More people than ever live in downtown Miami — and they're starting to raise families
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/real-estate-news/article211743454.html
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The idea of raising a family in the downtown urban core — with its high-rise living, stop-and-go traffic and adult-oriented entertainment such as nightclubs and restaurants — might have seemed nutty as recently as a decade ago. But a new analysis of Greater Downtown Miami demographics by the Miami Downtown Development Authority, which uses data from the U.S. Census, shows the population in Greater Downtown Miami has hit an all-time high of 92,235 — a 65 percent jump from 2000-2010 and another 38 percent increase from 2010-2018.
The number is projected to swell another 19 percent by 2021, with the total population in Greater Downtown Miami expected to reach 109,617. By comparison, the downtown area populations in similarly sized cities range from 26,850 in Atlanta to 48,000 in Dallas to 80,000 in Denver.
Young professionals between the ages of 25-44 are the most populous group in downtown Miami, comprising 45 percent of dwellers. But the number of children aged 14 and under has grown 53 percent since 2010, to a current total of 11,484 residents.
The number of family households — defined as people related by birth, adoption or marriage — has also spiked 42 percent, to 47,958.
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The Greater Downtown Miami area comprises 3.8 square miles east of I-95, west of Biscayne Bay, south of I-195 and north of the Rickenbacker Causeway. It is made up of seven neighborhoods: Brickell, Midtown, Edgewater, Wynwood, Historic Overtown, and the Central Business and Arts & Entertainment districts.
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Walkability issues
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Still missing: Clear walkways where pedestrians could stroll from Brickell to Edgewater and back without having to dodge traffic or breathe exhaust fumes.
In its latest annual list of the 15 most walkable cities in the U.S., the website WalkScore ranked Miami sixth — ahead of Seattle, Philadelphia, Chicago and Washington D.C. — specifically citing the neighborhoods of Wynwood, Edgewater and downtown. But Rosso said the city could do much better. He is a big supporter of the Biscayne Line, a proposed bayfront walkway that would connect Edgewater to downtown and Brickell.
"You see what places like New York have done with the High Line," the elevated public park that runs down the western side of Manhattan, Rosso said. "People will start using spaces where they can run and bike on the weekends, because when you live in an apartment, your space is smaller."
Other key findings from the Greater Downtown Miami demographics study:
▪ Downtown's daytime population, which includes residents, workers, students and tourists, is 250,757, or nearly 66,000 people per square mile — the densest in Miami-Dade County. Fort Lauderdale's downtown daytime population is 79,962, while West Palm Beach hits 25,187.
▪ The median household income in 2018 was $76,610, nearly double the Miami-Dade County median household income of $44,224, according to the U.S. Census. The per capita income was $52,200, more than double the Miami-Dade per capita income of $24,515.
▪ The average asking rent price per square foot for Class A office space in Brickell is $52.53 — the highest in Miami-Dade County — according to the 2018 first quarter report by JLL. Still, the vacancy rate is 10.3 percent, which is lower than the county-wide average of 12.3 percent.
Some experts say that although downtown's boom is good for Miami as a whole, the high cost of living in the urban core has consequences.
"A lot of people who work in downtown have been forced to move out into Kendall and Homestead," said Dr. Ned Murray, associate director of the Metropolitan Center at Florida International University. "Miami-Dade is the proverbial tale of two cities. The growth of downtown has no effect on the lack of public transit, the high cost of transportation and the housing index for people in Kendall and Doral and Homestead. There’s no progress there.
"Then you combine that with the environmental issues of sea-level rise and climate change," Murray said. "Brickell is in a storm surge planning zone that gets evacuated for Category 2 storms and above. We’re not building a very resilient Miami right now, but it continues to grow. At some point we’re going to have to face the consequences of that unless we take planning more seriously."
