Denver Metro Real Estate and Economy Good News!

The Denver Post published the following article on July 21, 2008. I feel like this is awesome news for our local economy and real estate!
West’s growth far from done
As the population grows, more production, workers and education will be needed.
By Mark Jaffe The Denver Post
Article Last Updated: 07/21/2008 01:37:26 AM MDT

The Intermountain West — the fastest-growing region in the country over the last 20 years — is set to continue the trend by adding 12.7 million residents and 8 million jobs to its metropolitan areas by 2040, according to a Brookings Institution analysis.
That would double the population and workforce and require an estimated $3 trillion in housing and nonresidential development in the region comprising Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada.
“The West isn’t about wildfires, endangered species and mining anymore,” said Mark Muro, Brookings’ urban-policy director.
“The region is growing up, flexing its muscle and distancing itself from California, which historically has had an outsized impact on the West’s development,” the analysis said.The study identified several challenges for the region, including increasing labor productivity, improving education and innovation, and developing better transportation links to the rest of the nation.
The Brookings analysis identified five “megapolitan” areas in the Intermountain West:
• Colorado’s Front Range.
• Utah’s Wasatch Front linking Ogden, Salt Lake City and Provo.
• Arizona’s Sun Corridor linking Tucson, Phoenix and Prescott.
• Greater Las Vegas.
• Northern New Mexico linking Albuquerque, Santa Fe and Los Alamos and Rio Arriba counties.
“What is hard to realize is that these megapolitans are now equal to the size of a Cleveland or St. Louis,” said Robert Lang, a Brookings analyst.
The growth will be powered by continued migration to the region and a young population — the Western states’ average age of 34 is about two years younger than the national average — having families, the analysts said.
Nevertheless, the region continues to lag in some key areas, the report said.
For example, labor productivity in all but the Front Range trailed the national average. And while productivity nationally rose 2.3 percent a year between 2001 and 2005, in the West it averaged 1.8 percent.
Per-capita income also lagged the national average in all the regions except the Front Range.
“Denver’s growth has been tied to new technologies and new industries, and that’s what the numbers reflect,” said Jeff Romine, an economist with the Denver Office of Economic Development. He was not an author of the Brookings study.
The lag in income and productivity points to problems in education and workforce training in the West, Muro said.
“There is a young workforce in places like the Wasatch area and a real need for training,” Muro said.
The West, Romine said, has long depended on educated and well-trained workers moving into the region.
“Now, we are getting to the point where we have to train and educate our own population,” he said.
The growth of the urban West will continue to put pressure on water supplies — particularly in agriculture, which in 2000 used twice as much water as urban areas, the report said.
The Brookings study said “creative conservation and water planning” are a hallmark of the region and that they will be critical for the region’s growth.