The new 'cool' cities for Millennials

[10023]

Originally Posted by sbarn

I am a total Europhile and agree with your second statement - and generally agree that European cities are better connected than American ones.

However I still don't buy the argument that most (all?) American cities of any size outside of the Northeast corridor are "too isolated". I've lived all over the U.S. (California, Colorado, now New York City) and haven't found that to be the case. Obviously there are many places in the U.S. that are super isolated, but the feeling of connectivity isn't exclusive to the northeast given that population centers tend to cluster. The northeast is the largest cluster of cities, but not the only one.

Well this part gets subjective. For me, the two big knocks against Chicago (which I think is a great city, and where I grew up) are the weather and its relative isolation. There are some other cities nearby*, but not ones that are that interesting to me personally.


*even this is a subjective term. Chicago to Indianapolis is a 3.5 hour drive. I can be in Paris or Brussels in much less time than that.

[Jasonhouse]

Originally Posted by Bailey

Can someone please explain the years of birth used to categorize the following groups:

Gen Y

Gen X

Millennials

I know what they are but I've seen so many different ranges thrown out there that they all seem to overlap.

First, Gen Y is the Millennials.

Gen X = Generally regarded as born between 1961-1980 or 1965-1980, or thereabouts.

Millennials = Generally regarded as born between 1981-2000 or so.

[599GTO]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

that list is only counting college-educated millennials living the "city center", which is defined by this study as areas within 3 miles of a given city's CBD. there are likely hundreds of thousands of college-educated millennials living in the LA metro, but only ~20,000 live within a 3 mile radius of downtown LA.

The original story says these numbers represent an increase in college millennials per metro area but it seems they meant increase in college millennials living in core of metro area.

Makes sense now, I guess.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by 599GTO

The original story says these numbers represent an increase in college millennials per metro area but it seems they meant increase in college millennials living in core of metro area.

yeah, the original article totally botched what these numbers represent.

[Jasonhouse]

^Damn, no wonder this list didn't seem to jibe with other info I've seen recently on this very thing.

[Vlajos]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

yeah, the original article totally botched what these numbers represent.

Originally Posted by Jasonhouse

^Damn, no wonder this list didn't seem to jibe with other info I've seen recently on this very thing.

Again, so people can see the actual numbers and not the poorly written article:


http://cityobservatory.org/ynr/

[mhays]

I haven't read anything beyond this thread, but no surprise at all if they botched it. Few reporters have any clue about demographics, and don't have the BS alarms that many of us do. It shows, all the freaking time.

Media culture and processes are part of the problem. There's typically no knowledgable review of any kind, only editorial/proofing. Questions are limited to clarifications they happen to think of. There's nobody to say "whoa, time out, you're getting it wrong."

[Steely Dan]

in terms of the raw numbers of educated young adults in "city centers", the usual suspects still dominate.

here are the top 10 ranked by 2010 total:

1. NYC - 228,505
2. SF - 91,035
3. DC - 77,651
4. chicago - 75,738
5. boston - 70,090
6. philly - 50,273
7. denver - 31,678
8. seattle - 31,665
9. baltimore - 25,223
10. minneapolis - 25,156

source: http://cityobservatory.org/ynr/

[Jasonhouse]

Looking at that, DC to me really stands out, for having a high growth rate, from a large base. The raw number of college educated Millennials moving into DC's 'city center' exceeds the total 'city center' populations of college educated Millennials in many other cities. According to this list, DC even outpaced NYC in raw numbers, even though NYC has a population that is several times larger.


And let's just make this easier for people...

Their methodology, "Using data from the recently released American Community Survey, this report examines population change in the 51 metropolitan areas with 1 million or more population, and focuses on the change in population in close-in neighborhoods, those places within 3 miles of the center of each metropolitan area’s primary central business district."

For those who don't know, this is the American Community Survey.

The list I prefer from that site...

source: http://cityobservatory.org/ynr/


edit: Philly stands out to me too.

[jpdivola]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

in terms of the raw numbers of educated young adults in "city centers", the usual suspects still dominate.

here are the top 10 ranked by 2010 total:

1. NYC - 228,505
2. SF - 91,035
3. DC - 77,651
4. chicago - 75,738
5. boston - 70,090
6. philly - 50,273
7. denver - 31,678
8. seattle - 31,665
9. baltimore - 25,223
10. minneapolis - 25,156

source: http://cityobservatory.org/ynr/

The list is not too surprising, basically the big 6 traditional urban cities, the 4 new urban/knowledge centers (Portland would be 11) and then Baltimore which like mini-Philly, a hybrid blue collar rust belt town and a gentrifying, dense old urban city.

The only thing that really surprises me with the list is the Denver is ranked higher than Seattle (in practice a tie). Seattle has a much livelier/bigger core. I'm curious if this is some fluke of geography? DT Seattle is right on the water, so a good deal of it's 3 mile radius is the Puget Sound?

[Jasonhouse]

^I would think that's a given.

[brian_b]

Originally Posted by jpdivola

The only thing that really surprises me with the list is the Denver is ranked higher than Seattle (in practice a tie). Seattle has a much livelier/bigger core. I'm curious if this is some fluke of geography? DT Seattle is right on the water, so a good deal of it's 3 mile radius is the Puget Sound?

Yeah, probably.

Thinking about 10023 and his comments about isolated cities and network effects makes me wonder if the changes shown in the original post have more to do with the growing ubiquity of broadband internet. Des Moines is less isolated than it's ever been despite a fairly stagnant regional population.

[Jasonhouse]

^Yeah, but look at how DC, Balt, NYC, Boston help make his point. Big raw number growth on top of large base populations... Pittsburg's and Buffalo's urban growth may well be demonstrated to be spillover from the Bos/Wash corridor pricing out some folks, who then turn to these tertiary urban markets that are closest to where their base of friends and family most likely is. And culturally, they're more familiar than Sunbelt cities.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Jasonhouse

^Yeah, but look at how DC, Balt, NYC, Boston help make his point.

but then there's chicago. another top gainer on top of a big existing base, but in the middle of nowhere in 10023's eyes.

[jpdivola]

It is important to remember we are only looking at population change in the closest 3 miles to downtown (not the whole region). So it is really hard to figure out how much of the growth is people moving within region vs people relocating from other regions.

My guess is that most of this is simply:
1) this is a growing demographic: there were more college educated 25-43 year olds, so most places will have more of these people. Plus, there is the growth of the grad school demographic. It could be that some of these people are living in town because they are going to grad school.
2) more of this yuppie demo is chosing to live in the center city vs. out in the suburbs. Young singles are trading the garden apartment in the burbs for the big city.

I would place more weight in these two factors than yuppies being priced out of San Francisco and Boston are picking up and moving to rust belt downtowns. Especially since the big traditional yuppie markets generally had much larger aggregate pop gains.

[Jasonhouse]

^Except we know that SLC and Denver are receiving quite a few transplants from places like SFO.

It's sort of silly to think that places like Pittsburgh aren't receiving spillovers from the massive Bos/Wash corridor, when we all know full well that there are southern states getting large swaths of their populations from these places.


edit: This person's testimonial about going from NYC to the 'Burgh is interesting...
http://www.popcitymedia.com/features...yde103013.aspx

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

but then there's chicago. another top gainer on top of a big existing base, but in the middle of nowhere in 10023's eyes.

Yet combined, they dwarf the entire Midwest, including Chicago.

Network effect isn't about how single nodes do, it's about how the whole network does.

[Don't Be That Guy]

Originally Posted by jpdivola

It is important to remember we are only looking at population change in the closest 3 miles to downtown (not the whole region). So it is really hard to figure out how much of the growth is people moving within region vs people relocating from other regions.

My guess is that most of this is simply:
1) this is a growing demographic: there were more college educated 25-43 year olds, so most places will have more of these people. Plus, there is the growth of the grad school demographic. It could be that some of these people are living in town because they are going to grad school.
2) more of this yuppie demo is chosing to live in the center city vs. out in the suburbs. Young singles are trading the garden apartment in the burbs for the big city.

I would place more weight in these two factors than yuppies being priced out of San Francisco and Boston are picking up and moving to rust belt downtowns. Especially since the big traditional yuppie markets generally had much larger aggregate pop gains.

The 3-miles to downtown metric seems completely arbitrary. Why three miles? The development patterns and neighborhood characteristic of what's in that three miles has as much to do with it's ability to attract new residents as the character and economic condition of the city itself. For example, the most attractive neighborhoods for millennials and and other college educated populations in my city are 4-5 miles from the city center. These neighborhoods are still urban but somehow don't count?

[Jasonhouse]

^That's why ultimately, this whole discussion kinda sucks, because it's based on a partially arbitrary metric.

[mhays]

Originally Posted by jpdivola

The only thing that really surprises me with the list is the Denver is ranked higher than Seattle (in practice a tie). Seattle has a much livelier/bigger core. I'm curious if this is some fluke of geography? DT Seattle is right on the water, so a good deal of it's 3 mile radius is the Puget Sound?

Yes, half the circle is water or industrial. Also 2010 is very different than what's completed/occupied in 2014. (Central Denver has also grown since then of course, but not on Seattle's scale.)

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Jasonhouse

According to this list, DC even outpaced NYC in raw numbers, even though NYC has a population that is several times larger.

To me, that makes total sense. NYC does not seem to have growth in millennials concentrated anywhere in a three mile radius of Midtown. Millennials are obviously moving to NYC in very large numbers, but not within the prescribed three mile radius of the core. It's way too expensive, limited rental housing, and culturally not for for 20-somethings,

You would get a much higher rate of increase or net increase if you did a three mile radius of Prospect Park or McCarren Park or something, but that's nowhere near the city center. The fact is that millennials concentrate in places not directly in the core (really mostly Brooklyn, Queens, JC, and far uptown, with wealthier millennials downtown).

In contrast, DC has significant rental housing development targeting millennials in and around the traditional city center. Core NYC development is almost 100% luxury for sale.