St. Louis Park Sees Big Gain in Workers During the Day

St. Louis Park’s office complexes, retail establishments and other workplaces cause the number of workers to surge during the day, according to recently released Census data.

About 27 percent more workers come into the city than live here, based on estimates from the 2006-2010 American Community Survey. In all, commuters increase the city’s population by 7,306 people—from a resident population of 44,665 to a population of 51,971 during the workday.

Southwest metro cities all showed strong results in the survey—and St. Louis Park actually came in below some of its neighbors. While Hopkins posted a comparable 24 percent increase, cities like Edina and Golden Valley posted much bigger gains.

The situation is less rosy for Lake Minnetonka communities, the north metro and cities south of Eden Prairie and Bloomington.

Use the map above to compare how Minnesota cities fared. The map is colored according to each city’s “employment-residence ratio”—which compares the number of workers in a community to the number of workers who live there.

Ratios greater than 1.0 mean more people work in a community than it has workers living there. A community with a ranking of 1.19, for example, would have 19 percent more workers working there. By contrast, communities with ratios less than 1.0 send more residents to other communities to work than they receive.

The colors mean:

• Red: .23 to .5
• Yellow: .5 to 1
• Blue: 1 to 1.5
• Green: 1.5 to 5