Bedroom boom likely to continue

• Contra Costa will add most of the houses while Santa Clara County continues to fuel the job market in the next century

REPORT HIGHLIGHTS

Between 2000 and 2020:

• The region's total population will grow to 7.77 million.
• Contra Costa will have the Bay Area's largest population increase.
• Santa Clara County will add the most jobs, 217,400. Alameda County will have the second most 200,860. The rate of job growth will be high in Contra Costa (40 percent increase) and Solano (60 percent).
• Solano County's numbers will be lower but its rate of growth will be the Bay's highest -- 36 percent more population and 60 percent more jobs.
• The city population growth leaders: Rio Vista up by 424 percent; Brentwood with 123 percent; Dublin with 108 percent.
• Whites will be the largest ethnic group, but at 47 percent of the population no longer will be a majority group. Hispanics will account for 24 percent of the population, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders at 20 percent and African-Americans at 9 percent.
• One in five people will be over 65, said Patricia Perry, ABAG senior regional planner.
• The average Bay Area household income will increase from $66,900 in 1995 to $96,700 in 2020. Contra Costa's average will be $101,300; Alameda County's will be $82,500 and Solano's $76,800.(Numbers in constant 1995 dollars.)

By Ariel Ambruster
TIMES STAFF WRITER

Contra Costa County will race past other counties to become the Bay Area's biggest growth spot in the first decades of the 21st century, say population projections released today.

A study by the Association of Bay Area Governments shows Contra Costa's population growing more than any other Bay Area county between 2000 and 2020. Contra Costa is projected to add 211,700 of the Bay Area's 1.4 million new residents during that time, with bustling Santa Clara County close behind, adding about 190,900 people.

Contra Costa's eastern regions will lead its bedroom boom, with dramatic growth in Oakley, Discovery Bay, Antioch, Brentwood and Pittsburg.

While Contra Costa will see the largest explosion in houses, Santa Clara will continue to create the most new jobs in the early years of the new millennium, ABAG says.

And that means the traffic travails of our era are likely to continue, as groggy commuters from the northern side of the Bay jam Interstate 80 and the Sunol Grade on I-680 each morning to get to their high-paying, high-tech jobs on the Bay's south rim.

"If all these jobs are going to Santa Clara, and all these people are going to Contra Costa County, you've got to imagine that a lot of those Contra Costans may be commuting to Santa Clara jobs," said ABAG spokeswoman Michelle Fadelli.

The economic growth will continue to spawn problems in providing affordable homes, and in placing homes near transit and jobs, ABAG planners say.

"All of these numbers aren't unexpected, but they're troublesome," said Mark DeSaulnier, chairman of the Contra Costa Board of Supervisors. "You've got to wonder what it's all going to look like when it's all here. … Managing that growth is going to require a lot of out-of-the-box thinking by both the public and private sector."

DeSaulnier has joined with leaders from Alameda and San Joaquin counties in an effort to attract more jobs to the bedroom communities of the East Bay as a way of stemming traffic congestion and air pollution.

The East Bay may see some job relief as software and telecommunications firms from Silicon Valley run out of room and look for space up north, in the Tri-Valley areas and along I-680, said ABAG Planning Director Paul Fassinger.

"I think those two are more likely to spread out beyond Silicon Valley," he said, "and in this timeframe, it will certainly include Contra Costa County."

There's some good job news for Contra Costa and Alameda counties in ABAG's figures. They show the Tri-Valley region, which includes the business parks and shopping centers of San Ramon, Pleasanton and Dublin, more than doubling its jobs from 1995 to 2020.

That's a trend welcomed by Alameda County Supervisor Scott Haggerty.

"I don't think the valley has really truly established its corporate identity," he said. "We know the valley is an excellent place to live, but from my standpoint, we need more jobs. We need to shorten people's commute, get people to work closer to their homes."

Solano County, as it recovers from the '90s economic slump caused by the closing of the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, and as businesses crowd the I-80 corridor from the Bay Area to Sacramento, will have the fastest rate of job growth, 60 percent.

Contra Costa in those two decades shows a 40 percent increase in jobs, but Fadelli said most of that won't take place until after 2010.

Edition: SRVT,  Section: A,  Page: 1