Population Growth

[MJLO]

Official 2020 census numbers are out.  Though I can't find any easy to convert data sets so it's going to take a couple days to build some stuff to report.  A few quick notes from what I see.  Most of the states underestimates from 2020 happened in SE Michigan/Detroit metro.  GR metro was underestimated from the 2020 numbers by about 6,000 so the official total is 1,087,592.  Most of those underestimates came in suburban areas, Ottawa, Montcalm, and Ionia counties.  Kent County was shorted a little but was largely accurate.   Here's the quickfacts data for those counties.  Note you have to look at the 4th row down to see the 2020 numbers.  The first bolded row is still the 2019 estimates. 

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/montcalmcountymichigan,ioniacountymichigan,ottawacountymichigan,kentcountymichigan/PST045219

Grand Rapids city was overestimated by a couple thousand people, official numbers come in just below 199k people.   That official 200k number continues to allude GR.  Wyoming officially surpassed Kalamazoo in population.  Kzoo was surprisingly overestimated and came in at 73,598 for official 2020 numbers.  Wyoming is 76,501.  Kentwood was significantly underestimated coming in at 54,304 an 11.5% jump in growth.   I had been saying that the 2019 and 2020 estimates were off in both Kentwood and Wyoming.  They both have large immigrant populations and logic tracked a slow down in growth in more diverse municipalities over the last couple years of the decade.  I think this is largely going to prove true across the board.   The table for select cities below.    More to come

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/kentwoodcitymichigan,kalamazoocitymichigan,wyomingcitymichigan,grandrapidscitymichigan/PST045219

[Matchetes]

25 minutes ago, MJLO said:

Official 2020 census numbers are out.  Though I can't find any easy to convert data sets so it's going to take a couple days to build some stuff to report.  A few quick notes from what I see.  Most of the states underestimates from 2020 happened in SE Michigan/Detroit metro.  GR metro was underestimated from the 2020 numbers by about 6,000 so the official total is 1,087,592.  Most of those underestimates came in suburban areas, Ottawa, Montcalm, and Ionia counties.  Kent County was shorted a little but was largely accurate.   Here's the quickfacts data for those counties.  Note you have to look at the 4th row down to see the 2020 numbers.  The first bolded row is still the 2019 estimates. 

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/montcalmcountymichigan,ioniacountymichigan,ottawacountymichigan,kentcountymichigan/PST045219

Grand Rapids city was overestimated by a couple thousand people, official numbers come in just below 199k people.   That official 200k number continues to allude GR.  Wyoming officially surpassed Kalamazoo in population.  Kzoo was surprisingly overestimated and came in at 73,598 for official 2020 numbers.  Wyoming is 76,501.  Kentwood was significantly underestimated coming in at 54,304 an 11.5% jump in growth.   I had been saying that the 2019 and 2020 estimates were off in both Kentwood and Wyoming.  They both have large immigrant populations and logic tracked a slow down in growth in more diverse municipalities over the last couple years of the decade.  I think this is largely going to prove true across the board.   The table for select cities below.    More to come

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/kentwoodcitymichigan,kalamazoocitymichigan,wyomingcitymichigan,grandrapidscitymichigan/PST045219

Ooofff coming in just under 200K. That's tragic. I don't know what bragging rights come from being a 200K city but I know that I want them.

 

The data will be released in a more manageable format on 8/16 to be used for redistricting purposes, though i think the most user friendly version is coming in September. You may just want to wait until Monday before spending hours with the data sets

[MJLO]

8 minutes ago, Matchetes said:

Ooofff coming in just under 200K. That's tragic. I don't know what bragging rights come from being a 200K city but I know that I want them.

 

The data will be released in a more manageable format on 8/16 to be used for redistricting purposes, though i think the most user friendly version is coming in September. You may just want to wait until Monday before spending hours with the data sets

I have a compulsory fascination with population stats and how they compare geographically.  I'm not sure I can wait lol, it's worth the effort for me. 

[GRDadof3]

1 hour ago, MJLO said:

Official 2020 census numbers are out.  Though I can't find any easy to convert data sets so it's going to take a couple days to build some stuff to report.  A few quick notes from what I see.  Most of the states underestimates from 2020 happened in SE Michigan/Detroit metro.  GR metro was underestimated from the 2020 numbers by about 6,000 so the official total is 1,087,592.  Most of those underestimates came in suburban areas, Ottawa, Montcalm, and Ionia counties.  Kent County was shorted a little but was largely accurate.   Here's the quickfacts data for those counties.  Note you have to look at the 4th row down to see the 2020 numbers.  The first bolded row is still the 2019 estimates. 

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/montcalmcountymichigan,ioniacountymichigan,ottawacountymichigan,kentcountymichigan/PST045219

Grand Rapids city was overestimated by a couple thousand people, official numbers come in just below 199k people.   That official 200k number continues to allude GR.  Wyoming officially surpassed Kalamazoo in population.  Kzoo was surprisingly overestimated and came in at 73,598 for official 2020 numbers.  Wyoming is 76,501.  Kentwood was significantly underestimated coming in at 54,304 an 11.5% jump in growth.   I had been saying that the 2019 and 2020 estimates were off in both Kentwood and Wyoming.  They both have large immigrant populations and logic tracked a slow down in growth in more diverse municipalities over the last couple years of the decade.  I think this is largely going to prove true across the board.   The table for select cities below.    More to come

https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/kentwoodcitymichigan,kalamazoocitymichigan,wyomingcitymichigan,grandrapidscitymichigan/PST045219

Wow! Go Wyoming!

Plus, the city of GR is now 36.4% with a bachelors degree or higher. Kent County is 35.7%.

 

 

[MJLO]

OK so I've got some numbers compiled let's hope I haven't mistyped anything but here goes.  EDIT: sorry everyone it looks like the website shifted away from embedded photos at some point. 

[img]https://live.staticflickr.com/7033/26524381924_c70b07cf36_o.png[/img]

As always I start with the inner ring and work my way out.  This years census showed that estimates for Michigan were under by about 90k residents.  I had speculated that this underestimate came from a political climate that either incentivized immigrant populations to be under the radar, or perhaps discounted those who were not legal citizens.  I suspected this would affect areas with higher proportions of Latino immigrants.   In my head I thought the Grand Rapids area would be undercounted because of this.   It was undercounted, but nowhere nearly as dramatic as the results for the Detroit area which ended up with a net gain of about 80k residents off of original estimates.   The GR area was under counted only by about 6,000.  Grand Rapids city was OVER estimated per census by about 1,500.  This resulted in an underestimation of suburban areas by about 8,000 people.  What I have found by looking at the numbers throughout under estimated states, is that suburban areas in general were under estimated while core cities were over estimated(A few exceptions to this rule largely in the Northeast). 

The inner ring:

The city of Grand Rapids is stuck in a purgatory of "almost" since 1970.  It inches so close to 200k residents, but every time the census comes out it's not quite there.  That said the city grew almost 6% and had the largest numerical gain for the decade and ended with it's highest official recorded population ever.  The six inner ring burbs all grew by a greater % than GR with the largest percent gains in Kentwood and GR Township.  As I stated previously Wyoming is officially the 2nd largest city in the western half of the state.  It is now larger than Kalamazoo by more than 3k residents.  The total inner ring which if combined would be city of 401,213 people in 140sq mi.  To put this in perspective Birmingham Alabama has 200k people in 148 sq mi.  From another perspective Boston MA has 675k people in 48sq mi so it's all relative.  The inner ring gained 26k people total for a growth rate of almost 7%. 

Next we add in the outer ring, and Rockford.

 

 

The outer ring suburbs in Kent County posted solid double digit growth rates.  The areas especially along M6 continued the surge in population they have been experience the last several decades.  I like to cluster the areas around Rockford together because I've always felt that the areas that  they"identify" as Rockford , and are larger than just Rockford city.  You'll note I included Cannon Twp as part of Rockford, and also alone in the inner ring.  It is not added into the numbers twice.  

Next are the Ottawa County townships along the eastern border with Kent.  

These are the Western GR burbs that have the strongest commuting ties into Kent. They posted the strongest growth numbers of any area.  Particularly impressive are Allendale, Georgetown, Jamestown and Blendon Townships.  At 54,000 residents Georgtown TWP is the largest municipality in Ottawa County.  I was under the impression that it was largely built out which is clearly not the case since it gained the 2nd most residents in raw numbers after GR.   The eastern half of Ottawa grew at a significantly faster rate than the western half.  This combined with a softening automotive employment base along the lakeshore should strengthen the commuting ties between the counties.   I am fairly confident that Ottawa won't be separated from Kent County again.   The final total at the end of the chart roughly represents the Grand Rapids urbanized area.  There are a few townshipsthat aren't dense enough to be included, my guess is that the urbanized number will be around 650,000 when published. 

The township on the eastern edge of Kent County grew at almost twice the rate of the Northern townships.  Though by actual raw numbers there is not a big difference. 

 

More data for the surrounding areas and counties:

Here are bordering townships from outlying rural counties.  Montcalm and Ionia Counties  both grew by over 3,000 people.  Both were to have only estimated to have grown a couple hundred each.  That's a significant under estimation for rural counties.  I would have thought the bulk of that growth would be coming from the areas near the border with Kent County.  That growth must be more evenly distributed through the counties as the border areas did not show that strong of growth in Ionia County, it was a bit stronger in Montcalm.  Still it makes me wonder how far out from the folks in the country must be commuting into the metro. 

Barry County is a mystery to me.  It suddenly disappeared from the GR metro alignment during the 2018 shift, and Ionia County was added back in.  The townships that border Kent County account for 1/4th of Barry County's population, but a full 2/3rds of it's overall growth.  I have a hard time imagining that it dropped below the 15% threshold to be counted in the CSA, and these numbers would indicate a strengthening in commuting patterns.  I need to spend more time researching OMB guidelines for statistical areas to understand why.  I have theories but I don't want to put anyone to sleep.

Allegan County is considered the "Holland Michigan Micropolitan area", because a portion of Holland extends into Allegan.  Even though the majority of Holland is in the GR MSA.   The county grew to more than 120k residents making it the 4th most populous county in the area after Muskegon.  The townships that border Kent County posted some of the most impressive growth numbers in the region at 17% for the decade. Particularly impressive was Leighton Township with surged almost 42% since 2010.  I am not confident that the growth in this quadrant of the county would be enough to shift commuting patterns to adding Allegan fully back into the GR metro.  It only accounts for about 1/4 the total population.  The rest of the county is divided into commuting pockets: Plainwell/Otsego commute into Kalamazoo.  The northwestern portions of the county largely commute into the Holland area, and you have self containing pockets of the county such as the city of Allegan, and Saugatuck/Douglas.

Grand Haven/Holland:

FInally here's a breakdown of the western side of Ottawa County, Grand Haven and Holland.  I've always thought Grand Haven was artificially small on paper.  When you add up the urbanized cluster around it you get a city of almost 50,000 people.  Also interesting is that there are more jobs than employment base in the Grand Haven area.   A significant enough portion of Muskegon's urbanized area commutes into Ottawa County which is enough to include Muskegon in the GR CSA.   The areas around Grand Haven grew faster than those around Holland, Though Holland still grew more in raw numbers.   

The areas around Holland comprise and urbanized population of around 110k people.  When I include the Allegan County portions that immediately feed into Holland you get and area with about 117k residents.  Holland has been going through a shift in its employment base with Johnson Controls divesting in it's Holland business units, and the majority of the R&D and corporate positions being shifted over to the Detroit area.  Still it's managing to grow at a healthy enough pace.  

Alright I'm ending it here.  If you all have any questions or requests let me know. 

[Khorasaurus1]

Cool info! Much easier than the Census website.

"I am fairly confident that Ottawa won't be separated from Kent County again. "

Was this a comment on redistricting? Ottawa County and Kent County can't be, in their entirety, in the same congressional district. They have too many people - 1,050,000, approximately, while a congressional district will be between 750,000 and 800,000. 

It would be possible to create a "Metro GR" congressional district, though, made up of the southern 2/3 of Kent County and the eastern portion of Ottawa. 

Edited August 14, 2021 by Khorasaurus1

[MJLO]

46 minutes ago, Khorasaurus1 said:

Cool info! Much easier than the Census website.

"I am fairly confident that Ottawa won't be separated from Kent County again. "

Was this a comment on redistricting? Ottawa County and Kent County can't be, in their entirety, in the same congressional district. They have too many people - 1,050,000, approximatley, while a congressional district will be between 750,000 and 800,000. 

It would be possible to great a "Metro GR" congressional district, though, made up of the southern 2/3 of Kent County and the eastern portion of Ottawa. 

That comment was not related to redistricting, it was related to metro alignment which happens at the county level.  Redistricting happens at a microscopic census tract level.    You are correct, the GR  MSA is too big for just one congressional seat. I believe the current MSA has parts of 3 different congressional districts.  I have no clue what it will look like with this new citizen based redistricting commission.

In regards to my comment.  The OMB reassesses the alignment of metropolitan areas every 5 years.  In 2002 the original GR MSA which included 4 counties was split in to 4 separate statistical areas.  It made the area artificially small on paper, as it made Ottawa County an independent metro, and split the GR urban area in half.    In the 2013 alignment they combined Kent and Ottawa counties back into the same metro which boosted the MSA above 1 million people again.   When it comes to statistical areas it can be hard to predict what the OMB will do.  That million+ person threshold for a metro area gives a surprising amount of visibility to a region which is silly since all they do is rearrange how they cluster counties together and not much else changes. 

Either way there's on going concern/speculation about if/when they split Ottawa and Kent Counties which would again drop the region below 1 million people, and it would no longer be considered a "large" metro.  It's really obnoxious and counterintuitive sometimes(Like how the city of Holland is in two separate statistical areas depending on which side of 32nd st. you live on).    Since metro's are calculated based on commuting patterns  my comment was speculating that the commuting between the two counties is likely getting stronger, and it's less likely to see a fractured metro area again. 

[RegalTDP]

2 hours ago, MJLO said:

The total inner ring which if combined would be city of 401,213 people in 140sq mi.  To put this in perspective Birmingham Alabama has 200k people in 148 sq mi.  From another perspective Boston MA has 675k people in 48sq mi so it's all relative. 

And Detroit is 139 square miles!  Interesting to compare GR's relative density to theirs.

[droonus2000]

7 hours ago, Khorasaurus1 said:

Cool info! Much easier than the Census website.

"I am fairly confident that Ottawa won't be separated from Kent County again. "

Was this a comment on redistricting? Ottawa County and Kent County can't be, in their entirety, in the same congressional district. They have too many people - 1,050,000, approximatley, while a congressional district will be between 750,000 and 800,000. 

It would be possible to great a "Metro GR" congressional district, though, made up of the southern 2/3 of Kent County and the eastern portion of Ottawa. 

Thank you! I was thinking about redistricting today and how urbanized areas of Kent and Ottawa could be in the same district as I feel that makes more sense than the current lines. Your idea sounds perfect, please submit it to the new citizen commission. 

[MJLO]

Here's the breakdown for Muskegon.  Overall the county grew pretty uniform at about 2%.  There were low spots with Muskegon City, Twp, and Heights losing population(the Heights by a noticeable margin).  There were also higher growth spots with Egelston TWP leading the county at 12% growth.   

WARNING FRIVOLOUS RANT COMING:

Tiny Roosevelt Park also posted an impressive 8% growth rate, though in raw numbers it's only 341 people.  To be fair an inner ring burb that's only one square mile growing at all is good.  Roosevelt Park has always been one biggest of the poster children for the redundant nature of Michigan suburbs.  In the late 50's/ early 60's there was this proliferation of unincorporated townships bordering core cities that chartered as cities themselves to prevent annexation.  They didn't want the city's to annex them and then have to pay city taxes, and deal with city problems.  At the time it made sense because the cities were powerful and they were all starting to lose their tax bases to the extra spaces just outside of their borders.   The dirty consequence were core cities that were politically walled in by other entities that syphoned off their tax bases, wealth, and political clout leaving them nowhere to go but decline.  

All due respect to Roosevelt Park residents logically I don't see any value in one sq mi of land being politically autonomous from an overall core. The result is redundant government services that cost extra tax dollars and hinder core cities from regaining health.  There are literally hundreds of examples like this (though none as tiny as RP) throughout the state and they are a huge contributing factor to why Michigan as a whole has such weak core cities and is struggling to catch up in the modern era that places a higher value on stronger urban cores with character.   Michiganders love their tiny fractured governments and plethora of redundant school districts.  If there ever were to be a shift and cities/services started consolidating/merging, the tax payers would save literally billions, and the state would be much better positioned to make moves in regards to overall urban health.

[MJLO]

 

It's time for the geographical breakdown of state population for the decade.   I'm sure you're all ecstatic! 

e 

The corresponding label on the map matches the data set below it.  I included the 2019-2020 numbers to get a better idea of where in the state was under estimated vs. over.   They definitely  over estimated losses in the UP, though it still lost almost 10k people across all regions over the decade.  They also over estimated the losses in the northern I-75 corridor as well.    What I found interesting was that college centric counties were significantly OVER estimated.  Both Isabella County (CMU) and Mecosta County (Ferris State) had significant population losses over the decade.  My assumption is that this largely correlated to ongoing enrollment drops at the universities there.  Together they lost 9,000 residents which accounts for more than 2/3rds of the losses in the norther lower regions.  Even with those losses the Western side of the region gained more than 10,000 residents for the decade, while the Lake Huron side lost about 13k.  Though counted in that 13k are the 6,000 lost residents in Isabella County so when not factored in the results are less dramatic in the rural areas.  Still every county but Otsego County (Gaylord) posted losses on the Lake Huron side.  The star of northern Michigan is definitely the Grand Traverse region which gained 11,450 residents during the decade.   When added all together the areas basically north of Big Rapids total 1,081,012 residents, about 10.7%  of the overall state population.

The counties around Grand Rapids posted a robust 111k resident gain, they were slightly underestimated in the estimates models, but largely they came in where we thought they'd be.  Surprising was the underestimation of Grand Rapids suburbs compared to the city, and the rural counties to the east (Ionia, Montcalm, and Barry) which all gained a couple thousand more than estimates models predicted.  Ottawa County officially passed Ingham County in population.  It is now the 7th most populated county in the state.  Perhaps now they will consider building another direct north/south road in the county.  As of now if you're not on US-31 on the lake shore  you have to make a series of  turns on several different back roads to get through the county.   Perhaps they should finally start planning for the growth that's been happening there the last several decades.  

The Lansing area grew, but it was over estimated in models and posted less than 2% gains.  Prior to the census models had it gaining as much as 4% .  The actual population gains were half of what estimates had said.  There could be a university correlation there as well, but I can only speculate. 

Surprising to me is the Southwest corner of the state.  Every county except for Kalamazoo lost population over the decade.  Kalamazoo County was also over estimated and the city surprisingly lost people.  Again there could be a university correlation. The region as a whole gained almost 5k residents, but that's all out of Kzoo county which gained more than 11,000.   I would consider that area of the state more attractive with a decent corporate presence, and relatively easy access to Chicago and South Bend.  It is largely rural and population attrition from rural areas has been the trend since the 90s.   I would still expect these counties to perform better than the more isolated northern Michigan counties, but they actually perform worse. 

The northern I-75 corridor (Flint/MBS/ the thumb) remains the most stagnant and declining part of Michigan.  It's not surprising since the cities that anchor it are old auto manufacturing hubs that have never been able to recover their economic losses from so many of those jobs shifting south.  Still their declines were over estimated by about 3,000.  Losses for the region were over 42k residents.  Genesee County (Flint) lost about 4.5% of it's population which is less than I expected.  The city of Flint plummeted to 80k residents, but the county didn't fair near as bad.  The affects of the water crisis were largely contained to the city, as the losses at the county level were less than expected.  Also Genesee County has been slowly turning into a commuting option for folks working in Oakland County.  I imagine this is helping the county from entering a total free fall. 

The southern I-75 corridor had by far the largest corrections from estimates.  It jumped almost 100,000 residents from what estimates models had predicted.  The Detroit area out gained the Grand Rapids by about 15k residents,  but didn't come near GR's growth rate.   When combined the 2 halves of the I-75 corridor were just shy of 6million residents, they account for almost 60% of Michigan as a whole.  What's more interesting is Wayne County only losing 27K residents for the decade, it's slowest decline by far since the 1970s.   Also interesting is that several inner ring Detroit suburbs that had been stagnant or declining over the last several decades posted surprisingly robust gains in the 2020 census.  The city of Dearborn actually gained more residents than Grand Rapids.   It's great news for the Detroit area that these long time stagnant communities have started seeing resident influxes again.  This is definitely something I plan on studying more.  

So there's my phone it in recap of 2020 census numbers for the state.  If anyone would like I can post the hard data for the counties.  I used to post the hard data but it created some very busy posts that were hard to follow. 

 

[GRDadof3]

15 hours ago, MJLO said:

 

It's time for the geographical breakdown of state population for the decade.   I'm sure you're all ecstatic! 

e 

The corresponding label on the map matches the data set below it.  I included the 2019-2020 numbers to get a better idea of where in the state was under estimated vs. over.   They definitely  over estimated losses in the UP, though it still lost almost 10k people across all regions over the decade.  They also over estimated the losses in the northern I-75 corridor as well.    What I found interesting was that college centric counties were significantly OVER estimated.  Both Isabella County (CMU) and Mecosta County (Ferris State) had significant population losses over the decade.  My assumption is that this largely correlated to ongoing enrollment drops at the universities there.  Together they lost 9,000 residents which accounts for more than 2/3rds of the losses in the norther lower regions.  Even with those losses the Western side of the region gained more than 10,000 residents for the decade, while the Lake Huron side lost about 13k.  Though counted in that 13k are the 6,000 lost residents in Isabella County so when not factored in the results are less dramatic in the rural areas.  Still every county but Otsego County (Gaylord) posted losses on the Lake Huron side.  The star of northern Michigan is definitely the Grand Traverse region which gained 11,450 residents during the decade.   When added all together the areas basically north of Big Rapids total 1,081,012 residents, about 10.7%  of the overall state population.

The counties around Grand Rapids posted a robust 111k resident gain, they were slightly underestimated in the estimates models, but largely they came in where we thought they'd be.  Surprising was the underestimation of Grand Rapids suburbs compared to the city, and the rural counties to the east (Ionia, Montcalm, and Barry) which all gained a couple thousand more than estimates models predicted.  Ottawa County officially passed Ingham County in population.  It is now the 7th most populated county in the state.  Perhaps now they will consider building another direct north/south road in the county.  As of now if you're not on US-31 on the lake shore  you have to make a series of  turns on several different back roads to get through the county.   Perhaps they should finally start planning for the growth that's been happening there the last several decades.  

The Lansing area grew, but it was over estimated in models and posted less than 2% gains.  Prior to the census models had it gaining as much as 4% .  The actual population gains were half of what estimates had said.  There could be a university correlation there as well, but I can only speculate. 

Surprising to me is the Southwest corner of the state.  Every county except for Kalamazoo lost population over the decade.  Kalamazoo County was also over estimated and the city surprisingly lost people.  Again there could be a university correlation. The region as a whole gained almost 5k residents, but that's all out of Kzoo county which gained more than 11,000.   I would consider that area of the state more attractive with a decent corporate presence, and relatively easy access to Chicago and South Bend.  It is largely rural and population attrition from rural areas has been the trend since the 90s.   I would still expect these counties to perform better than the more isolated northern Michigan counties, but they actually perform worse. 

The northern I-75 corridor (Flint/MBS/ the thumb) remains the most stagnant and declining part of Michigan.  It's not surprising since the cities that anchor it are old auto manufacturing hubs that have never been able to recover their economic losses from so many of those jobs shifting south.  Still their declines were over estimated by about 3,000.  Losses for the region were over 42k residents.  Genesee County (Flint) lost about 4.5% of it's population which is less than I expected.  The city of Flint plummeted to 80k residents, but the county didn't fair near as bad.  The affects of the water crisis were largely contained to the city, as the losses at the county level were less than expected.  Also Genesee County has been slowly turning into a commuting option for folks working in Oakland County.  I imagine this is helping the county from entering a total free fall. 

The southern I-75 corridor had by far the largest corrections from estimates.  It jumped almost 100,000 residents from what estimates models had predicted.  The Detroit area out gained the Grand Rapids by about 15k residents,  but didn't come near GR's growth rate.   When combined the 2 halves of the I-75 corridor were just shy of 6million residents, they account for almost 60% of Michigan as a whole.  What's more interesting is Wayne County only losing 27K residents for the decade, it's slowest decline by far since the 1970s.   Also interesting is that several inner ring Detroit suburbs that had been stagnant or declining over the last several decades posted surprisingly robust gains in the 2020 census.  The city of Dearborn actually gained more residents than Grand Rapids.   It's great news for the Detroit area that these long time stagnant communities have started seeing resident influxes again.  This is definitely something I plan on studying more.  

So there's my phone it in recap of 2020 census numbers for the state.  If anyone would like I can post the hard data for the counties.  I used to post the hard data but it created some very busy posts that were hard to follow. 

 

Nice breakdown. The growth of West Central is (I believe) accelerating. 110,000 over the last decade is a lot for a community of our size.  Especially in the Midwest/Great Lakes area. 

[joeDowntown]

That's a lot of data to summarize. Great job. I'm surprised the NW Lower Region lost so much. From what I've seen/witnessed, I have to think the Traverse / Petoskey area is booming, so does it indicate that other counties in that area are bleeding residents at a high rate?

Joe

[MJLO]

53 minutes ago, joeDowntown said:

That's a lot of data to summarize. Great job. I'm surprised the NW Lower Region lost so much. From what I've seen/witnessed, I have to think the Traverse / Petoskey area is booming, so does it indicate that other counties in that area are bleeding residents at a high rate?

Joe

Well remember the NW lower gained over 10k residents for the decade.   If you just look at the 2019-20 number it shows a loss but that's almost entirely attributed to Mecosta county so there clearly was an over estimation.  My guess is that models weren't set up to anticipate the attrition of student populations.   I think that's more of a one time adjustment.  Overall the NW Lower is holding its own mostly due to the Traverse City/Petoskey/Charlevoix regions. 

 

Ignore the 2011 date over the screen shot the numbers in the 2nd column are for 2019.  I didn't check that before I screen shotted.

[arcturus]

Nice to see the state offset the population decline from 2000 - 2009 and tow the line sufficiently to only lose 1 house seat, joining Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in the Midwest. The state has been losing seats in Congress after every decennial Census going back to 1980 and will shortly have the lowest representation since the 20's.

I have yet to see any verifiable data to quantify the number of ex-residents who swell the population during the spring/summer, many of whom own property.  Anecdotal at best but I swear the population increases at least 5% above and beyond normal short duration vacation traffic based on highways and stores.

The 'education effect' is definitely in play.  Wasn't there a recent article stating that GVSU along with MI State and U of MI were the only universities who saw increases in enrollment while many other state universities were losing if not hemorrhaging students?

[GRDadof3]

11 minutes ago, arcturus said:

Nice to see the state offset the population decline from 2000 - 2009 and tow the line sufficiently to only lose 1 house seat, joining Illinois, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in the Midwest. The state has been losing seats in Congress after every decennial Census going back to 1980 and will shortly have the lowest representation since the 20's.

I have yet to see any verifiable data to quantify the number of ex-residents who swell the population during the spring/summer, many of whom own property.  Anecdotal at best but I swear the population increases at least 5% above and beyond normal short duration vacation traffic based on highways and stores.

The 'education effect' is definitely in play.  Wasn't there a recent article stating that GVSU along with MI State and U of MI were the only universities who saw increases in enrollment while many other state universities were losing if not hemorrhaging students?

Are you saying you think the population in the Grand Rapids area grows in the summertime? If so I would agree with that. I personally know quite a few snowbirds (or know of them, parents of friends, etc.).

And yes, I saw the same article. Maybe 6 months ago? 

 

[arcturus]

8 hours ago, GRDadof3 said:

Are you saying you think the population in the Grand Rapids area grows in the summertime? If so I would agree with that. I personally know quite a few snowbirds (or know of them, parents of friends, etc.).

And yes, I saw the same article. Maybe 6 months ago? 

 

Not only GR but up and down the west coast where towns like Ludington swell what seems to be threefold during summer and parts of M-10 look like 131 at times.

[MJLO]

13 hours ago, arcturus said:

Not only GR but up and down the west coast where towns like Ludington swell what seems to be threefold during summer and parts of M-10 look like 131 at times.

I'd say this is very true.  That's not even counting the amount of snow birds that migrate north between mid April and Memorial day.

[Khorasaurus1]

22 hours ago, arcturus said:

The 'education effect' is definitely in play.  Wasn't there a recent article stating that GVSU along with MI State and U of MI were the only universities who saw increases in enrollment while many other state universities were losing if not hemorrhaging students?

Also worth noting that the Census is supposed to be a snapshot of April 1, 2020. Which was right after many universities sent their students home during the initial Covid lockdown.

[GRDadof3]

I think all 110,000 addl residents were downtown last night. Holy cats it was like artprize.

[MJLO]

Ok so I've figured out how to use the census reporter tool that shows commuting patterns between counties and MSA's etc.  The most recent data only goes to 2018.  I must be reading the data wrong.   Not only does it show Barry County with enough commuters to be included in the GR MSA (28.9%)  It shows that more people commute to Kent from Barry for work vs. folks who both live and work in Barry County.  Additionally the 2018 numbers show the strongest commuting percentage to date between the counties.  Similar results when I look at Newaygo County, with 29.5% of their workforce commuting into Kent.     Both Ionia and Montcalm Counties have more than 30% of their workforces commuting into Kent County which is greater than their core employment bases.  

Almost half of Muskegon's workforce stays with in it's county,  however in 2018 17.6% commuted into Ottawa, and 14.5% commuted into Kent.  Together that's 32.1% of Muskegon County's workforce commuting into the two core counties of the GR  MSA.  

Allegan County is even more confusing.  Only 28.3% of it's workforce lives and works there.  22.5% commute into Kent, and 19% commute into Ottawa county.  That's a total of 41% of it's workforce commuting into the GR MSA.  Though like Muskegon neither county has 25% of a commute so that may have something to do with it. 

That still doesn't explain Barry and Newaygo not being added into the core metro, the only difference between them, Montcalm, and Ionia is that both the latter have more than 30% commuting in.  So I'm wondering if there's a margin of error they are not showing, and if the cross commute could fall below 25% with the MOE they perhaps do not include the county into the core metro.    Still every year it shows a strengthening of commuting patterns for Barry and Kent, which means there was a lower percentage of workers commuting from Barry County into Kent when it was included in 2013.    

Either way Ottawa County's commute into Kent stands at about 38% of it's workforce.  There's little if any chance of the two being statistically separated in the next alignment. 

If anyone has insight as to how these decisions are made please feel free to share.  As of right now it makes no sense why Barry and Newaygo counties aren't included in the metro, and I'm pretty confused on Allegan too. 

The 2023 alignment could have a GR MSA with 1.5million people, or 950k the the margins of error are perfectly aligned. 

 

https://onthemap.ces.census.gov/

[GRDadof3]

12 hours ago, MJLO said:

Ok so I've figured out how to use the census reporter tool that shows commuting patterns between counties and MSA's etc.  The most recent data only goes to 2018.  I must be reading the data wrong.   Not only does it show Barry County with enough commuters to be included in the GR MSA (28.9%)  It shows that more people commute to Kent from Barry for work vs. folks who both live and work in Barry County.  Additionally the 2018 numbers show the strongest commuting percentage to date between the counties.  Similar results when I look at Newaygo County, with 29.5% of their workforce commuting into Kent.     Both Ionia and Montcalm Counties have more than 30% of their workforces commuting into Kent County which is greater than their core employment bases.  

Almost half of Muskegon's workforce stays with in it's county,  however in 2018 17.6% commuted into Ottawa, and 14.5% commuted into Kent.  Together that's 32.1% of Muskegon County's workforce commuting into the two core counties of the GR  MSA.  

Allegan County is even more confusing.  Only 28.3% of it's workforce lives and works there.  22.5% commute into Kent, and 19% commute into Ottawa county.  That's a total of 41% of it's workforce commuting into the GR MSA.  Though like Muskegon neither county has 25% of a commute so that may have something to do with it. 

That still doesn't explain Barry and Newaygo not being added into the core metro, the only difference between them, Montcalm, and Ionia is that both the latter have more than 30% commuting in.  So I'm wondering if there's a margin of error they are not showing, and if the cross commute could fall below 25% with the MOE they perhaps do not include the county into the core metro.    Still every year it shows a strengthening of commuting patterns for Barry and Kent, which means there was a lower percentage of workers commuting from Barry County into Kent when it was included in 2013.    

Either way Ottawa County's commute into Kent stands at about 38% of it's workforce.  There's little if any chance of the two being statistically separated in the next alignment. 

If anyone has insight as to how these decisions are made please feel free to share.  As of right now it makes no sense why Barry and Newaygo counties aren't included in the metro, and I'm pretty confused on Allegan too. 

The 2023 alignment could have a GR MSA with 1.5million people, or 950k the the margins of error are perfectly aligned. 

 

https://onthemap.ces.census.gov/

Dang, that's a lot of exurbanites. Although I personally know at least a half a dozen people who drive to Grand Rapids to work, who live way out in what I consider the boonies (Allegan area, Newaygo, Lake Odessa, etc..) 

I honestly don't feel like we're a metro of 1.5 million people though. Our urbanized area just doesn't scream "big city" to me.  Yet anyway. 

 

[MJLO]

21 minutes ago, GRDadof3 said:

Dang, that's a lot of exurbanites. Although I personally know at least a half a dozen people who drive to Grand Rapids to work, who live way out in what I consider the boonies (Allegan area, Newaygo, Lake Odessa, etc..) 

I honestly don't feel like we're a metro of 1.5 million people though. Our urbanized area just doesn't scream "big city" to me.  Yet anyway. 

Yeah I don't disagree with that.  That's a problem with these OMB standards for calculating Metro areas.  Decentralized population clusters like  West Michigan create a problem.  Grand Rapids doesn't feel like a 1.5 million metro area, yet it has more people living within a 40 mile radius of it than many 1.5 million metros.  

Also the inclusion of exurban counties in metro area's is more common than you might think.  For instance Omaha's metro is nearly 2,000 sq mi larger than Grand Rapids with 100k less people.  It's all relative I suppose. 

[cutlervillegr]

21 hours ago, MJLO said:

Ok so I've figured out how to use the census reporter tool that shows commuting patterns between counties and MSA's etc.  The most recent data only goes to 2018.  I must be reading the data wrong.   Not only does it show Barry County with enough commuters to be included in the GR MSA (28.9%)  It shows that more people commute to Kent from Barry for work vs. folks who both live and work in Barry County.  Additionally the 2018 numbers show the strongest commuting percentage to date between the counties.  Similar results when I look at Newaygo County, with 29.5% of their workforce commuting into Kent.     Both Ionia and Montcalm Counties have more than 30% of their workforces commuting into Kent County which is greater than their core employment bases.  

Almost half of Muskegon's workforce stays with in it's county,  however in 2018 17.6% commuted into Ottawa, and 14.5% commuted into Kent.  Together that's 32.1% of Muskegon County's workforce commuting into the two core counties of the GR  MSA.  

Allegan County is even more confusing.  Only 28.3% of it's workforce lives and works there.  22.5% commute into Kent, and 19% commute into Ottawa county.  That's a total of 41% of it's workforce commuting into the GR MSA.  Though like Muskegon neither county has 25% of a commute so that may have something to do with it. 

That still doesn't explain Barry and Newaygo not being added into the core metro, the only difference between them, Montcalm, and Ionia is that both the latter have more than 30% commuting in.  So I'm wondering if there's a margin of error they are not showing, and if the cross commute could fall below 25% with the MOE they perhaps do not include the county into the core metro.    Still every year it shows a strengthening of commuting patterns for Barry and Kent, which means there was a lower percentage of workers commuting from Barry County into Kent when it was included in 2013.    

Either way Ottawa County's commute into Kent stands at about 38% of it's workforce.  There's little if any chance of the two being statistically separated in the next alignment. 

If anyone has insight as to how these decisions are made please feel free to share.  As of right now it makes no sense why Barry and Newaygo counties aren't included in the metro, and I'm pretty confused on Allegan too. 

The 2023 alignment could have a GR MSA with 1.5million people, or 950k the the margins of error are perfectly aligned. 

 

https://onthemap.ces.census.gov/

Driving down M-37 at rush hour will tell you that there is a strong amount of Kent/Barry traffic occurring.  The Middleville-Hastings corridor has definitely seen some strong population growth that should continue.  

[wingbert]

On 8/24/2021 at 9:59 AM, GRDadof3 said:

Our urbanized area just doesn't scream "big city" to me.  

Unfortunately, the same could be said about the mindset of much of our city/county leadership