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Expected future
Top 20 projected fastest growing US metros (of the 50 largest), 1995-2020
| Rank |
Metro area |
1995 (est.) |
2020 (proj.) |
Increase |
% change |
| 1 |
Sacramento-Yolo |
1,604,724 |
2,770,060 |
1,165,336 |
+72.6% |
| 2 |
Dallas-Fort Worth |
4,449,875 |
7,412,332 |
2,962,457 |
+66.6% |
| 3 |
Austin-San Marcos |
999,936 |
1,656,298 |
656,362 |
+65.6% |
| 4 |
San Diego |
2,644,132 |
4,173,814 |
1,529,682 |
+57.9% |
| 5 |
Orlando |
1,390,574 |
2,173,267 |
782,693 |
+56.3% |
| 6 |
Phoenix-Mesa |
2,563,582 |
3,990,792 |
1,427,210 |
+55.7% |
| 7 |
West Palm Beach-Boca Raton |
972,093 |
1,504,081 |
531,988 |
+54.7% |
| 8 |
Las Vegas |
1,138,758 |
1,760,723 |
621,965 |
+54.6% |
| 9 |
Atlanta |
3,431,983 |
5,215,731 |
1,783,748 |
+52.0% |
| 10 |
Seattle-Tacoma-Bremerton |
3,265,139 |
4,943,055 |
1,677,916 |
+51.4% |
| 11 |
Salt Lake City-Ogden |
1,199,323 |
1,733,924 |
534,601 |
+44.6% |
| 12 |
San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose |
6,539,602 |
9,396,971 |
2,857,369 |
+43.7% |
| 13 |
Raliegh-Durham-Chapel Hill |
995,256 |
1,419,452 |
424,196 |
+42.6% |
| 14 |
Portland-Salem |
2,021,982 |
2,806,810 |
784,828 |
+38.8% |
| 15 |
Nashville |
1,093,836 |
1,503,006 |
409,170 |
+37.4% |
| 16 |
Denver-Boulder-Greeley |
2,233,172 |
3,036,753 |
803,581 |
+36.0% |
| 17 |
Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater |
2,180,484 |
2,963,304 |
782,820 |
+35.9% |
| 18 |
Los Angeles-Riverside-Orange County |
15,362,165 |
20,849,218 |
5,487,053 |
+35.7% |
| 19 |
Charlotte-Gastonia-Rock Hill |
1,289,177 |
1,720,939 |
431,762 |
+33.5% |
| 20 |
Norfolk-Virginia Beach-Newport News |
1,540,446 |
2,053,253 |
512,807 |
+33.3% |
Source: www.bizjournals.com/journals/demographics/reports/63/63-1.html
Qualitative description
The populations of cities will continue to grow, with more and more people heading for new suburbs built further and further from downtown. Most development will continue to be sprawling suburbs (Phoenix now covers an area similar to Los Angeles, with a population only one-third the size). The value of properties between these new layers of development and the redeveloped and expensive downtowns will drop. These areas could become run down areas housing only those who are not able to escape or could be renovated or redeveloped, just as downtowns are now. More cities will experiment with expensive mass transit projects as a way to alleviate increasing traffic problems and boost their images (e.g., Houston, St. Louis, Buffalo, Memphis, and more). There will continue to be scattered attempts at building neighbourhoods suitable for walking, with conventional mixed-use centres, but there will also be more secure communities and private security guards elsewhere. Vehicle ownership will increase, particularly in developing parts of the world, with the number of vehicles world-wide rising from 550 million today to more than one billion by 2020. Working or studying from home will be an increasingly available possibility for some, although it is hard to tell how many will take the chance. New building technologies will allow new kinds of buildings, and construction on previously unusable land. See the third scenario, for another look at a baseline forecast.
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