Posted on 06/19/2008 2:35:55 PM PDT by blam
Americans migrate back to the cities
By Tom Leonard in New York
Last Updated: 2:23AM BST 19/06/2008
Americans are choosing to abandon the suburban sprawl in favour of a more comfortable, cheaper and greener life in the city centre.
Americans flocked to the suburbs after the WWII. Soaring energy prices and the sub-prime crisis are driving them back to the cities
The mass migration of America's middle classes from urban areas to the suburbs amounted to a demographic revolution in the years after the Second World War.
But the so-called "driveable suburb" is becoming increasingly unfeasible as soaring fuel costs make a long commute too expensive for many.
Higher energy prices are also having a disproportionate impact on bigger homes, such as those found in the suburbs, as they inevitably cost much more to heat in winter and cool in America's often fiercely hot summers.
The sub-prime mortgage crisis has accelerated this flight to the cities – experts have christened it New Urbanism – as property prices have particularly collapsed in more remote areas.
According to a poll for Reuters, about 10 per cent of Americans said they were considering moving closer to work while roughly the same percentage said they were thinking about getting a job closer to home.
John Zogby, a political pollster, said the findings added up to a "broad cultural change" which translated into millions of people considering a major transformation in their lives.
He said: "Low energy costs and the availability of autos helped fuel suburbanisation."
But as people concluded that high energy prices were here to stay, "this is now one of those big changes in our lives that requires nothing short of dramatic lifestyle changes," he said.
Even before the latest economic downturn, demand for urban living had been rekindled among two generations – the so-called "baby boomers" in their fifties and "millenials", the latter born between the late 1970s and mid-1990s.
Both are already drifting away from the suburbs, the baby boomers because they want smaller homes and more accessible amenities, and the millenials to rebel against their cul-de-sac upbringing.
Transportation is now the second biggest household expense in the US after housing. Much of the new demand for city homes is in neighbourhoods close to light railway stations, hastening the move away from a car culture.
Some towns around cities have responded to this exodus by rejecting suburban status and working hard to reinvent their own centres.
Americans are not just reconsidering their living arrangements because of the latest economic downturn.
Nearly 39 per cent of those surveyed in the Reuters/Zogby poll said they were considering changing holiday plans, while 31 per cent plan fewer restaurant visits.
“I’ve not seen any evidence of migrations back to the city. Has anyone else?”
....yes, but it depends on the neighborhood....when my daughter called me Sunday she mentioned that there had been an uptick in activity at her inside-the-beltway neighborhood in Maryland...she’s 7 miles from downtown Washington, DC....believe me, 14 miles a day roundtrip in that area ain’t bad....there’s plenty of people that do 100 and up, and I do mean up......around there, transportation costs can be second only to your house note in your monthly budget.
“I wonder how do they explain that?”
There are a lot of single/ no kids households out there. Those people like to live in urban cities.
This is a part of 2 Americas
Single / Urban / no kids / liberal / etc. America
Married / Suburban / kids / conservative America
Chicago.
I live in the heart of the city of San Diego.
More people are selling their homes going into condos.
In the downtown area, over 30 high rise condo bldgs have been built and more are under way, many up to 43 stories high. Over 30,000 have moved downtown recently.
They range from near million dollars a unit to 12 million a unit on up.
I am just up from downtown and condo bldgs also built in recent yrs and still going up. Most of these run from half a million to 4 million+ a unit
Many units are being sold before the bldgs are built.
The media is in a frenzy, trying to write a new meta narrative concerning the high price of oil. There was a front page article in the WSJ with a headline, saying that the high cost of fuel was resulting in the return of jobs to the US. Then when you read the article, it didn’t really say that at all. It did say that a manufacturer said that he would rethink sending any more jobs to China.
I was stuck in the Apple because of my job. Once I retired I moved to America! I'm now in the “ex-urbs” of a bustling town of 7,000 (when the college is in session)
Well, the article is from the UK, and they’re easily led Sheep, so if their Handlers tell them that life is better in the city, in a box, that’s where they’ll go.
It’s most likely closer to the Dole Office, or whatever they call it in the UK, LOL!
The “downtown” of many blue, mid-sized (200K or so) Midwest cities are decaying from within. (Think Madison, and then for an even better example, Milwaukee, WI.)
This is crap. “Let’s be green by moving to the cities and half million dollar hovels in high crime neighborhoods.” They wish.
This is just sour grapes. This Brit is just sore about the last “mass migration” when all of the really able people left Europe for America.
You can buy a nice three bedroom Victorian in Detroit for $2,000, complete with crooked politicians, crumbling streets, thieving bureaucrats, burglars, rapists and a communist governor. Go for it, libs.
People who have already put down roots are less likely to move. Those who haven’t started families yet find it easier to relocate.
There is a fair amount of it in Atlanta. It isn't new, it has been going on for at least ten years. Part of it is new condos and small houses in new mixed-use developments, and part of it is gentrification of old neighborhoods.
Along the lakefront of Chicago, I know quite a few empty-nesters who migrated to the city, mostly for the amenities. This migration started over 10 years ago, before the current oil price increase.
Most of these folks hardly fit the demographics of Ohio or Madison, Wisconsin. The aforementioned couples were earning in excess of $250,000 back then so two-bedroom condos were not a big deal.
A weekend visit to some of the shops in Bucktown or along Mayor Daley’s neighborhood (between South Lake Shore Drive and South Michigan Ave.) reveals a surprising number of older Boomer couples.
That’s true, but if enough unattached, but otherwise normal people move back to the cities, the quality of life will improve, which will in turn will bring back families.
“...the millenials to rebel against their cul-de-sac upbringing. “
Oh the horror of living in a cul-de-sac! What am I doing to my kids! Probably scarring them for life having to play with all the other kids here, riding bikes, jumping on tramolines, begging to sleep over and running the 1/4 mile to the park.
To be fair, I probably lean more toward the greeny-weeny side personally which is why when I was offered the chance to become a ‘virtual worker’, I jumped at it. Working from home is great.....it allows me to hear the screams of agony from my kids as they suffer out front with all the other kids.
‘TEC’ : typical evil conservative.
well, we are considering it. Hubby is going to be working in Crystal City, and would really like to live somewhere near the Metrorail, even though we could afford much more further out of the DC area. He wants to actually see us during the week. Right now though, we are keeping all options open.
Gas prices aren’t the main deciding factor though...it’s commute time. Who knows, we will see how bad it is when we get there I guess. lol
“Moving closer to work” is now seen as “moving into socialist cities”.
New York City, the safest and richest of the big cities, has not seen its population increase. It was about 8m in the 1940’s. It’s about 8m today. Most of our other cities would not be considered cities in the European sense - they’re too spread out for efficient mass transit.
Yes, it’s happening. And for those who choose to stay in the suburbs, the ghetto is coming out to join you - forced out of the city centers by rising property values. Antioch and Palmdale in California are two good examples.
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