Baton Rouge’s population ranking among American cities has steadily declined since its 1980 heyday, according to a recent Axios study, with local professionals largely chalking it up to the suburban flight of people moving to Ascension and Livingston parishes.
An important distinction: Axios only mapped the populations of legally defined cities, rather than broader metro areas, in order to facilitate comparison all the way back to 1790. (Learn more about that data here.) The study reveals how “uneven” the most recent urban revitalization has been.
Before 1950, Baton Rouge wasn’t even on the map of the 100 most populated U.S. cities. But the city landed a No. 82 rank that year, with 125,600 residents, steadily growing until it reached its No. 62 peak in 1980, with 219,400 residents. Between 1980 and the 2010 Census, however, the city’s population ranking dropped 23 spots, to No. 85—its lowest ranking in 60 years. Its population count was 229,500, or just 10,000 more people than it had three decades before, and its 2017 numbers appear to be even lower.
Andrew Fitzgerald, senior director of business intelligence for the Baton Rouge Area Chamber, points out the study doesn’t account for the Capital Region’s population growth, noting Ascension and Livingston parishes are the fastest- and third- fastest-growing parishes in the state, respectively.
Development of new industrial plants in the south and east parts of the parish is drawing talent closer to those areas, he says, adding many former city residents are moving to unincorporated areas of East Baton Rouge Parish.
“In order to compete for talent, metros need strong urban cores with walkability and amenities,” Fitzgerald says in an email. “The city is clearly on a positive trajectory … Organizations like the Downtown Development District and Mid City Redevelopment Alliance are revitalizing formerly sparsely-populated areas of the parish, and [those] populations are growing.”
Affordable housing and high-performing schools are also “big pull factors” to suburbs and unincorporated parts of the parish, says Troy Blanchard, interim dean of LSU’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences, who specializes in social demography.
The data also reflects what appears to be a broader national trend of suburbanization, says Blanchard, with technology allowing people to live and work in different cities.
“People are spreading out quite a bit,” Blanchard says. “Technology has the potential to drive some of those trends—people are now able to work from home, and entrepreneurs can live anywhere in the country.”
In a nutshell, the largest places will maintain their dominance in terms of their ability to attract people, Axios reports. But the more recent growth occurring in mid-sized cities, as well as suburbs and exurbs of the biggest cities, is constantly shifting.
