Estimates of future demographic changes in the coastal zone

Abstract

This paper reports estimates of the relative and absolute sizes of the coastal population in the United States in the years 1990, 2000, and 2010. The estimates vary greatly among states in both the rate and direction of change, with increases expected for most marine coastal states and declines for most states bordering the Great Lakes. Together, only about 52.9 percent, 53.3 percent, and 53.6 percent of the United States's population is predicted to live in counties entirety or substantially within 50 miles of coastlines in the years 1990, 2000, and 2010, respectively. The need for long‐range planning is not diminished, however, since the absolute size of the coastal population is estimated to increase to nearly 143 million people by the turn of the century.