Some interesting stats regarding local population and associated rankings.
Raleigh: 474,069 - 41st in the country
Wake County: 1,111,761 - 40th in the country
Raleigh MSA: 1,390,785 - 42nd in the country
Raleigh Urbanized Area: 1,493,000 - 33rd in the country
9 Likes
Okay, this is going to be my 3rd in row post in this topic because I’m a huge data geek. I thought about editing the post above, but it didn’t feel connected well enough. In any case, here are the populations of our current CSA for select Census years back to 1900:
1900: 233,459
1950: 483,104
1980: 765,191
2000: 1,312,478
2019: 2,079,687
In just the last 19 years, the Triangle’s CSA added more people than existed in the the same area in 1980. that’s pretty remarkable.
Since 1980, Wake County alone has also added more people than existed in the entire CSA at that time.
13 Likes
Need a reply so you can keep going? 
1 Like
Could you PLEASE make a complete “John” list…? 
Would wuv to have that as I always find myself creating my own personal favorites…lol
1 Like
A complete list of what? I’ll take requests and do what I can.
1 Like
Not a specific list that I had in mind as much as a “John List”… 
From all the awesome information that you have provided, I thought that you were either making a spread-sheet, comprehensive list, etc. of your own? Maybe one that you would share with your DTR friends? 
1 Like
Clearly you think that I am more organized than I am!
I will research any requests though, and share what I find.
2 Likes
Yesterday I attended a webinar with my professional organization, and the featured speaker was a commissioner for the city of Miami. In the webinar, I learned something that I didn’t know that has to do with population and reaching the half million municipal threshold. According to that commissioner, for cities that reach that number, their relationship with the federal government changes to one that’s direct and not interceded by its state. Certainly had the Republicans not eliminated at will annexation, Raleigh might be at 500K already. While there’s been arguments here in the community that Raleigh may not have any interest in annexing Swiss-cheese parcels, it seems to me that it would be enticing for the city to do so to accelerate meeting that benchmark. If Raleigh has to go through the state to reach the federal government, it could be argued that any hostility that the state government has towards cities prevents Raleigh from getting the sort visibility that it needs.
In the end, if it’s true that the city changes its relationship with the federal government at 500K, then the city should be doing everything it can to push infill residential development to reach it. At least that’s my opinion.
10 Likes
Raleigh has gotta be right at 500K by now. According to wiki: Population: 469,298 (2018). Post covid we should firmly be above 500K.
1 Like
For the 2019 estimate, we are still below 475K. Unless there’s been a serious estimating problem this decade, we are nowhere near 500K. at our current growth rate, it will take 5 more years to get there without some huge residential development.
Do you have a link to this webinar?
I feel like there’s more nuance to this (or at least, it’s more of a rule of thumb for federal agencies rather than a specific rule), but I feel like the full context would make that clearer.
It’ll definitely be nice to have a direct line of communication with the feds to apply for grants or negotiate policies. But from that webinar, did it sound like that sort of access would be exclusive to Raleigh? Or would it be more of a regional thing (i.e. DC bureaucrats would try to negotiate with metro areas), implying that this would have to be a team effort with Durham?
The webinar was hosted on Zoom and focused on the commercial real estate professionals and the workplace industry. It is not something that I can link you to. I’m sorry.
Essentially, the commissioner was asked a question about Miami’s abysmal Census response rate so far, and that’s when he started talking about the importance of counting every resident of the city. I didn’t get a sense that it’s about a greater regional representation or about just the municipality, but if it’s important to a city commissioner in a city that anchors a 6M person Miami metro, then it must really be important. Miami is in a very similar position to Raleigh in that it’s really close to eclipsing the 500K mark.
1 Like
It’s all good! I figured it’s worth a shot to ask.
That’s interesting; I thought Miami surpassed that point ages ago (or maybe it’s just their CSA…?). I guess the Census will be super important to the Triangle for the same reason, then.
Miami is geographically the smallest major city in the United States. Its land area is less than 36 square miles, or 1/4 the size of Raleigh’s municipal limits. To reach 500K, the city needs to approach 14,000 ppl/m2. As a county, Miami-Dade is 2.7M, with only about 500 square miles of it actually developed; the rest is basically the Everglades and other swampland.
With Raleigh’s and Wake County’s physical sizes being what they are, there is tons of opportunity for them to grown and add population. Even 600,000 in the city’s existing limits isn’t such a lofty goal, and the county has the capacity to keep adding a couple/few hundred thousand each decade.
6 Likes
Here is a vid I stumbled across down the YouTube rabbit hole today. Interesting to watch as NC drops down, then quickly rises back up towards the end.
12 Likes
I had no idea NC was ever the third most populous state. Looks like our low was 17th around 1907. I also have a feeling NC will pass Georgia by 2050 since we have multiple growing cities vs Atlanta having the majority of Georgia’s population.
5 Likes
I think there were still only 13 states in 1790 when this started so being 3rd was easier back then.
4 Likes
I go down the youtube rabbit hole on a daily basis. I’ve seen this video and all the other ones that are like it. That are fascinating to watch!!!
3 Likes
The rate at which Calif. zooms to the top starting in the 1900s is pretty stunning.
Atlanta also faces a sever water shortage that ought to hinder its growth.