Shaking off a population slump tied to the housing bust, Phoenix is now poised to surpass Philadelphia in population growth, making it, once again, one of the nations fastest growing cities.
Nearly all of the state’s largest municipalities gained population in 2012, the U.S. Census Bureau estimates.
Phoenix, 1,488,750 (+1.7%).
Mesa, 452,084 (+1.7%).
Chandler, 245,628 (+2.5%).
Glendale, 232,143 (+1.5%).
Scottsdale, 223,514 (+1.7%).
Gilbert, 221,140 (+3.4%).
Tempe, 166,842 (+1.9%).
Peoria, 159,782 (+2.0%).
Surprise, 121,287 (+1.8%).
Avondale, 78,256 (+1.5%).
Goodyear, 69,648 (+3.4%).
Buckeye, 54,542 (+4.1%).
Phoenix added more than 24,000 new residents and edged closer to overtaking Philadelphia as the fifth-largest city in the country. The population surge spilled into the Valley’s suburbs as well, with 11 municipalities adding a collective 42,000 new residents. Among them was Buckeye, a West Valley city which ranked ninth-fastest growing city in the nation in 2012.
The annual census estimates are slightly higher than estimates produced by the state, but they both suggest growth is picking up momentum in Arizona again.
Phoenix is estimated to have 1.49 million residents, about 59,000 fewer than Philadelphia. But Phoenix grew 1.7 percent last year while Philadelphia grew 0.6 percent, suggesting a reordering is only a matter of time.
Many of the biggest U.S. cities, such as New York, Houston, San Antonio, San Diego and Dallas — like Phoenix — are outpacing the nation’s 1.7 percent growth rate since 2010.
“Urban America is recovering faster than more remote, more rural places,” said Robert Lang, a professor of urban affairs at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.
Lang said urban areas appeal to Millennials (those born from about 1982 to 2001) “in part because they haven’t seen cities in crisis. They missed the riots of the 1960s, the urban decline of the 1970s and the crack epidemic of the 1980s.
“If you’re a kid born in 1993 or 1992 and you’re in college now, you’re looking around the country thinking about where you want to move … you’ve seen fairly … tranquil cities, in relative terms to what their history was.”
Via Ronald J. HansenThe Republic | azcentral.com; USA Today contributed to this article.