigration (both legal and illegal) is down the last few years, and the US depends on immigration for growth, since Americans don't have children at replacement levels anymore. With the state of the economy, I think it will take many years to recover and to start attracting large numbers of immigrants again.
Superstar cities (you can pretty accurately guess which ones this label refers to) have for decades been expected to fall back towards the pack as technology improved and theoretically leveled the playing field for all cities (and even rural areas). But no, surprisingly superstar cities across the world keep making strides by more than their fare share. I'm not necessarily referring to population, though that generally is reflected as well, but in other areas like wealth, jobs, GDP, influence, etc. As Richard Florida says, the world is "spiky" and all the benefits keep going increasingly to the already successful cities.
I say all of this to say that the pandemic appears to be a game changer that may see superstar cities begin to fall off, and smaller cities/rural areas begin to gain some ground. However, urbanists have been predicting this for decades and it hasn't happened so I am still very skeptical if there's really going to be any kind of permanent change from all of this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by saybanana
So which cities in the next 40 years will absorb all the new people living in America? Can these cities actually handle additional people for housing, schools, traffic congestion, public transit? What will the cities look like?
Most cities across the country will play a part in this. Small metros will become medium sized. Medium metros will become large. Outside of a small percentage of anomalies, I'd expect every MSA to see sizable growth over the next 40 years. Can these urban centers handle the growth? They will have to...cities are the only places that can! It may not be pretty, and planners are often playing catch up in the real world, but cities are the growth centers of most civilizations throughout history.
The population growth is entirely dependent upon immigration. It's been this way for the last 30 years most likely if not 40, the projections from the 1950s said that we would peak at 250 million people by 2050...But that was before the immigration law changes that happened in 1965.
Organic growth in America has slowed to zero. There will be no future organic growth.
The fertility rate - that's the number of children the average woman will have - has dropped to 1.73.
It takes a rate of 2.0 to maintain an existing population.
It's not just America. It's happening all over the world. Some countries, like Japan and Russia, are nearly in panic mode, but there seems to be nothing that can be done.
Do I believe that some day there will be fewer people on earth? Yes, I do. Far fewer. When the world wide fertility rate dips below 2.0, the contraction of the human race will have begun. It is at 2.4 now.
By that Census projection, the population is expected to grow 7.6% over next 10 years.
70 million projected over next 40 years. With less each decade. IF it was steady growth that would be a bit less than 0.5% annual growth. In 1960, the rate was almost 3.5 times that. (Fell off quickly.)
So, ok, probably some growth in total population. A lot in seniors. But a lesser rate than in the past. Unless something changes.
Where do the seniors want to live? Mega-regions? Which ones? How many buck out of mega-regions or at least their cores?
One thing that's surprised me a little about academic projections of US metro population growth, as climate change really sets in, is that it's not so much cities in southern latitudes that people will be leaving, but specifically cities close to the coast. So people will be moving out of cities like Miami, Charleston, LA, and Houston and into cities like Dallas, Atlanta, Nashville, and Phoenix.
Climate change isn't going to be kind to DFW, Austin, or San Antonio. Extreme high temps over 120 degrees will become more common if the models are accurate.
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