New Orleans Population Shrinks By 1/3 In 10 Years
Ten years after Katrina, The Big Easy's population shrinks by one-third.
Feb. 7, 2011 -- New Orleans may always hold the nickname "The Big Easy," but its population isn't quite as big as it was 10 years ago.
The population in New Orleans shrunk by nearly 30 percent in 10 years according to new data released last week. Much of that loss was attributed to the ravages of Hurricane Katrina which devastated the city in 2005.
The U.S. Census Bureau released local 2010 Census data, which revealed New Orleans's population stood at 343,829 people in 2010. Ten years earlier, the city's population sat at 484,674 people, reflecting a 29.1 percent change in the population.
This drop in New Orleans' population size is credited to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the most destructive and costly natural disaster in the history of the United States.
"It's obviously a smaller city," Allison Plyer, chief demographer for the Greater New Orleans Community Data Center, said. "That drop was very much expected. Obviously, Katrina had a huge impact."
Known for its rich traditions from cultivating the foundations of jazz music to the lively atmosphere and history of the French Quarter and Bourbon Street, the city endured the worst of the 2005 storm. Nearly 80 percent of its population fled the city to safer locations in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas, but it remains unclear how many of these evacuees eventually returned to New Orleans.
Before Katrina hit, the city's racial composition was overwhelmingly black with over 67 percent of the population identifying themselves as black or African American in the 2000 census. In 2010, this percentage dropped to 60, with the city losing 119,000 people who identified themselves as black or African American in 2010 while New Orleans saw an influx in its Hispanic population.
In addition to the change in the cultural landscape of the city, the housing sector took a noticeable hit from the storm as well. Prior to Katrina, only 12.5 percent of housing units were unoccupied, according to 2000 census data, but the 2010 census revealed the occupancy number declined with 25 percent of housing units listed as unoccupied.
