People have probably heard Cleveland’s rather humorous slogan when advertising the city (“At we’re not Detroit”), yet there has been nothing funny about Cleveland’s population over the past decade. A blog post from 2009 on the Cleveland.com blog sums up the sentiments of the city pretty easily in the first paragraph:
Some cities will be toasting the decennial census next year, celebrating population gains and a bright future. But it’s likely there will be no champagne corks popping in Cleveland City Hall. The city is losing people at an alarming, trend-setting pace.
In the past decade, Cleveland has lost 10 percent of it’s population. Once one of United States more prosperous city’s, Cleveland has been a gross reminder of what the past decades has done to former manufacturing centres and while cities such as Chicago and Philadelphia record population increases in the last few years, Cleveland has yet to get off the ground.
Unfortunately, there are a number of factors working against the city: a high crime rate, a cold climate and very few job opportunities. This doesn’t bode well for the next decade and along with other rust belt cities such as Buffalo, Toledo and Detroit, it will be interesting to see if Cleveland can re-establish itself. Pittsburgh has. Will Cleveland be next?
