Counterurbanization in California

The progressive population exodus following the demise of the "Gold Rush," and the subsequent rise of deserted settlements ("ghost towns") in the Californian Sierra Nevada, was reversed through tourism-oriented innovations in the late 1920s. The increasing significance of tourism and permanent inhabitants in these high-altitude regions has led to a renewed growth of population and settlements outside designated nature preserves like U.S. Federal National Parks. From 1960 onward, the High Sierra counties rank among those Californian regions with the strongest relative population growth. Re-evaluation of peripheral areas are driving population growth and human settlement expansion ("counterurbanization"). Similar in many respects to the Austrian Alps, California`s scattered mountain sport centers, too, have become focal points for permanent mountain settlements over the past decades. The new year-round residents are predominantly professional and business people who migrated from the urbanized areas around the San Francisco Bay Area, the northern Central Valley, and Southern California. They have found or created favorable living conditions in these high-mountain regions often called "leisure" or "amenity" landscapes. Predictably, tourism provides the majority of job opportunities. The proposed project seeks to analyze the phenomena of counterurbanization (exurbanization) in the Californian Sierra Nevada and its impact on economic, social, and environmental structures, as well as on human settlement expansion. Therefore, land use patterns and planning problems present major investigation focuses. The proposed project emphasizes evident parallel structures between the Austrian Alps and the Californian High Sierra: tourism and population growth, in combination with settlement expansion, combine to cause considerable planning problems. Therefore, the research project will also explore to what extent the experiences of what we in Austria call "zoning" policy of one high- altitude area (Tyrolean Alps) may have relevance to land use decisions in the other (Sierra Nevada), given the difference in the political, cultural, and social background between the two. The evaluation and interpretation of the current status of research, the scientific interpretation of source material, specifically of official statistics, field studies with a variety of data acquisition methods, discussion of first investigation results and judicial assembling of case studies` results will be key tools to achieve the project goals.

While from 1990 to the present more Californians have left their state than U.S. citizens have migrated to California, the Sierra Nevada has experienced the opposite trend, as domestic migration has continuously increased the population in this region. On the one hand, this migration can be found already in the foothills, which have meanwhile become part of the Sacramento metropolitan area; on the other hand, there is also considerable population growth in various areas of the high mountains - far removed and sometimes isolated from metropolitan areas ("High Sierra"). There is no doubt that the process of counterurbanization - the re-discovery and re-evaluation of rural regions as permanent residential and commercial space - is the driving force of settlement expansion and population growth in the high altitude areas of California and partly of Nevada. This process has profoundly changed the Sierra Nevada during the last five decades. In certain areas the settlement enlargement has reached the limit of (private) land to build on. This reduction of land available for developments has resulted in a steady vertical settlement expansion that in some places already exceeds the 2.600 meter contour line. The majority of the new residents originates from the Californian metropolitan areas and migrates to the Sierra Nevada because they associate life in the mountains with a higher quality of living. Additionally, safety/low crime rate, ethnical homogeneity, and recreational amenities attract people from the overcrowded cities to the mountains. Modern telecommunication technologies also stimulate the settling of permanent and intermittent residents. High portion of white residents, dominance of younger age categories and male persons, and progressive tertiarization are significant demographic characteristics of the Sierra Nevada. Moreover, the "urban refugees" have a higher income than the local population and are well educated - far above the Californian average. The high number of newcomers and the restricted availability of private land - only about one third of the Sierra Nevada - have led to an unexpected and enormous increase in land and housing prices in most parts of the Sierra Nevada. We found out that long time residents are often unable to afford living in their original place of residence and are forced to move to less expensive areas in Nevada. This may constitute a serious potential for conflict between the local population and newcomers. In terms of employment, the real estate market, the building industry, and the service sector profit the most from the counterurbanization process. Apart from this, they also benefit from the increasing year-round tourism intensity. Moreover, our study emphasizes the increasing relevance of the phenomenon regarding second home ownership (related to amenity migration) as well as the fact that in certain areas the percentage of seasonal residents is already higher than that of permanent dwellers. Tourism provides the most important impulse for High Sierra counterurbanization. We should not forget that the (later) migrants from Californian metropolitan areas initially came to know and appreciate the high quality of life in the High Sierra as a result of vacation and travel experiences. Furthermore, tourism constitutes the major source of employment. The project finally discusses the various deficits of appropriate planning strategies in the Sierra Nevada. Nevertheless, the authors suggest that it is not advantageous to adopt specific land use models tested in the Eastern Alps to the High Sierra: this would most likely result in massive restriction of migration into the High Sierra, heralding the end of counterurbanization.