St. George metro area growth ranks 2nd in U.S.

ST. GEORGE — Former St. George city councilman Larry Gardner remembers when the first stoplight at Main and the Boulevard went up, putting the proverbial brakes on the teenage ritual of cruising the main drag with friends.

"Back then we would call it 'dragging Main,' even though we were really dragging the Boulevard," says Gardner of the 1960s, when St. George was small enough for everyone to know everyone else.

Times have changed. The booming St. George metropolitan area is the nation's second-fastest-growing, according to a census report released today.

Still, the estimated 5.1 percent growth St. George saw from July 1, 2006, to July 1, 2007, is a slowdown. In the previous year the metro area, which encompasses St. George and Washington County, saw a 6-percent rise in population and was the nation's fastest-growing. This year, St. George was surpassed by Palm Coast, Fla., which grew by 7.2 percent.

The census estimates released today are for metropolitan areas that comprise one or more counties with a core urban area of at least 50,000 people. Estimates were also released for micropolitan areas with cores of 10,000 to 49,999.

Nationwide, the estimates show a temporary slowdown of a long-term migration pattern from the Northeast and Midwest to the South and West. It's a result of the housing bubble crash and slowing economy impacting people's mobility, said William Frey, demographer for the Brookings Institution.

"People continue to want to live in the West," Frey said. "This is basically a result of the housing market functioning in a way that has gotten out of control and the financial markets not working correctly. ... Eventually that's going to clear up."

In general, the estimates indicate Utah's metro areas weren't as hard hit as areas such as Las Vegas and Phoenix, said Pamela Perlich, senior research economist at the University of Utah. She pointed out that St. George was one of only four metro areas in the top-10 growth that had also been on the list in the prior year.

The estimates also indicate New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are starting to recover from the impact of Hurricane Katrina. New Orleans saw an influx of 38,000 people and ranked eighth in overall growth. On the Mississippi Gulf Coast, the Gulfport-Biloxi and Pascagoula metro areas also saw population growth.

In Utah, Perlich said while growth is likely to slow somewhat, "the trend remains quite positive."

The Provo-Orem metro area, which ranks eighth nationally in growth since 2000, ranks 34th in its one-year growth of 2.6 percent. And the Ogden-Clearfield metro area ranked 26th with 2.9 percent growth.