Anyone want to take a guess what the 2020 population of Sacramento proper will be?
 

I'm going to guess that the 2020 count of Sacramento will top 504,000-just wondering what your guessiemates are??

Do you mean Sacramento City proper? Its estimated 2016 population is 493,025. However, unless Sacramento City proper can annex adjacent "Un-City" areas to it, or becomes more infill development friendly (particularly in the old North Sacramento area where swaths of vacant space still abound, they just need better road access), it probably will not grow much above 500,000. :(

Sacramento County is odd relative to other California counties in that it has so much "un-City", namely, so much urban and suburban area that is unincorporated, surrounding it. Sacramento city proper made a big mistake in the 1950's when it did not try to annex that, in particular anything and everything starting to develop around then McLellan and Mather airbases. North Highlands, Rancho Cordova, Carmichael, and Arden Arcade should have been grabbed.

What if a more proactive City of Sacramento had also encouraged suburban development along the American River and what is now the Route 50 corridor *first*, which at the time was many square miles of gold dredge tailings, unsuitable for any "farm to fork" efforts? And built more than a one hand count of bridges crossing that river?

^That's all easy to say now about past development, but what was built, was at the time, the best way to do things; the car was saving America from urban blight! I agree with you though on annexation, as providing services to some areas is a challenge, and has left many areas behind.

As for the issue at hand, Sacramento will easily top 500k, and possibly get north of 510 or 515. The central city has filled in with many more people just in the past few years, and more large residential projects will be finished before 2020. Natomas is also going crazy again, and that's another big boost with mostly families in each new unit built. Further out, factor in Crocker Village, Delta Shores, Greenbriar, and Panhandle...we have a lot of room to grow in the future.

Even if the city proper only grows 1% a year until 2020 it will easily pass 500k. More likely to be about 1.5% per year on average.

I thought you guys has been reading the newspaper all this time. Sacramento is the fastest growing city in California. Sacramento is #6 now in terms of population. By next year or in two years time it will overtake Fresno, which has 520k people. I know you guys are talking about Sacramento proper but the Sacramento area is gaining 90 people a day, about 2700/mo.

Per the CA Dept of Finance, Sacramento proper grew by 1.4%, or 6,900 ppl from 2016-2017. So applying that same growth rate, the city should be around 515k by 2020 assuming growth rate is static.

1/1/16: 486,111
1/1/17: 493,025 (+6,914) per CA dept of Finance
1/1/18: 500,037 (+7,012)
1/1/19: 507,149 (+7,112)
1/1/20: 514,363 (+7,213)

Yup sounds reasonable.

Although I won't think we will overtake Fresno (at least for another 20 years) unless

(1) It starts having negative population growth (unlikely)
(2) Sacramento's growth rate becomes double of Fresno (maybe, but skeptical)
(3) Sacramento annexes South Sacramento or Arden (most likely to happen within the next decade)

You think? I don't see Darrell Steinberg or anyone else in the Sacramento (city proper) government making that a priority, let alone successfully pitching it to nearby un-city dwellers.

Although annexing the "Fruitridge-Florin Finger" (down to Elk Grove city limits), Arden-Arcade, and the "Natomas-Robla Panhandle", would be sensible ideas.

I say within the decade because the those areas (South Sacramento, Arden) will continue to decline due to lack of resources, regulation and suburban flight to urban environments until it's untenable not to annex them and clean them up. Arden might finally form it's own city but look show shitty most of South Sacramento is right now and imagine what it's going to look like in 10 years with zero investment while places within city limits gets all of the development/gentrification such as Midtown, Oak Park, Curtis Park, and even suburban areas such as Natomas and Delta shore. There is NOTHING happening in unincorporated South Sacramento except decay. The county of Sacramento doesn't have the tools or the same resources an incorporated city does do to any of that.

The dynamic growth of the Asian American shopping areas in the vicinity of Florin Rd and Stockton Blvd would indicate otherwise, commercially. There is a lot of investment going on there.

As for Arden-Arcade, I am seeing the sprucing up and remodeling for the Fulton Avenue and even the Watt Avenue commercial centers. However, they still missed the boat when they chose not to incorporate themselves a la Citrus Heights, Elk Grove, or Rancho Cordova.

Annexation of "un-city" to Sacramento proper is a matter of political will. K.J. definitely had such a will, but he had a basketball team to save first, and then he was crippled by personal scandal. :( Darrell Steinberg is a drone who clearly does not.

But that doesn't explain the "un-city" phenomenon. After all, Fresno did not allow an Un-City of Calwa, or an Un-City of Herndon, to grow up around it. (Bakersfield apparently did, but that's Bakersfield for you, right? :haha: )

Keep in mind that there is a lot of political will by the very wealthy folks in Arden-Arcade to NOT incorporate--and a lot of the regional money is controlled by folks who are downright fearful of government, and convinced that private solutions are the best ones, so they deliberately work against incorporation or annexation. This dates back to the 1950s, and a legacy of the past and present business communities. The wealthy parts of the "uncity" do what they can to oppose and sabotage annexation, the poor and struggling parts of the "uncity" are not good prospects for annexation because they end up costing the city more money to annex than they provide in tax revenue, nor can they fiscally justify incorporation on their own.

This is a regional issue, not just city/county--look at wealthy suburban enclaves like Rancho Murieta or El Dorado Hills. That's where the regional money and power is centered, and they are mostly still unconvinced by all this "back to the city" stuff that everyone else has been on board with for decades.

All true. While annexing Arden/Arcade would be a sensible thing to do, there would be a lot of political headwind. Not saying it couldn't be accomplished, but the fight would be there. Also, I bet the County would want the south area 'finger' included in the same annexation or timing thereof to make up for the lost revenue. Arden/Arcade has a lot of money comparatively and only taking this area (by the City) would be a huge drain on resources for the County.

Going back to the thread topic, I'll keep with my original prediction, and agree with others about Fresno being out of reach in the rankings for at least a couple more decades with out the aforementioned annexations.

I could care less that Fresno population is larger. That said getting to 500,000 by 2020 is easy attainable - only need a couple of thousand residents to get there.

Thanks for the replies guys and I think I might revise my new 2020 guess at around 521,750. Its kinda funny since noticing the Sacramento city limit signs on I-5 southbound near highway 99 and the Sac airport it says Sac has a pop of 466 and some change-the sign on I-80 eastbound just east of the Sacramento River reads a pop of 418 and some odd change (maybe CalTrans is a bit slow in puting in current info??)..:???:

I think up until a few years ago there was a city limits sign on the tower bridge that say something like 360k.

I agree about the 1950s. That's when San Jose, then a very small farm town with a state college campus, and surrounded by prune orchards, annexed all the land that has since filled in, catapulting it to California's second largest city, and one of the top ten in the US. That could have been Sacramento's future, too, if there had even some visionary leadership at the time.

I actually understand and approve of that sentiment.

However, the problem with this, as the people of Citrus Heights, Elk Grove and Rancho Cordova figured out, and the people of El Dorado Hills are starting to figure out, is that with a growth situation, in the absence of a single municipal government, you have to create a bunch of other government entities, for example:
--a water district because the rural wells are no longer enough,
--a sewer district because the rural septic tanks are no longer enough,
--a fire district because the volunteer or small county fire department is no longer enough,
--a parks and recreation district to administer and maintain the parks that the (sub)urban developer put in,
--county sheriffs and local schools that have to expand dramatically,
--and so on, and so on, and so on....

Before you know it, you have a multi-headed Byzantine hydra of governments, when it would have been far simpler for the wealthy folks, *and* John and Jane Q. Public, to take their issues to one municipal place, or one City Hall.

I do not think the city's population alone makes all that much difference with regard to clout or reputation. San Jose has more people than San Francisco but that's about it. In most people's mind San Francisco remains *the City.* Same sort of thing with Fresno vs Sacramento. And not just here. Look at Atlanta. It has a smaller in-city population than even Sacramento but wields more cultural influence in part because it's the hub for a larger metropolitan area.