Growth sectors: over-65 age group, Hispanics; 32,000 new residents headed our way
The latest study from the Atlanta Regional Commission predicts a bright future for Fayette County.
The new ARC county population and employment forecasts, released last week, show Fayette experiencing 44 percent employment growth over the next 25 years. That is the fourth-highest predicted growth rate in the 20-county Atlanta region.
The expected population increase by 2040 is about 32,000 new residents, bringing the total in Fayette to just over 143,000, according to the ARC.
In conjunction with the release of this information, ARC executive director Douglas Hooker addressed the Fayette County Board of Commissioners at its April 26 regular meeting, espousing this positive news and encouraging county leaders regarding other key developments.
“You guys have a very bright future ahead of you,” he told the commissioners. “We are happy to help support you in that.”
Some other predictions contained within the 2040 forecast for Fayette include added diversity, as the Hispanic population is expected to nearly double to more than 14,000. The county’s economy is expected to add more than 23,000 jobs, with the top growth fields being in the education, healthcare and construction sectors. The forecast for the 65-and-over segment of the population is a rise from 18 percent to 29 percent of the overall population.
ARC officials predict that the region will add 2.5 million people and be home to more than eight million by 2040. While Gwinnett, Fulton, Cobb and DeKalb are expected to add the most people, the outlying counties will likely grow at faster rates.
Hooker acknowledged some specific transportation news impacting Fayette, such as $36 million allocated in the 2014-15 transportation improvement program for the county as well as $7 million in regional funds designated for the I-85/Hwy. 74 interchange, which is technically in Fulton County but affected a huge portion of Fayette County motorists on a daily basis.
Nearly all of the feedback on Hooker’s remarks came from Commissioner Steve Brown, who said a lot of citizens in the county are worried about the ARC’s stance on transportation planning. Citing the failure of the 2015 vote on the T-SPLOST and other initiatives, he expressed concern about what the county wants versus what it might have to pay for.
“We are worried that, even though we don’t have the transit component here, we will be picking up part of that tab,” he said.
Brown talked about MARTA and the Atlanta Streetcar project, which he termed a “disaster” with decreased ridership and “astronomical” costs per mile.
“A lot of our folks are scratching their heads, saying, ‘Why are we spending our tax dollars on projects like that?’” said Brown. “I really hope ARC takes a serious look at, if we are going to be involved in some of those plans, how we are going to sustain them.”
Hooker assured the board that individual communities have to decide whether they want to participate in transit, and no other body is going to force any municipality to use MARTA.
“We think transit is a wise investment for the communities that need and want it,” said Hooker. “We don’t think it makes sense to try to foist it on those that don’t want it.”
The ARC chief said his organization’s duty is to “investigate various possibilities,” adding that those investigations have to be assessed “at a higher rate than in the past” because things change more quickly now.
“Fayette is an extremely important part of the this region,” he said. “We are not looking for homogeny [with transportation and other development issues]. We think diversity is more attractive.”
Commissioner Charles Rousseau said he is looking forward to seeing the ARC’s new data come out and welcomes its assistance as Fayette leaders continue to improve upon the county’s quality of life.
Commissioner David Barlow complimented the ARC for what it does for Meals on Wheels and senior services.
Some other highlights of ARC’s county forecasts include:
Gwinnett County will be the region’s largest county in 2040, with a population of 1.35 million. Fulton County will be second-largest, with 1.26 million residents.
Forsyth County will grow at the fastest rate, seeing its population more than double by 2040, to 430,000.
The number of Hispanics in metro Atlanta will reach 1.75 million, an increase of more than 1 million. Most of the growth will occur in the region’s core counties of Fulton, Gwinnett, Cobb, DeKalb and Clayton.
The number of residents age 65 and over will nearly triple to 1.6 million.
The Atlanta region is expected to add more than 1 million jobs by 2040. The top employment sectors in 2040 will be health care, retail, education and professional and scientific.
The forecasts helped inform the development of the Atlanta Region’s Plan, a long-range blueprint that details the investments that will be made in the next 25 years to improve the Atlanta region’s quality of life.
“The Atlanta region will remain a desirable place to live, thanks to our low cost of living and a strong economy that continues to create jobs,” said Mike Alexander, director of ARC’s Center for Livable Communities. “We’ll see growth in existing suburban areas as well as the region’s core, as more people choose to live near jobs or transit.”
More charts from the ARC about Fayette below.
