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Metro area seeing population boom
August 26, 2004

Minneapolis, Minn. — (AP) - The Twin Cities area has grown more rapidly in the last three years than during the boom years of the 1990s, with the fastest growth shifting away from the eastern suburbs.

And neither Minneapolis nor St. Paul is losing population, as the Census Bureau has said, according to new estimates by the Metropolitan Council.

The seven-county Twin Cities area had 2.7 million people as of April 2003, up by nearly 100,000, or 3.7 percent, from three years earlier. The state's population is about 5 million.

"The numbers are quite dramatic," said Mark Vander Schaaf, the council's director of planning and growth management. "We're adding the equivalent of the city of Duluth every three years."

The council's estimates are based on tracking additions in housing units, minus demolitions, along with information on vacancy rates and occupancy of group quarters. The estimates are important because they're used in distributing hundreds of millions of dollars in state aid, as well as guiding council planning.

We're adding the equivalent of the city of Duluth every three years. - Mark Vander Schaaf, Met Council

Met Council President Peter Bell said the numbers released Wednesday confirm projections that the metro area will add a million residents between 2000 and 2030.

"There's no question that the growth we're experiencing in the region is both a blessing and a burden," Bell said. "Growth lends vitality and prosperity, but it also poses challenges in terms of congestion, pollution and so on."

Blaine, which wasn't among the top 10 fastest-growing cities in 2000, now tops the list after tripling its average annual increase. The city has moved aggressively to develop open acreage.

Mayor Tom Ryan called the growth "crazy."

"We've added 46 restaurants in three years," Ryan said. "I don't know what chain we don't have. Unless the economy falls apart I don't see it slowing down."

Maple Grove, Eden Prairie, Shakopee and Lakeville, all to the south or west of the core cities, rounded out the top five biggest gainers.

Woodbury, the growth leader three years ago, is 10th in the new estimates as its growth rate has halved.

The population in Minneapolis and St. Paul showed little change, in contrast to official Census numbers. The Met Council and the state demographer's office said local analysts have more current information.

(Copyright 2004 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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