ST. GEORGE — Former St. George city councilman Larry Gardner remembers when the first stoplight at Main and the Boulevard went up, putting the proverbial brakes on the teenage ritual of cruising the main drag with friends.
"Back then we would call it 'dragging Main,' even though we were really dragging the Boulevard," says Gardner of the 1960s, when St. George was small enough for everyone to know everyone else.
Times have changed. The booming St. George metropolitan area is the nation's second-fastest-growing, according to a census report released today.
Still, the estimated 5.1 percent growth St. George saw from July 1, 2006, to July 1, 2007, is a slowdown. In the previous year the metro area, which encompasses St. George and Washington County, saw a 6-percent rise in population and was the nation's fastest-growing. This year, St. George was surpassed by Palm Coast, Fla., which grew by 7.2 percent.
The census estimates released today are for metropolitan areas that comprise one or more counties with a core urban area of at least 50,000 people. Estimates were also released for micropolitan areas with cores of 10,000 to 49,999.
Nationwide, the estimates show a temporary slowdown of a long-term migration pattern from the Northeast and Midwest to the South and West. It's a result of the housing bubble crash and slowing economy impacting people's mobility, said William Frey, demographer for the Brookings Institution.