The 1400 block of Church Street NW is in Census Tract 52.01. This Logan Circle tract’s population grew 33 percent from 2000 to 2010 due to new residential buildings on Church, P and 14th Streets NW as well as Rhode Island Avenue. (Luis Gomez Photos)
From Matty Rhoades
D.C. is divided into eight wards. Ward 2 grew at a rapid rate and will have to shed residents. (DC Government)
The U.S. Census Bureau released D.C.’s results on Thursday. The big buzz was that (1) D.C. gained people for the first time since 1950 and (2) the black majority is on the verge of disappearing, with only 50.7% of residents now being African-American. There were huge gains in the number of whites and smaller gains in the numbers of Latinos and Asians living in D.C. Citywide, African Americans are about 51% of the population, Latinos are at 9%, Asians at 3% and non-Latino whites are at 35%.
D.C. now has more than 601,000 people, a 5.2% increase from 2000 — but still far below the city’s peak year of 1950 when the Census recorded 802,000 people in D.C.
Growth in Wards 1 and 2
Locally, Ward 2 — the bulk of the Borderstan.com coverage area — grew the fastest with a 16% population increase, from 68,000 to 79,000 people. This means it will have to lose people – certain blocks will have to be moved to other Wards — some eastern parts of the Ward could go to Wards 5 and 6. However, some northern chunks of Ward 2 could possibly go to Ward 1, which grew at a much smaller 3.9% rate.
Logan Circle. Census Tract 52.01 is a great example of how Ward 2 gained so many new people in the past 10 years. The tract’s boundaries are 14th Street NW on the east, 16th Street on the west, Massachusetts Avenue on the south and S Street on the north. The tract registered a 33% increase, going from 4,559 to 6,077 residents. It’s easy to figure out how this happened: the new rental and condo buildings on the 1400 blocks of P and Church Streets NW, plus additional units on the west side of 14th Street and on the 1400 block of Rhode Island Avenue.
