Demographic Inversion Loudoun County Witnessing a reversal of migration and settlement patterns that had characterized suburbia for more than a half century. Manassas Park Manassas Prince William County City of Fairfax Fairfax County Falls Church Arlington County Alexandria Groping toward new communities of the 21st Century Alan Ehrenhal!
The New R E P U B L I C HOW BOXING EXPLAINS JOHN McCAIN Michael Crowley OBAMA TURNS on the PRESS Gabriel Sherman SECRECY, SECURITY, and THE NEW YORK TIMES Jack Goldsmith TRAFFIC and the MEANING of LIFE Edward L. Glaeser IT S ALIVE! The American City Reinvents Itself by Becoming the Suburbs ALAN EHRENHALT Trading Places The demographic inversion of the American city. A L A N E H R E N H A LT THIRTY YEARS AGO, the mayor of Chicago was unseated by a snowstorm. A blizzard in January of 1979 dumped some 20 inches on the ground, causing, among other problems, a curtailment of transit service. The few available trains coming downtown from the northwest side filled up with middle-class white riders near the far end of the line, leaving no room for poorer people trying to board on inner-city platforms. African Americans and blamed this on Mayor Michael Bilandic, and he lost the Democratic primary to Jane Byrne a few weeks later. Today, this could never happen. Not because of climate change, or because the Chicago Transit Authority now runs flawlessly. It couldn t happen because the trains would fill up with minorities and immigrants on the outskirts of the city, and the passengers left stranded at the inner-city stations would be members of the affluent professional class. In the past three decades, Chicago has undergone changes that are routinely described as gentrification, but are in fact more complicated and more profound than the process that tial neighborhood with a modest residual presence of financial corporations and financial services jobs. What s happening in Lower Manhattan isn t exactly an inversion in the Chicago sense: Expensive condos are replacing offices, not poor people. But it is dramatic demographic change nevertheless. If you want to see this sort of thing writ large, you can venture just across the Canadian border to Vancouver, a city roughly the size of Washington, D.C. What makes it unusual indeed, at this point unique in all of North America is that roughly 20 percent of its residents live within a couple of square miles of each other in the city s center. Downtown Vancouver is a forest of slender, green, condo skyscrapers, many of them with three-story townhouse units forming a kind of podium at the base. Each morning, there are nearly as many people commuting out of the center to jobs in the suburbs as there are commuting in. Two public elementary schools have opened in downtown Vancouver in the past few years. A large proportion of the city s 600,000 residents, especially those with money, want to live downtown.
Population Growth " 267,718 First seven years of the decade, averaging increases of 38,000 per year Locus of growth along outer"rim and beyond Inner Suburbs Increase! of NoVa Fairfax County 42,763 16.0 Fairfax City 1,717 0.6 Falls Church 903 0.3 Total 45,382 17.0 Outer!Ring Suburbs Increase! of NoVa Loudoun County 105,997 39.6 Prince William 91,126 34.0 City of Manassas 3,660 1.4 City of Manassas 1,393 0.5 Close!In Suburbs Increase! of NoVa Arlington County 11,710 4.4 City of Alexandria 8,449 3.2 Total 20,159 7.5 Total 202,176 75.5
Historical Cycles of Metropolitan Growth and Decentralization Altered demographic context to current and future population growth that is profoundly di#erent from earlier decades Simultaneously experiencing racial and ethnic transformation as a nation and a region
U.S. Population Growth Share Coming from each Group Asians 13% African- American 16% 49% 20% Non- Whites 4%
Northern Virginia s Population Growth Share Coming from each Group Asians 28% African- American 14% 36% 18% Non- Whites 4%
What Census Bureau is Projecting for first half of 21st Century Sources of Population Growth
Asians African- American Non- Whites
What Census Bureau is Projecting TIMETABLE: Transition to Majority-Minority
Northern Virginia and the U.S.A. On a Similar Racial and Ethnic Trajectory Loudoun County City of Fairfax Arlington Falls County Church Alexandria Manassas Park Fairfax County Manassas Prince William County Size of Minority Population 40.4% 33.9% Minority Contribution to Net Population Growth 82% 80% 11.9% African-Americans 12.8% Asian 14.6% 12.1% 15.0% 4.4%
Increased Racial and Ethnic Diversity How Counties and Cities Rank in terms of their Percentage of Minorities 1990 PERCENT 2000 PERCENT Alexandria 35.7 Arlington 30.5 Fairfax County 22.6 Manassas 19.4 Prince William 19.3 City of Fairfax 17.9 Falls Church 14.5 Manassas Park 14.5 Loudoun County 12.3 Region 23.2 Alexandria 45.3 Arlington County 38.7 Fairfax County 34.8 Prince William 34.8 Manassas 33.2 City of Fairfax 32.9 Manassas Park 32.2 Falls Church 20.1 Loudoun County 20.0 Region 34.4
Increased Racial and Ethnic Diversity How Counties and Cities Rank in terms of their Percentage of Minorities 2000 PERCENT Alexandria 45.3 Arlington County 38.7 Fairfax County 34.8 Prince William 34.8 Manassas 33.2 City of Fairfax 32.9 Manassas Park 32.2 Falls Church 20.1 Loudoun County 20.0 2007 PERCENT Manassas Park 50.0 Prince William 47.9 Manassas 46.3 Alexandria 41.7 Fairfax County 40.7 City of Fairfax 37.1 Arlington County 34.9 Loudoun County 32.6 Falls Church 23.4 Region 34.4 Region 40.4
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Prince William County 50% Asians African-Americans 0% 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic City of 50% Manassas Asians African-Americans 0% 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic City of 50% Manassas Park Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Arlington County 50% Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Alexandria 50% Asians African-Americans 0% 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Fairfax County 50% Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Northern Virginia 50% Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Loudoun 50% County Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007
Public School Enrollment 100% Whites Non-Hispanic Falls Church 50% Asians 0% African-Americans 1995 2007