Next Boom Town

[circuitboard]

Were #20, behind Denver.

http://www.newgeography.com/content/...owns-in-the-us

[Larry OKC]

Oh no! That means Trammel will never stop calling the Thunder the Boomers.

[circuitboard]

oh no! That means trammel will never stop calling the thunder the boomers.

lol

[dmoor82]

All theses other cities started there boom before the recession,wait until the economy comes back and OKC will thrive!

[UnclePete]

Drove through Downtown yesterday mainly to drive over the Walker Avenue bridge. Downtown from SW 7th to NW 6th looks like a warzone. Just how good of an idea is replacing traffic lights with stop signs? I am glad I didn't have out-of-town guests with me to see that mess.

[ljbab728]

Drove through Downtown yesterday mainly to drive over the Walker Avenue bridge. Downtown from SW 7th to NW 6th looks like a warzone. Just how good of an idea is replacing traffic lights with stop signs? I am glad I didn't have out-of-town guests with me to see that mess.

UnclePete, is any construction area ever pretty?

[UnclePete]

UnclePete, is any construction area ever pretty?

No they aren't, but why try to do so many at once? I have no reason to go downtown, but it would be nice to go through downtown on occasion. Reno Avenue used to be a good way to go through, but not any more.

[dcsooner]

All theses other cities started there boom before the recession,wait until the economy comes back and OKC will thrive!

I agree, I think OKC will move significantly up that list! The city is poised to make a large leap in growth the next 10-20 years. Very Exciting

[Reno and Walker]

Man why is Austin #1, Yuck!!!

[kevinpate]

Drove through Downtown yesterday mainly to drive over the Walker Avenue bridge. Downtown from SW 7th to NW 6th looks like a warzone. Just how good of an idea is replacing traffic lights with stop signs? I am glad I didn't have out-of-town guests with me to see that mess.

Short term pain for long term gain. It's a pill presently, but it would be a bigger nastier horse pill if it was stretched out to do only a street or two at a time until it was finished. It would feel like it was never going to end.

[ljbab728]

Short term pain for long term gain. It's a pill presently, but it would be a bigger nastier horse pill if it was stretched out to do only a street or two at a time until it was finished. It would feel like it was never going to end.

Agreed. In a couple of years the pain will be gone and we'll wonder why there was ever any concern. Downtown is still navigable in any case.

[Spartan]

A lot of these make sense. It's good company to be in, the point is that there are a LOT of boom towns and OKC is not the only one.

1 Austin, TX
2 Raleigh, NC
3 Nashville, TN
4 San Antonio, TX
5 Houston, TX
6 Washington, DC-VA-MD-WV
7 Dallas-Fort Worth, TX
8 Charlotte, NC-SC
8 Phoenix, AZ
10 Orlando, FL
11 Indianapolis, IN
12 Salt Lake City, UT
13 Columbus, OH
14 Jacksonville, FL
15 Atlanta, GA
16 Las Vegas, NV
16 Riverside, CA
18 Portland, OR-WA
19 Denver, CO
20 Oklahoma City, OK
21 Baltimore, MD
22 Louisville, KY-IN
22 Richmond, VA
24 Seattle, WA
25 Kansas City, MO-KS

Look at some of the cities we're right ahead of. I think the question is whether these Sun Belt cities will go back and recreate a REAL city or whether they will just fade away as quickly as they appeared.

My initial reactions are..San Antonio ahead of Houston?? Phoenix?? Riverside, CA?? But whatever, it's just another dumb list.

[lasomeday]

Spartan I agree on the San Antonio over Houston. Houston is growing like crazy, but you haven't been to Cali or Phoenix lately. It is depressing. Empty stores and homeless everywhere. I think Phoenix will benefit from being close to Cali, but Cali is falling apart. I was just there and development is virtually at a standstill.

[Spartan]

Spartan I agree on the San Antonio over Houston. Houston is growing like crazy, but you haven't been to Cali or Phoenix lately. It is depressing. Empty stores and homeless everywhere. I think Phoenix will benefit from being close to Cali, but Cali is falling apart. I was just there and development is virtually at a standstill.

Yeah, I just never go to Cali for some reason. Is that indicative of the whole state, and including urban areas like LA, SF, SD proper, or just the insane sprawl mania places like Riverside?

Ooooh now I get it, yeah I was separately questioning San Antonio over Houston, and then questioning the inclusion of Phoenix and Riverside ahead of....anyone.

[bluedogok]

It all comes down to the criteria used, I think the rate at which San Antonio is growing (growth percentage wise to existing metro) in relation to Houston is "higher", because Houston is established and has so much more than SA that Houston's growth in comparison to its existing metro is lower. There are a lot of things going on in SA, we are doing many more speculative proposals and some have turned into actual projects in San Antonio than in Austin.

[Bunty]

Man why is Austin #1, Yuck!!!

Because a hell of a lot of people want to go live there and work. So, make no doubt about it, Austin is the opposite of Yuck. Besides, some people who work for Dell in OKC, end up promoted to better paying jobs for Dell in Austin.

[dmoor82]

I dont get how this list is supposed to be America's NEXT boom town but some of these cities have allready "Boomed" clear back into last decade and beyond,cities like OKC just in the past few years have started to boom and make these lists',so if OKC is just starting to "boom" then we will be much higher on lists' like these in years to come.OKC is allready #20 and just getting started!

[Spartan]

I dont get how this list is supposed to be America's NEXT boom town but some of these cities have allready "Boomed" clear back into last decade and beyond,cities like OKC just in the past few years have started to boom and make these lists',so if OKC is just starting to "boom" then we will be much higher on lists' like these in years to come.OKC is allready #20 and just getting started!

It's harder, perhaps even impossible, to make a more genuine list like that, however. But much more fun! Feel free to make predictions, other than just OKC..

Bluedog, that makes sense, and I'm aware that SA has a lot of construction of course. The canal extension seemed interesting, although it didn't seem like so much a catalyst for development as I've seen in other cities that might qualify as upcoming boom towns. I always get the sense that SA is kinda stuck in the 90s and early 00s, at least in terms of trends.

[dmoor82]

OKC,Richmond, Lousiville all have about the same Metro population and I think OKC has the lowest GDP on this list,I would like to see where OKC would be ranked among'st peer cities and not lumped together with the likes of DC,Dallas,ATL,Houston,PHX!

[dmoor82]

Forbes had OKC as the 5th fastest growing Metro and this list has OKC #20 on America's next boom town,so which is more accurate?I think it differs from source to source so I wouldnt read to much into rankings,though nice to be on!

[adaniel]

I know I shouldn't complain when OKC is on a "good list" but some of the cities on this list are a little suspect.

I know the conventional wisdom that Atlanta is booming i,e. "Hotlana". But from everything I've heard from family out there--I have quite a few relatives in Gwinnett and Cobb Counties on the northern outskirts of town--the ATL is really hurting these days. Lots of foreclosures, "ghost subdivisions", and a troubling number of bank failures. There's also been a lot of structual shifts in the economy (closure of two very large military bases, loss of tech industry to NC). Yet there are still a ton of people moving there from NYC, Boston, Chicago, etc. I guess being warm and unemployed is better than being cold with a job??

Don't discount San Antonio. With the decline of FL as a popular retirement destination, I can totally see San Antonio rising up to takes its place with the hill country nearby and the great health care facitilies in SA. In a lot of ways its becoming a cheaper alternative to Austin.

[Spartan]

Atlanta is interesting because of the recent surge in growth inside of its tiny corporal limits.

[Architect2010]

Yet there are still a ton of people moving there from NYC, Boston, Chicago, etc. I guess being warm and unemployed is better than being cold with a job??

I've heard a lot of these transplants, from those northern cities in particular, are of African American heritage; a majority of them being posterity of the large demographic shift of the Great Migration[s]. Now that racial tension is more drama from the past than it is a current issue, a large number of blacks are moving from the northern cities and BACK to Southern USA. Or their "homeland" as the article put it. Lol. In fact, the percentage of blacks living in Southern USA is at 57%, the highest it's been since 1960. Atlanta being the African American magnet it is, naturally captures a certain percentage of those transplants.

[lasomeday]

Good point Arc,

Houston and Dallas are also drawing a lot from that percent of the population. One of my friends shot a music video in Houston and she said that most of them moved there from other places.

I don't think the draw is as big as Hotlanta, but it is happening in Texas too.

[Architect2010]

Agreed, Atlanta is definitely not the only drawing piece. Those Texan cities are definitely on the top lists of transplants from anywhere in the US, not only blacks.