ROANOKE AREA MISSING CHANCES TO
REVERSE URBAN, SUBURBAN DECAY

	CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., April 7 -- Roanoke's metropolitan area
has been sliding into urban and suburban decline while missing
opportunities to improve its quality of life, according to a study
by University of Virginia planning researchers.
	"Income disparities between Roanoke City and County
residents had become extreme by 1990, with median family income
nearly 50 percent higher in the county than in the city," said
William H. Lucy of the School of Architecture's Department of Urban
and Environmental Planning, study co-author with David L. Phillips.
	Such disparities could be limiting the region's economic
prosperity, Lucy noted, since "annual earnings per private job in
the Roanoke region actually declined by $80 from 1970 to 1990."
	Jobs in the region increased by more than 28,000 during the
1980s, while population rose by 136, indicating a rising stream of
commuters from population growth areas, such as Bedford County,
outside the Roanoke metropolitan area, the researchers noted.
	Family incomes of Roanoke City residents declined slightly
in constant dollars during the 1980s, falling from a median of
$28,320 to $28,203, despite a higher percentage of city residents in
the workforce as more women held jobs.  While family income for the
metropolitan area rose, the increase lagged behind many areas of
Virginia, falling from 105 percent of the state median in 1960 to
only 91 percent in 1990.
	The Town of Vinton is traveling the same path at a slower
pace as its neighbor Roanoke City, with declines in population,
relative median family income, and rate of home ownership, the
planners discovered.
	Although the population of the metropolitan area remained
stable in the 1980s, significant numbers of people moved from
Roanoke City and Vinton to Roanoke and Botetourt Counties.  
	Sixty-seven percent of Roanoke County's farmland was
converted to other uses between 1959 and 1992, with farm conversion
continuing steadily during the 1980s, Phillips said.  If the rate of
farmland loss in Roanoke County continues at its recent rate, only
five percent of the county's land would be in farm use by 2020, he
added.
	Some Roanoke suburbs will go into decline as more affluent
families move even farther from urban centers and are replaced by
lower income residents, the planners predicted.  
	"The effect of aging of inner suburban housing was reflected
in modest relative median family income decline in seven of the nine
county census tracts bordering the City of Roanoke," Lucy observed.
	Effects of aging housing and low home ownership on incomes
have been evident in the city, he said.  One-half of the homes in
the city were more than 34 years old in 1990, the planners said,
compared with 19 years in Roanoke County.  Only 52 percent of city
residents owned their homes compared with 74 percent of county
dwellers.
	The Roanoke region could have reorganized governmentally to
reduce the negative effects of income disparities, Lucy and Phillips
concluded.  Instead, income disparities increased and suburban
sprawl continued, reducing the region's assets for encouraging
economic development, they found.
	But prosperity alone, if it increases, will not solve city
problems, the researchers observed, as proven by the ongoing exodus
of many affluent families from cities nationwide.
	"Replacing residents who move out with similar residents who
move in is crucial to stabilizing cities and suburbs," Phillips
said.  "With 52 percent of U.S. metropolitan residents having moved
between 1985 and 1990, local jurisdictions must cope with enormous
population fluctuations.
	"Unless greater attractiveness and greater density in
developed areas is combined with limitations on intrusions into
agricultural areas, metropolitan sprawl is likely to continue for
the foreseeable future," he said.
	Some parts of cities have advantages over most suburbs, and
the challenge is in making the most of them, the planners observed.
	"City neighborhoods are more apt to have advantages of
non-profit institutions, interesting architecture, walkable
neighborhoods, and access to mass transit," Lucy explained.  "For
people in the housing market who value these qualities, few suburbs
will offer attractive alternatives.
	"Thus, there may be portions of cities that increase their
attractiveness to some middle and upper income people, even as
other, usually larger, areas of these cities decline, and while the
inner suburbs and other suburbs built to modest standards decline
also.
	"Some inner suburban decline and some neighborhood city
revival unfolded in Roanoke and its suburbs between 1980 and 1990,
although their presence thus far is not nearly as evident as they
have been in the Richmond and Hampton Roads regions."
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April 6, 1995
	PLEASE NOTE:  William H. Lucy may be contacted at (804)
924-4779, and David L. Phillips at (804) 982-2196.