PHILADELPHIA | Lowrise/General Developments Thread II

[PHLtoNYC]

Philly’s population dropped for a second year in a row, census data show

Newly released census estimates say Philly lost more than 22,000 residents between July 2021 and July 2022, a 1.4% drop andthe largest one-year decline since 1977

https://www.inquirer.com/news/philad...-20230330.html

The info in the article is not as bad as the title reads. Some points...

1. These are prelim numbers, census isn't very good at snapshot predictions (better at trends). The final loss will likely be mush less.

2. Philadelphia is similar to many other large cities for total loss, per capita loss, and domestic out-migration rates.

My concern is if Philadelphia falls into a stagnant/incremental population loss cycle (like Pittsburgh) despite being a desirable place to live.

And my confusion, with construction everywhere, perhaps multi-generational households are packing up, and those moving in are singles or couples (likely affluent)?

[Gatorade_Jim]

Originally Posted by PHLtoNYC

Philly’s population dropped for a second year in a row, census data show

Newly released census estimates say Philly lost more than 22,000 residents between July 2021 and July 2022, a 1.4% drop andthe largest one-year decline since 1977

https://www.inquirer.com/news/philad...-20230330.html

The info in the article is not as bad as the title reads. Some points...

1. These are prelim numbers, census isn't very good at snapshot predictions (better at trends). The final loss will likely be mush less.

2. Philadelphia is similar to many other large cities for total loss, per capita loss, and domestic out-migration rates.

My concern is if Philadelphia falls into a stagnant/incremental population loss cycle (like Pittsburgh) despite being a desirable place to live.

And my confusion, with construction everywhere, perhaps multi-generational households are packing up, and those moving in are singles or couples (likely affluent)?

My suspicion is that Center City and it's adjacent neighborhoods are growing while farther out neighborhoods are shrinking in population as residents move out of the city when they can.

[mcgrath618]

Whenever I see Census news, I check the year. Is it a number ending in a 0? If not, I take everything with tremendous grains of salt.

The 2019 Census Estimates had Philadelphia losing people, and then the actual census in 2020 showed that to be completely false.

[PHL10]

Originally Posted by mcgrath618

Whenever I see Census news, I check the year. Is it a number ending in a 0? If not, I take everything with tremendous grains of salt.

The 2019 Census Estimates had Philadelphia losing people, and then the actual census in 2020 showed that to be completely false.

Exactly.

[skyhigh07]

No matter how you spin it, it’s not great news. However, obviously there’s a lot of caveats to unpack including census adjustments, reduced immigration during Covid and specific neighborhood contractions/growth.

If you go on different NYC threads and boards, there’s a lot of discussion that the census numbers there aren’t great either. They’re saying even while Manhattan gained in population, it’s still running a deficit of 98,000 since April 2020 and while they netted 17,000 last year ending in July, they still lost 111,000 in the previous 12 months. The migrant situation possibly helped boost those numbers. However, I speculate it’s more attributed to people moving back for work after the city had been substantially hemorrhaging residents during Covid. Brooklyn and Queens lost population which further fills out the overall picture.

Going back to Philly, it seems like CC and it’s immediate environs are still relatively thriving. Overall, there’s a fair amount of nuanced demographic and internal migration trends that are driving changes within the city as well.

Great resource for neighborhood population trends:

https://economyleague.org/providing-insight/leadingindicators/2023/01/27/fiveyearneighborhoods2021-part1#:~:text=South%20Philadelphia's%20Stadium%20District%20saw,Bella%20Vista%2C%20and%20Grays%20Ferry

[chimpskibot]

I highly doubt Philly has lost population two years in a row unless there has been a massive shift in HH size. And although HH size has been trending down since the 60's, Philly now has more HH than ever. There would also be a lot of housing pressure alleviated if so many people were moving out that just isn't showing up in the current rent or for sale market.

[arkitect13]

I cant see population growth slowing, in all honesty, while I'm sure the city lost residents, at this point I believe the city is gaining people again.

[McBane]

What is HH?

[jhdiesel]

HH = households?

[3rd&Brown]

Originally Posted by chimpskibot

I highly doubt Philly has lost population two years in a row unless there has been a massive shift in HH size. And although HH size has been trending down since the 60's, Philly now has more HH than ever. There would also be a lot of housing pressure alleviated if so many people were moving out that just isn't showing up in the current rent or for sale market.

It's nearly inconceivable to me that the city lost population when there are something like 26,000 units under construction.

[chimpskibot]

Originally Posted by jhdiesel

HH = households?

Originally Posted by McBane

What is HH?

Households. Sorry if it was unclear.

[ColdJay64]

Some thoughts. No population loss is good... BUT:

1. Philly is #8 of all cities when it comes to net gain of Gen Z - https://www.usatoday.com/story/money...n/11337814002/

We've gained more than NYC, Houston, Seattle, Charlotte, Tampa, Pittsburgh, and others. This great news for the future!

2. Who knows if this is accurate at all. I've also seen this:

"Using an analysis of cell phone location data, the company examined where Americans have been moving during the pandemic.

They found that while Philadelphia steadily lost population during the first year and a half of the pandemic, the picture has been more mixed since mid-2021. Between April 2021 and April 2022, the city’s population grew by 0.8%, while Brooklyn, Chicago and San Francisco have not experienced a single month of population increase since March 2020."

https://localtoday.news/ny/philly-at...hows-5778.html

3. The biggest losers were Los Angeles County, California (-90,704); Cook County, Illinois (-68,314); Queens County, New York (-50,112); Kings County, New York (-46,970); and Bronx County, New York (-41,143).

This tells me that as usual, we are beholden to national trends. I didn't do the math but it looks like LA, Chicago, and NYC lost more, proportionally speaking

[UrbanRevival]

Re: Census Estimates, I think it's very difficult to come to any sort of meaningful conclusion with this data or give it a ton of validity when:

1. 1-year Census estimates have been very error-prone in the past, especially with large, dense cities.

2. COVID was still casting a large pall on cities like Philadelphia for all of 2021 and even part of 2022. Even one year later has made a huge difference as far as things like foot traffic, office use, and general event activity.

3. Philadelphia is still dealing with depressed immigration rates, which is what accounted for so much of its growth in prior years (the next Mayor should absolutely prioritize promoting the city's global profile again, something that the city has clearly lost traction on during the Kenney years, but that's another conversation entirely).

All that to say, as frustrating as it is to not have data that's really useful or reliable as far as Census estimates, that's the reality we're in. Regardless, even if there was population growth showing up in the data, everyone knows that no city can rest on its laurels.

It's becoming more and more apparent that the next 5 years or so are going to be absolutely critical for the trajectory of Philadelphia for the next generation (although that's likely true for every large city). The next round of decision-makers that fill City Hall and in other prominent business or institutional positions have to work in tandem to get the city back on track like they never have before. In 2023, there's no more room for petty politics.

[Urbanthusiat]

Originally Posted by ColdJay64

Some thoughts. No population loss is good... BUT:

1. Philly is #8 of all cities when it comes to net gain of Gen Z - https://www.usatoday.com/story/money...n/11337814002/

We've gained more than NYC, Houston, Seattle, Charlotte, Tampa, Pittsburgh, and others. This great news for the future!

This is the article I was thinking about specifically.

From the Inquirer, just a few days ago: https://www.inquirer.com/news/gen-z-...-20230329.html

The data in the graph says Philly had a net gain of 2,007 people on domestic migration across all generations. I just don't see how it would be possible for us to have positive domestic net migration but still be losing people. In the past when Philly was shrinking, we would gain on natural increase and international migration while losing people to domestic migration. Unless we somehow reversed decades-long trends and started having a lot more deaths than births (we didn't) and losing a lot of people to international migration (pretty sure that also didn't happen) then there's simply no way that Philly is losing residents if its typical source of loss isn't actually negative. It just doesn't pass the sniff or the eye test. ACS always undercounts Philly in non-Census years.

[DeltaNerd]

I hope the CVS at 11th and Market gets redeveloped soon.

Nov 2020: https://goo.gl/maps/ELsUk5K4zr2Xwurp7
Aug 2009: https://goo.gl/maps/U3zVxiqMJhPntx8M9

Just looking at that timeline is amazing how much the area changed in 10 years. Regardless of the arena being built I hope between 10th and 11th on Market st the whole block gets redeveloped and the street behind (Ludlow) will get the pedestrianized treatment.

I put this here because I think it would be a lowrise development (10 floors)

[PHLtoNYC]

Originally Posted by UrbanRevival

3. Philadelphia is still dealing with depressed immigration rates, which is what accounted for so much of its growth in prior years (the next Mayor should absolutely prioritize promoting the city's global profile again, something that the city has clearly lost traction on during the Kenney years, but that's another conversation entirely).

Good point. A whole different conversation, but 100%, the net Mayor needs to prioritize showcasing Philadelphia on a global stage.

Philadelphia checks all the boxes for global interest / competitiveness, the city just needs motivated and forward thinking leaders.

[PurpleWhiteOut]

Originally Posted by Gatorade_Jim

My suspicion is that Center City and it's adjacent neighborhoods are growing while farther out neighborhoods are shrinking in population as residents move out of the city when they can.

Yes, this has been the case in the past. The trend has been that much of greater CC's/UC's growth has been offset especially by a shrinking Northeast. I think North and Southwest have also been shrinking still but not as quickly

[youngniems]

Originally Posted by PurpleWhiteOut

Yes, this has been the case in the past. The trend has been that much of greater CC's/UC's growth has been offset especially by a shrinking Northeast. I think North and Southwest have also been shrinking still but not as quickly

Shrinking Northeast?? The Northeast has been one of the fastest growing sections of the city outside of the core. This is almost exclusively due to the extremely large immigrant population up there.

[summersm343]

We have this same conversation every year. A news article comes out every year. The yearly census estimates are highly inaccurate. It’s been proven at this point. They typically widely underestimate denser legacy cities like Philadelphia, NYC and Chicago, and highly overestimate and inflate newer sunbelt cities like Phoenix, Austin and Dallas.

From 2020, to 2021, they estimated Philadelphia lost 25,000 people… then revised that down to 11,000. Even that might be too high. They were off by 14,000 people? Lol. I would lose my job if I were that inaccurate. If we use the same margin for error, 2021 to 2022 should be revised down to 8,000… even these revised numbers I’d take with an extreme grain of salt.

Northeast Philly is not shrinking. It’s actually growing. The amount of housing being developed in “Greater Center City” and “Greater University City”… there’s no logical way Philadelphia is losing.

Everyone says: “people moving out of the city…” where are they moving to? Seriously… the housing market is SUPER tight right now. There’s almost no houses on the market for sale. Where would people go? We know apartments are somewhere around 95-96% occupied in the city. People can’t move whom own a home without selling it or renting it out…. Soooo. What’s the explanation for Philadelphia losing population? I guess you can say the people come in and replacing residents that are leaving are less per housing unit? Like a young couple replacing a family of 3 or 4? Maybe… but I just don’t see how that would be happening on such a large scale to offset the influx of people buying and renting all of these new units to such a large extent.

Again… take these yearly estimates with a huge grain of salt. Really not going to know for sure what is happening until the 2030 census. That will give us a more legit view of trends.

[PurpleWhiteOut]

Originally Posted by youngniems

Shrinking Northeast?? The Northeast has been one of the fastest growing sections of the city outside of the core. This is almost exclusively due to the extremely large immigrant population up there.

Not evenly. What I was thinking was this source from 2017
https://nextcity.org/features/philad...mapping-growth

They list holmesburg, bustleton, bridesburg, Mayfair, "northeast Philadelphia" (not sure where), Tacony, Fox Chase, Torresdale, Somerton, Frankford, and Rhawnhurst as experiencing population declines. Maybe this isn't true now, but I haven't dug into more recent data I guess