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In population, Mich. a loss leader

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/artic.../606210330/1003

In another dubious distinction for state, census shows drop in 6 cities, with economy a likely culprit.

John Wisely and Amy Lee / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- Michigan is home to six of the fastest-shrinking cities in the United States, according to population estimates released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.

Detroit, Lansing, Flint, Ann Arbor, Warren and Grand Rapids all placed in the top 60 among cities with more than 100,000 people as ranked by percent of loss. Demographers note the changes are estimates and represent a one-year, 2004-to-2005 snapshot. Still, Michigan's slumping economy is likely driving the trend...

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Michigan's moves reflect a broader national trend of people leaving urban areas, said state demographer Ken Darga.

"One of the most interesting things in the estimates is the township population (in Michigan) is over 50 percent of the total for the first time since 1900," Darga said. "It tells us more about the form of government than about the population."

I would be interested in seeing how the population numbers work out for the regional area - would it be an increase, or are the same people just moving from place to place?

Must go research .

I'm not sure I understand the "form of government" comment . . .

Trixie

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With the emphasis on urban living through downtown condos, apartments and lofts -- I would hope this might stabilize -- at least in the city of Grand Rapids.

What are we adding -- hundreds if not thousands of new downtown residences this decade? At some point it should make up for some of the suburban flight that has been the trend over the past 30 years or so.

I'd love to see this study broken down by census tract or neighborhood. Has anyone seen the actual Grand Rapids percentage? The linked article didn't mention it.

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The population has been moving from urban to suburban and exurban locations, however, trends in many areas show that the outward migration has begun to reverse as people have started to move back into the cities. This is made up of young professionals, elderly, and singles. Since families have not started to move back in yet, inner city schools are still going to face issues.

I am surprised that Grand Rapids is still loosing population. I think that in the next census we will show an increase.

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Here's a little population synopsis for City and Metro GR

1960 197,193

1970 197,649

1980 181,843

1990 189,126

2000 197,800

2003(est) 195,601

2005 (est) 195,763

Total net loss over 45 years = about 1500 people

Metro Area Growth 1960 - 2000:

669,578 - 1,088,514 = +418,936 (+ 62%)

Grand Rapids Metro has gained about 60,000 people since 2000. Less than 2000 people decrease in the City of GR from the 2000 high is not bad at all, and probably within the census' margin of error.

I think the comment about government structure is, that a city like Phoenix may add people in an area a certain distance from the city core that is considered "the city of Phoenix", whereas in Michigan cities, it would be xxxx Township, and doesn't get counted toward the census data for the City proper, only the Metro area. That would be my guess at what he's saying.

I'm not comparing our growth even (Metro wise) with the desert Southwest, which is growing exponentially. Just as an illustration.

Clear as mud?

Phizzy covered the population estimates a bit in his THREAD from the other day. Even before the mainstream press. :thumbsup:

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hey Phizz! where are you with one of your helpful lists. I would like to see the estimates for the surrounding areas.

I think you could attribute that shrinkage in part to an aging population, and more single people moving to the city, filling up family size homes. But I do think that Detroit is about to hit rock bottom on it's declines and start going up. When I was in the city at the begginning of may I was dumbfounded to see all the new housing going in in the city.

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This is just shock journalism, and not based in much sound fact, either. If a .7% for Ann Arbor ranks it up that high in the loss list, that kind of discredits the whole point of the article, IMO.

BTW, people keep remarking on the hundreds of new units being added to center cities in Michigan, and while nice, that's nothing compared to the hundreds/thousands still leaving the middle-of-the-road neighborhoods outside these central cores. Downtown redevelopment is nice, and all. In fact, it's a necessity, but it's not going to turn around a population loss of these kinds of shrinking cities, which is why I'm confused so many continue to bank on a downtown renaissance to turn around a shrinkning city's population.

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This is just shock journalism, and not based in much sound fact, either. If a .7% for Ann Arbor ranks it up that high in the loss list, that kind of discredits the whole point of the article, IMO.

BTW, people keep remarking on the hundreds of new units being added to center cities in Michigan, and while nice, that's nothing compared to the hundreds/thousands still leaving the middle-of-the-road neighborhoods outside these central cores. Downtown redevelopment is nice, and all. In fact, it's a necessity, but it's not going to turn around a population loss of these kinds of shrinking cities, which is why I'm confused so many continue to bank on a downtown renaissance to turn around a shrinkning city's population.

I agree. I posted something to that affect on the other population thread:

http://www.urbanplanet.org/forums/index.ph...mp;#entry469670

I think it's even too premature to say that Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor or a few other cities are actually losing population. Population estimates are hit and miss.

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I agree with that, too. I don't put too much stock in these estimates unless they are of a city known to be bleeding or gaining people at a fast rate (i.e. Detroit, Washington, Phoenix, San Antonio...). Though, I could definitely see a good argument for all of Michigan's major cities losing population. It's definitely not a stretch. In fact, I think it may be a bit more of a stretch, or at least a bit harder to prove, that any of them are growing.

The point of city boundaries is also a good one that most, but not all, people understand. Of Michigan's major cities, only three of them have over 36 square miles (because of the old township layout), and those are:

Detroit: 142.9 square miles (138.8 sq mi of land)

Grand Rapids: 45.3 square miles (44.6 square miles of land)

Battle Creek: 43.7 square miles (42.8 square miles of land) of which a huge chunk is a decommisioned military base.

Even these cities are tiny in comparison (in size) to cities they are often compared to across the country. Just some random examples in the Midwest for instance:

Omaha: 390,007 at 118.9 square miles

Toledo: 304,973 at 135.3 square miles

Columbus: 730,657 at 342.1 square miles

Indianapolis: 791,926 at 368.1 square miles

Madison: 208,054 at 84.7 square miles

Kansas City: 444,387 at 318 square miles

Des Moines: 198,682 at 77.2 square miles

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It makes sense to me though, it's why Michigans core cities like Flint, Lansing and Grand Rapids have relatively small city populations but much larger Metro populations.

All three of those cities have Metro areas larger than Des Moines.

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Actually, Des Moines' MSA is now larger than both Metro Lansing and Metro Flint, and topped out at 471,000 as of 2003, and probably even bigger today. Lansing and Flint MSA actually only top out at 450,000 these days, as Des Moines MSA is fast growing. But, I think they've actually added counties since 2000, so that may be where the gain comes from.

*EDIT*

Upon further research, the Lansing and Des Moines MSA's are very close in size:

Des Moines: 1,752 square miles

Lansing: 1,715 square miles

And, Flint is the densest MSA as it's only one county:

Flint: 649 square miles (436,000 persons)

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Just a few more things to add that may or may not be directly on subject...

There are two ways to measure a cities "feel" and influence, and that is with Urbanized Areas (measure of the built environtment; feel of size) and Metro Areas (measure of a cities influence).

I'm going to concentrate, now, on Urbanized Areas. Below are a list of Michigan's major urbanized areas, population, square mileage, and population density, and map included:

Detroit: 3,903,377 - 1,261.45 square miles - 3,094.4 PSM (people per square mile)

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Detroit_70676_7.pdf

Grand Rapids: 539,080 - 257.35 square miles - 2,094.7 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Gran...ids_70679_7.pdf

Flint: 365,096 - 231.11 square miles - 1,579.7 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Flint_70678_7.pdf

Lansing: 300,032 - 136.86 square miles - 2,192.1 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Lansing_70685_7.pdf

Ann Arbor: 283,904 - 128.75 square miles - 2,205.0 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Ann_Arbor_70672_7.pdf

Kalamazoo: 187,961 - 107.74 square miles - 1,744.5 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Kalamazoo_70684_7.pdf

Muskegon: 154,729 - 99.65 square miles - 1,552.8 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Muskegon_70689_7.pdf

Saginaw: 140,985 - 73.74 square miles - 1,911.8 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_Saginaw_70691_7.pdf

South Lyon/Howell/Brighton: 106,139 - 95.01 square miles - 1,117.1 PSM

http://www.michigan.gov/documents/CGI_SLyo...ton_70692_7.pdf

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rank by Urbanized Area density

1. Detroit - 3,094.4 PSM

2. Ann Arbor - 2,205.0 PSM

3. Lansing - 2,192.1 PSM

4. Grand Rapids - 2,094.7 PSM

5. Saginaw - 1,911.8 PSM

6. Kalamazoo - 1,744.5 PSM

7. Muskegon - 1,552.8 PSM

8. Flint - 1,579.7 PSM

9. South Lyon/Howell/Brighton - 1,113.8 PSM

Anyway, just something else to help in discussing the "size" of a city/area. Though, even I think Urban Area desginations need to be made "tighter." Currently for a tract to be labeled, urbanized, it only has to have a population density of something like 1,000 people per square mile which I wouldn't call "urban." The density is also important as it shows how "sprawled" an Urbanized Area is.

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Columbus: 730,657 at 342.1 square miles

Indianapolis: 791,926 at 368.1 square miles

Kansas City: 444,387 at 318 square miles

Sheesh! Grand Rapids' MSA is probably the same size as these cities. Anyone know GR's Metro size in square miles? And then what GR's city population would then be?

I'm guessing it would be more like this:

172965418_59871a98e3_o.jpg

At 197,000 people in 45 square miles, that's a density of 4300/sq mi for GR.

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Sheesh! Grand Rapids' MSA is probably the same size as these cities. Anyone know GR's Metro size in square miles? And then what GR's city population would then be?

I'm guessing it would be more like this:

At 197,000 people in 45 square miles, that's a density of 4300/sq mi for GR.

GRdad,

Grand Rapid's MSA is pretty large at least by Michigan standards for a city its size:

2,774 square miles

Now, for the coastal counties, I only included land area, as quite a few of them include a huge amount of Lake Michigan, so it would technically be quite a bit larger, but you can't build on water...at least not yet. ;)

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GRdad,

Grand Rapid's MSA is pretty large at least by Michigan standards for a city its size:

2,774 square miles

Now, for the coastal counties, I only included land area, as quite a few of them include a huge amount of Lake Michigan, so it would technically be quite a bit larger, but you can't build on water...at least not yet. ;)

Could you imagine Muskegon going all Amsterdam on us and building out into the lake? I think that'd be pretty cool, actually.

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GRdad,

Grand Rapid's MSA is pretty large at least by Michigan standards for a city its size:

2,774 square miles

Now, for the coastal counties, I only included land area, as quite a few of them include a huge amount of Lake Michigan, so it would technically be quite a bit larger, but you can't build on water...at least not yet. ;)

Sure, I can understand that. I was just saying that if the City of Grand Rapids were the size of Indianapolis or Columbus in land size, and gained thousands of new people within an area like here marked in yellow:

post-2672-1151030980_thumb.jpg

then it would show on the census as gaining population (quite a bit I would imagine).

post-2672-1151030980_thumb.jpg

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Sure, I can understand that. I was just saying that if the City of Grand Rapids were the size of Indianapolis or Columbus in land size, and gained thousands of new people within an area like here marked in yellow:

post-2672-1151030980_thumb.jpg

then it would show on the census as gaining population (quite a bit I would imagine).

Yeah, I got that, but I was just giving the size of the Grand Rapids MSA liked you asked.

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I can understand how Grand Rapids is bigger than Lansing, there simply is more people there and more people moving there. But what I dont understand is how South Lyon and Brighton can be lumped together as an Urbanized area. Talk about a city with no core.

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Urbanized area is simply a collection of contiguous census tracts of a certain density, I think 1,000 people per square mile or more. So any collection of census tracts makes for an independant urbanized area. GR's is about 550,000+, Lansing's is a lttle over 300,000.

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