WASHINGTON, March 14 (UPI) -- Parts of the West are gaining population after years of decline thanks to the oil and gas boom, the U.S. Census Bureau said Thursday.
The Midland, Texas, metropolitan area, where population rose 4.6 percent in the year that ended July 1, 2012, was the fastest-growing in the country, analysts said. Williston, N.D., with a 9.3 percent increase in population, was the fastest-growing micropolitan area, a term defined by the bureau as having a population less than 50,000 and above 10,000.