PINAL PROJECTIONS STUDY

Market Area Assessment/Pinal County Projections

The purpose of this stage is to allocate the projection scenarios for the 3-County megapolitan region to the market areas in Pinal County, and then to sum the market areas to arrive at Pinal County control projections. These county control projections will later be used by CAAG to derive TAZ-level projections. The Projections Study will make projections only for Pinal County, as both the Maricopa Association of Governments and the Pima Association of Governments have each prepared and adopted projections for their respective counties. Background research for this stage includes several white papers, as well as data assembly and model-building.

Jobs-Housing Balance

Recent development in Pinal County has primarily been housing, and the County has a very low proportion of jobs to housing. This situation is not expected to continue for the projections period. This paper is a study of patterns for jobs-housing balance in other counties to judge a realistic ratio between jobs and housing in the future. It examines trends in each of the three study area counties, and also examines trends in comparative counties and metropolitan areas across the southern United States, and can be downloaded here.

Jobs-Population Lag

In newly-developing areas, a common historic pattern is for residential development to occur first, followed by development of jobs. This paper examines comparable counties across the United States, and cities in Maricopa County, in order to identify the most realistic assumptions of the lag between jobs and population. It can be downloaded here.

Water Supply

This paper reports the results of interviews with water experts, supported by the most recent data findings, for water supply issues across the market areas of the 3-County Region. It can be downloaded here.

Real Estate Markets

Interviews with real estate experts, supported by the most recent data findings, provide a background for assessing the competitive real estate situation across all the market areas of the 3-County Region. Although this assessment will not be presented as a formal report, it will inform the research questions and provide a check for other projections.

Pinal County Regional Transportation System

Transportation accessibility is one of the most important variables that will affect future development in Pinal County. Since 1999, there have been 19 independently prepared transportation studies and plans in Pinal County. However, these are all build-out plans that do not address the timing of when new transportation segments would be put in place. To address this gap, CAAG is undertaking a special transportation study, funded through a contract with the Maricopa Association of Governments. A consulting team that includes Wilson Company and Curtis Lueck Association is preparing this analysis. The objective is to anticipate an integrated transportation network, with segments prioritized according to Pinal County member agency direction, and three projection scenarios of future transportation development based on a separate analysis of the funding sources likely to be available in the future. This report detailing timing assumptions regarding the extent and character of future Pinal County roadway networks can be downloaded here.

Competitiveness of Market Areas

Here is an overview of growth projections. A description the factors determining Market Area Competitiveness can be downloaded here.

Pinal County Projection Scenarios

Applied Economics is developing a customized model to allocate the 3-County Region projections of population, housing and jobs by market area. The three Councils of Governments that cover the 3-County Region are providing their databases for the model input, so as to use consistent databases.The summary presentation from the June 24, 2009 workshop can be downloaded here. Drafts for review and discussion of socioeconomic projections of regional growth by market area are available for most optimistic, most likely, and most pessimistic competitiveness.