PORTLAND — San Antonio and Orlando, Fla., have leapfrogged the Portland area in population, according to new estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, leaving the Rose City and its environs as the nation’s 25th largest metro area.
The Portland area’s population now sits just under 2.4 million. It grew by about 1.7 percent last year, about the same as the year earlier.
Despite the flat growth, Portland remained the 14th fastest-growing metro area with a population of more than a million. The growth continues to strain the region’s housing supply and transportation infrastructure, pushing housing prices higher and putting more cars on increasingly congested roads.
Portland gained residents from migration at a rate of about 80 a day, a net gain of 29,000 residents. Natural increase — that is, births minus deaths — accounted for 11,000 new residents.
The fastest-growing major metro was Austin, Texas, where the population grew by 2.9 percent.
