There was a prediction in the decline of urban populations before the pandemic.

A very common lifecycle in the US is to grow up in the burbs, move to the city as a young adult, then go back to the burbs to raise kids.

Millennials are the biggest generation though, so when they hit the “move to the city” phase, urban populations rose. And due to great financial crisis, student debt, etc. they were also poorer and delayed family formation (and delayed leaving for the burbs), which mean their large urban pop blip hung around longer than previous generations.

This millennial blip fueled US urban renewal.

But even before the pandemic, demographers were noting that Millennials were finally getting around to family formation and starting the typical “return to the burbs” part of the American lifestyle.

Anecdotally, as an Xennial, most of my friends were city-dwelling & child-free right up until they started hitting the “now or never” child-bearing deadlines, and right around 40 nearly all my child-free friends suddenly had kids. Some immediately left for the burbs. Some stuck around for a couple years, but the vast vast majority bailed for the burbs.

WFH has definitely facilitated this, but the crime / unhoused / opioid issues ain’t helping.

When you’re twenty-something, a little city grit is fine. Some dirty needles, smoking on trains, gun violence…it just kinda rolls off the shoulders. By the time you’re 40, it gets old, and when you’re a parent it hits different. Plus, you just kinda age out of stuff like live music, bars, the new hip restaurant, parties, clubs, etc.

That being said, due to Millennials staying in urban settings longer, being more climate conscious, I think they’re more reluctant to give up on walkability, transit, etc. so I think when they are leaving, they’re opting for the denser suburbs with walkable main streets, with transit access into the city, your Ardmore, Collingswood, etc. (Maplewood is popular with my NYC friends).

That, or they’re moving to more affordable 2nd tier cities where you can buy a bit more space, or places like the little artsy towns of the Catskills.

Anyway, here’s some pre-pandemic “millennials are leaving the big cities for the suburbs” articles.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/29/millennials-are-fleeing-big-cities-for-the-suburbs.html

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ellenparis/2019/10/31/millennials-with-families-are-leaving-major-cities-for-the-suburbs-transforming-them-into-hipsturbia/amp/

https://www.planetizen.com/news/2019/10/106470-millennials-leaving-big-city

Read those, and then toss in how city issues related to crime, addiction, the unhoused, etc. have gotten worse while WFH / remote work has become more common.

Those trends will only increase, especially as more millennials age hit the “now or never” child-bearing deadlines.

Gen Z will inherit shrinking cities with growing problems. And once the pandemic era federal aid to transit systems runs dry, transit is gonna have some real issues too. 2020s are the new 1970s.

Also gen z is a smaller cohort than millennials. Gen z is moving into cities per a recent article that showed up on this sub. I turned 30 in 2020, and many of my millennial friends who were living in the city moved out to the suburbs - which is pretty typical for americans of that age thinking about schools, a yard for kids to play in etc.

In 2006 when gen x was reaching that stage of their lives more millennials were moving in to replace them because there were more 20yo millennials than 30yo gen xers. That math is now flipped.

There are no larger generations coming in the foreseeable future, and fewer commuters seems to be a permanent new norm. Cities in general are going to need to figure out how to be great places to raise kids (and be previewed as such). Seems obvious to me that it means safer streets and better public schools. Unfortunately that's kind of a new paradigm, and harder than just getting back to the way things were 10 years ago.