The US Census Bureau thread

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Well that sure is an unexpected one.

Detroit city proper lost another 10% over the past decade, but the MSA got a little bit denser overall?

Milwaukee, Baltimore, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh all lost central city population as well, and got a little less dense at the MSA level, but somehow metro Detroit bucked that trend. Strange.

Think of Detroit’s phenomena like dead-heading a flowering shrub. If you remove the dead buds, the roots grow and so, too, do new blossoms at the tips.

As Detroit has pursued an aggressive model of nature reclamation in some areas, what remains is more densely populated, the city is getting back to its roots and what little growth has happened in the suburbs has likely been blossoming of new infill between where the good old buds’ houses were.

If your population growth is close to flat, your weighted population density can still change given internal population movements. Example: teenagers moving out of their childhood home and getting their own apartment in the city (making the metro more dense) or young newlyweds buying their first house in the exurbs moving from the city where they lived with a roommate (making the metro less dense). If your growth is negative, those internal shifts can even outweigh the population loss (Detroit). Furthermore, population gains do not necessarily translate to weighted population density increases (San Antonio) if new housing development takes place in previously unpopulated areas at residential densities that are beneath the previous metro weighted average.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

@wwmiv, Thanks for assembling that!

I double checked the San Antonio number, and got the same result as before. Here is the % change map for San Antonio, with noticeable drops (blue tones) south and west of downtown, which I am guessing drove the drop in WPD.

Mmhmm. I must have omitted a section of precincts accidentally or made a typo for my hand calculations to have been so off for San Antonio.

I must say, I am not surprised at all by the real number and was more shocked by the number I had.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

Even though Pittsburgh and Cleveland reversed the MSA population losses, tough to see the drops in the cores result in a negative change for the weighted density. Likewise, Baltimore continues to have a rough number for the East Coast; I expect the other BosWash nodes to all be significantly positive.

On the other hand, amazing result for Seattle. Denver too; I was in Denver a few months ago and was impressed by the scale of downtown residential construction. Nice to see metros like Phoenix and the Inland Empire densifying nicely as well.

Pittsburgh is not in the top fifty most dense metro areas any longer. It has been overtaken by Orlando, Springfield, Albany, Worcester, Ogden, Boise and … Scranton. Scranton? Pittsburgh is not even as dense as Scranton? I chock that up to the way Pittsburghs precincts are drawn, where each one typically contains the peak of a ridgeline and slopes that are nigh undevelopable. Birmingham, Nashville, Knoxville, Greenville, Austin, and San Antonio and others have similar topographical problems… but so does Scranton and yet still average Scrantonite (?) lives in a more densely populated precinct than the precinct in which the average Steeler lives.

Also, 2010 weighted density for top 10:

NY: 31,251.4
LA: 12,133.9
Chicago: 8,613.4
Boston: 7,980.1
Philadelphia: 7,773.2
Miami: 7,395.3
DC: 6,388.1
Houston: 4,109.6
DFW: 3,903.3
ATL: 2,173*

[ChiSoxRox]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Atlanta was not in the top 50 most dense and I don’t have a number for it.

The original Census page is long dead, but the Austin Contrarian post has the 2010 number for Atlanta in a footnote: 2,173 ppsm.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

The original Census page is long dead, but the Austin Contrarian post has the 2010 number for Atlanta in a footnote: 2,173 ppsm.

I hadn’t noticed the footnote. Great catch! That’s where I was grabbing the data from also.

[craigs]

This thread is my nirvana. Thanks everybody for your hard work!

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Well that sure is an unexpected one.

Detroit city proper lost another 10% over the past decade, but the MSA got a little bit denser overall?

Milwaukee, Baltimore, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh all lost central city population as well, and got a little less dense at the MSA level, but somehow metro Detroit bucked that trend. Strange.

Detroit MSA grew by 2.23%. If its urban footprint has expanded less than that it would become denser overall and I guess that would impact weighted density as well.

The almost fully urbanized Oakland and Macomb counties grew 6.0% and 4.8% respectively. Wayne County minus Detroit, 4.3%. And the exurban Livingstone County, that usually grew like crazy in the past, post a mere a 7.1% in the past, with the already urbanized tracts growing more.

[BnaBreaker]

Originally Posted by craigs

This thread is my nirvana. Thanks everybody for your hard work!

^What he said! This is SSP at it's finest!

[streetscaper]

Originally Posted by craigs

This thread is my nirvana. Thanks everybody for your hard work!

God yes! and Yuri too in the other thread

[Emprise du Lion]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

The weighted population density for metros #11-25.

St. Louis....2,738.0

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Chicago's MSA now covers some 12,000 Sq. Miles of land, over 2/3 of which is literally cornfields. I see very little utility in including all of that rural land into a density calc of a "metro area". Even if a weighted calculation makes those areas count less, why would we include all of those peripheral cornfields in the first place?

This has me wondering what the density of the Missouri portion of metro St. Louis would be by itself, because the Illinois counties make up a geographic area that's just as big as the Missouri counties, but they hold less than 1/4 of the metro's population at this point. There are some built up cities in the Metro East, but we're talking endless cornfields otherwise.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

If your population growth is close to flat, your weighted population density can still change given internal population movements.

I understand how the math involved can allow it to happen, but if I was placing bets, and city X had a decreasing central city population with an overall increasing MSA population, I'd bet pretty big on that MSA's WPD going down.

Which is exactly what we saw from all of the other cities in that category, except Detroit, which somehow bucked that trend. That's quite interesting to me.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by yuriandrade

Detroit MSA grew by 2.23%. If its urban footprint has expanded less than that it would become denser overall and I guess that would impact weighted density as well.

Metro Detroit had significant population growth in immigrant-oriented urban suburbs, like Dearborn, Dearborn Heights and Hamtramck. I suspect that's the main driver. Immigrant households with larger family sizes probably replacing elderly grannies. Also, the older, more affluent Woodward corridor (favored quarter) suburbs mostly experienced population growth.

And, yeah, fringe sprawl seemed to slow down somewhat, but the fastest growing communities in Metro Detroit are still on the fringe.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

I understand how the math involved can allow it to happen, but if I was placing bets, and city X had a decreasing central city population with an overall increasing MSA population, I'd bet pretty big on that MSA's WPD going down.

Which is exactly what we saw from all of the other cities in that category, except Detroit, which somehow bucked that trend. That's quite interesting to me.

You're totally right: 9 times out of 10, if you're declining in population, you're also declining in weighted population density. Hell, 10 times out of 10, if you're declining in population, you're declining in standard population density.

But if I were placing bets on any specific metro area with a shrinking decreasing city having actually increased its weighted population density, I'd have placed my bet on Detroit. Crawford makes an excellent point above about household sizes probably playing a factor here as well.

[ChiSoxRox]

Originally Posted by Emprise du Lion

This has me wondering what the density of the Missouri portion of metro St. Louis would be by itself, because the Illinois counties make up a geographic area that's just as big as the Missouri counties, but they hold less than 1/4 of the metro's population at this point. There are some built up cities in the Metro East, but we're talking endless cornfields otherwise.

St. Louis MSA....2,738.0

Missouri portion....3,225.3

SL County + City....4,170.9

St. Louis city....6,834.8

For the overall WPD list, I have #4 (DFW) to #10 (Boston) atm, will post once I have LA and Chicago as well. NYC is going to be its own post due to its sheer scale.

Originally Posted by streetscaper

God yes! and Yuri too in the other thread

Thanks for the kind words!

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

St. Louis MSA....2,738.0

Missouri portion....3,225.3

SL County + City....4,170.9

St. Louis city....6,834.8

For the overall WPD list, I have #4 (DFW) to #10 (Boston) atm, will post once I have LA and Chicago as well. NYC is going to be its own post due to its sheer scale.



Thanks for the kind words!

Special request, please: can you do Fort Worth Metro Division versus Dallas Metro Division as well?

[ChiSoxRox]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Special request, please: can you do Fort Worth Metro Division versus Dallas Metro Division as well?

Dallas Division: 4,574.7

Fort Worth Division: 3,660.9

That would be a very smooth east-west split, if not for Denton County being attached to Dallas and not Fort Worth.

Now for LA through Boston....

[ChiSoxRox]

Weighted population density for MSAs ranked #2 to #10 in population

Los Angeles....12,169.4
Chicago....9,011.9
Boston....8,987.9
Miami....8,489.2
Philadelphia....8,258.5
Washington....7,296.1
Houston....4,606.4
Dallas....4,274.7
Atlanta....2,686.4

By % change from 2010:

Atlanta....+23.6% (+513 ppsm) !!!!
Miami...+14.8% (+1093.9)
Washington....+14.2% (+908.0)
Boston....+12.6% (+1007.8)
Houston....+12.1% (+496.8)
Dallas....+9.3% (+365.4)
Philadelphia....+6.2% (+485.3)
Chicago....+4.6% (+398.5)
Los Angeles....+0.5% (+55.5)

NYC is almost certainly positive as well, meaning the top ten metros all became more dense past decade. That is likely the first time in several decades that holds true. I might even wager that would be the first time since 1930, since the Depression caused several cities to dip and by the 1950 census the suburbs are in full bloom.

Especially outstanding densification in Atlanta! Los Angeles on the other hand was effectively flat; perhaps a balance between the core adding density versus household sizes in places like Santa Ana dropping?

The list over 6k, for the top 100 MSAs in population.

1. New York: north of 30k
2. San Francisco....13,267.8
3. Honolulu....12,581.9
4. Los Angeles....12,169.4
5. San Jose....9,075.9
6. Chicago....9,011.9
7. Boston....8,987.9
8. Miami....8,489.2
9. Philadelphia....8,258.5
10. San Diego....7,381.9
11. Washington....7,296.1
12. Las Vegas....7,031.7
13. Seattle....6,146.3

Once I get NYC's number, I'll post the full top 100 list.

[wwmiv]

Next up from ChiRoxSox: national weighted population density.

Jk jk

[ChiSoxRox]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Next up from ChiRoxSox: national weighted population density.

Jk jk

*screams*

The New York MSA is going to be nine pulls or so from the Census tool due to the 1000 tract bottleneck, summing up the product of density and population for each pull, then combining those at the end before finally dividing by the MSA population to get the weighted population density. (I am being careful not to divide by population until the very end, so as not to split the denominator and wreck the math.)

I'm doing all this in a Google Sheet, so quick to calculate but tedious to pull the data. I also have a cell summing the population for each jurisdiction as a check to ensure I pulled all of the right tracts

My New York plan is:

Each of the four dense boroughs is its own pull, being >500 tracts each. Then, I'll pull Staten Island so I can have the WPD for each borough and for NYC proper readily at hand. Then, Long Island is a pull, the Hudson Valley is a pull, and the New Jersey side is at least two, probably three pulls: Essex + Hudson + Bergen + Passaic if it fits for the Jersey core, then hopefully the rest of the Jersey side plus Pike, PA is under 1000 tracts.

I do want to calculate state numbers, but California is probably in the ballpark of 9,000 tracts. I'll have to do the same strategy as for LA County and its 2,495 tracts: add density filters to get bands of under 1000 tracts.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by ChiSoxRox

*screams*

The New York MSA is going to be nine pulls or so from the Census tool due to the 1000 tract bottleneck, summing up the product of density and population for each pull, then combining those at the end before finally dividing by the MSA population to get the weighted population density. (I am being careful not to divide by population until the very end, so as not to split the denominator and wreck the math.)

I'm doing all this in a Google Sheet, so quick to calculate but tedious to pull the data. I also have a cell summing the population for each jurisdiction as a check to ensure I pulled all of the right tracts

My New York plan is:

Each of the four dense boroughs is its own pull, being >500 tracts each. Then, I'll pull Staten Island so I can have the WPD for each borough and for NYC proper readily at hand. Then, Long Island is a pull, the Hudson Valley is a pull, and the New Jersey side is at least two, probably three pulls: Essex + Hudson + Bergen + Passaic if it fits for the Jersey core, then hopefully the rest of the Jersey side plus Pike, PA is under 1000 tracts.

I do want to calculate state numbers, but California is probably in the ballpark of 9,000 tracts. I'll have to do the same strategy as for LA County and its 2,495 tracts: add density filters to get bands of under 1000 tracts.

If you calculate states, you will already have the data to calculate nationally.