Posted on March 28, 2016 by in News, Uncategorized

Jacksonville in middle of pack with population growth; sees jump in foreign-born residents

It’s the 53rd fastest growing metropolitan area in the U.S., out of 388.

The U.S. Census Bureau keeps track of population growth in metropolitan areas and in counties and released new figures for the nation’s metro areas this week.

Jacksonville’s growth, which was about 104,000, isn’t fast — well behind Texas’ big cities. The Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston metropolitan areas alone accounted for 10 percent of the national growth in the past five years.

But Jacksonville’s growth also is not declining like Cleveland or San Juan, P.R. Puerto Rico’s population is shrinking faster than anywhere, and presumably many of the island’s people are coming to Florida.

Jacksonville is “not one of the fastest,” said Stefan Rayer of the University of Florida, who studies population and growth, “but it’s not also one of the slowest.”

In Florida, Duval County is the 30th-fastest growing county — behind suburban Nassau, Clay and St. Johns counties — but part of that is because it is already so big. It added the eighth most people, behind Orange, Hillsborough, Broward, Palm Beach, Miami-Dade, Lee and Polk counties.

Notably, Duval beat Pinellas County, in part because St. Petersburg has more people dying than being born, a fact only offset by its net migration.

“Statewide, most of the growth since 2010 has been due to migration,” Rayer said.

Duval has fewer than 4,000 people moving here from other parts of the country, a low statistic, but again not as bad as some places. Miami-Dade’s growth comes exclusively from babies and international migration, with a net decrease in domestic migration.

Compare that to fast-growing St. Johns County: more than 33,000 people moved there from within the country.

Duval growth was helped by international migration, bringing 18,000 more people than there were in 2010. From 2014 to 2015, about 4,000 foreigners made Duval their home. That compares to the 800 international migrants who came in the last five years to St. Johns County.

DUVAL COUNTY

  • 48,747 more people live in Duval County than did in 2010.
  • 26,163 of those were due to more baby-making than dying.
  • 21,868 migrated here, with most of them coming from other countries.
  • 5.5 percent growth in five years.

JACKSONVILLE METROPOLITAN AREA

  • 103,885 more people than in 2010.
  • 31,688 of those due to more births than deaths.
  • 70,439 people migrated here, with most coming from within the country.
  • 7.4 percent growth in five years.

 

[Source: U.S. Census Bureau]