Population growth 2006.
“America’s romance with sprawl may be over,” blares the headline of USA Today. “Five years ago, millions of Americans were streaming to new homes on the fringes of metropolitan areas. Then housing prices collapsed and the Great Recession slowed growth to levels not seen since the Great Depression in the 1930s. Growth remained slow last year, and largely confined to counties at the center of metropolitan areas.”
The maps at left (taken from USA Today) show just how much growth has slowed overall. What they don’t show very clearly is how growth has reoriented within metropolitan regions. Says the newspaper:
Population growth 2011.
Population growth in fringe counties nearly screeched to a halt in the year that ended July 1, 2011. By comparison, counties at the core of metro areas are growing faster than the nation as a whole.
“There’s a pall being cast on the outer edges,” says John McIlwain, senior fellow for housing at the Urban Land
Institute, a non-profit development group that promotes sustainability. “The foreclosures, the vacancies, the uncompleted roads. It’s uncomfortable out there. The glitz is off.”
But never count sprawl out. “Sprawl is the Freddy Krueger of American development,” says Robert Lang, author of Megapolitan America. “It’s always pronounced dead and yet somehow springs back to life.”
— JAB
