Fun with numbers

The U.S. Census Bureau is out with data today that confirms what most of us know, the South is where people want to live and eventually so many people will be living there that the earth will somehow become unbalanced and spin out of orbit. I hope it's all worth it, Texas.

In these parts, Sioux Falls is one of the fastest growing areas, but Minneapolis-St. Paul is no slouch. Its population grew 1.1 percent between July 2006 and July 2007.

By contrast, the fastest growing of the 100 metropolitan areas is Raleigh-Cary, North Carolina, which grew at the rate of 4.7 percent. Does this mean the Raleigh-Cary is better than the Twin Cities. No (although it may be).

Assuming that people vote with their feet, the "best" place among the 100 is the Dallas area, followed by Atlanta, Phoenix, Houston and Riverside, Calif.

Minneapolis-St. Paul, however, finishes 18th in the total number of people moving here (OK, it's not exactly people moving here, it could just as easily be that lots of people died in some areas where a few people moved, but work with me here!) We're just slightly ahead of Nashville and just slightly behind San Francisco.

And we actually have some work to do to catch up with Raleigh-Cary, which is 12th.

Pittsburgh, Buffalo, and Detroit bring up the rear, as has become tradition for them.

In terms of the rate of growth, who are we most like?

Columbus, Ohio; Augusta, Ga.;Omaha;Tampa; Louisville, and Allentown, Pa.

We're having a hard enough time keeping up with the 1.1% population growth (see public transit and other services) to worry about anything more than that as it is. I say let Raleigh-Cary and Dallas and wherever else deal with the insane pop. increases. Hey, when global warming is done having it's say, those places will all be a wasteland anyway.

"the "best" place among the 100 is the Dallas area, followed by Atlanta, Phoenix, Houston and Riverside, Calif."

Maybe I haven't visited at the right times of year, but every one of those cities has a bit of an armpit feel to it.