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Year 2000: Big drop in white population and revitalization of Loop

Forecasts by urban experts suggest that population trends in Chicago and its suburbs over the next two decades will reflect shifting racial compositions, a continuing boom in downtown developments and some significant changes in the age composition of the area. At a very basic level, these forecasts suggest that although the Chicago of the future won't house many whites, its Loop will continue to employ them.

The big drop in white population projected for the city by the year 2000 will be coupled with a revitalization of the central business district, a prospect that stands in sharp contrast to many major cities of the Northeast and Midwest where downtowns are grasping for survival.

Nobody in majority

Even today, the racial composition of the city suggests the trends of the future, according to most accounts. Chicago is now apparently a city where nobody is in the majority since whites make up less than half of the population while blacks and Latinos comprise significant minorities which together include more than half of the city's citizens.

A recent study by the Community and Family Study Center at the University of Chicago shows these estimates for 1978 and projections for 2000:

White estimate: 1,452,400 projection: 959,800

Black estimate: 1,183,900 projection: 1,303,000

Latino estimate: 325,900 projection: 528,500

Total estimate; 2,962,200 projection: 2,791,300

One criticism of this study is that it allegedly underestimates the Spanish-speaking population. Some knowledgeable observers, while they have not analyzed the situation with the thoroughness of the University of Chicago researchers, predict that blacks will constitute 50 per cent of the population by 2000. Latinos will make up 33 per cent and whites the remaining 17 per cent. There was a time when it was widely feared that the exodus of whites from the city would cripple the Loop. And granted, the Loop has changed: suburban women don't come down to State Street department stores like they used to, and after dark there are few white people on the streets. But the downtown area still has a huge number of daytime office workers, and it is enjoying one of the biggest construction booms in its history. Nearly two dozen high-rise buildings are either under construction or planned.

Among the new office buildings already going up are Three First National Plaza (57 stories), Three Illinois Center (27), the Xerox Centre at Monroe and Dearborn (40), a building at 2 N. LaSalle (26) and a building at 33 W. Monroe (28). The fact that the long-discussed North Loop redevelopment project is now at least a serious proposal is another sign of the continued good health of the downtown area. This plan involves gutting most of seven blocks and constructing a hotel, a new State of Illinois building, a library and numerous other buildings.

Also consistent with recent trends, Chicago's population is expected to decrease somewhat in the next couple of decades, while the suburban area will add at least another one million people — perhaps many more.

The black and Latino populations in the suburbs will more than double by 2000, according to the University of Chicago study, but there are not many of either group in the suburban area now, so doubling won't mean much. At present the suburbs are 92 per cent white; in 2000 they will be 86 per cent

white, according to the projections.

One significant trend of the 1970's has been that many of the older suburbs are experiencing declines for the first time since the dramatic shift of people from the city to the outlying areas began following World War II. More than 60 suburbs dropped in population from 1970 to 1975, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

The major reasons for these declines appears to be that people are moving out of Illinois — many of them to the Sunbelt — and that the birth rate has declined.

The number of people moving out of the metropolitan area during the first half of this decade exceeded the number moving in by 258,000, according to the census figures. In the previous two decades, the number moving in and the number moving out were about equal.

Prediction by age group

Given current demographic facts, the university study predicts what it calls "a progressively more favorable age composition" during the remainder of the century in both the city and the suburbs. In 1970, children (up to age 15) constituted the largest segment of the population of the metropolitan area. In 2000, the 25-44 age group will be the largest. The researchers see this as a favorable development because there will be fewer people in the area dependent upon others for support.

S ome of these forecasts, of course, are not much more reliable than last night's prediction for today's weather. A lot can happen in 21 years. The authors of the university report admitted in their introduction that "demographers do not have an outstanding record for predicting the future exactly." This refreshing admission deserves a commendation for, if nothing else, its candor. □

February 1979/Illinois Issues/34