Recession’s Ebb Fuels a Slow Return to the Suburbs

The Wall Street Journal reports:

With the recession’s impact fast receding, Americans are finally returning to the suburbs—and beyond.

The population of U.S. counties that represent the “urban cores” of large metropolitan areas—inner cities and dense, inner suburban areas—grew just 0.73% between July 2013 and July 2014, down from a growth rate of 0.90% the previous year, according to an analysis of new data from the Census Bureau by William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution. The year before, this growth rate also dropped, from 0.97%.

Suburbs of large metro areas, by contrast, are seeing their growth rates increase. The population of newer suburbs grew 1.20% last year, Mr. Frey’s analysis shows, up from 1.11% and 1.01% in the two prior years.

Perhaps most interesting: So-called exurbs—the peripheral parts of metro areas far from inner cities—saw population growth of 0.87% last year, up from 0.56% the previous year. This rate is now higher than the growth rate for inner cities. (Mr. Frey studied U.S. counties in metro areas with at least 500,000 people.)

“The recession’s influence on migration is diminishing,” said Ken Johnson, a demographer at the University of New Hampshire, who analyzed the data and found similar trends. “Migration patterns may be reverting to those common before the recession.”

The trend continues.