After nearly 70 years of population declines, The City of Good Neighbors is growing once again. 

According to Buffalo mayor Byron W. Brown, the city could register significant population growth after the 2020 Census, a product, in part, of the city's growing refugee and immigrant communities. According to Census counts, Buffalo's population registered at roughly 260,000 inhabitants in 2010; Updated estimates for the 2020 Census have not been announced. 

At an event commemorating World Refugee day, Brown touted the city's population boost, saying, "Diversity is an engine of growth," adding, "It is the way our country has grown from the very beginning."

To help guide future growth, the city overhauled its zoning code in 2017, another first since the 1950s. 

The new Unified Development Ordinance is billed as as a form-based "green code" that eliminates parking requirements for certain sites across the city while updating basic parameters for building height, setbacks, and lot coverage. 

As part of the city's renewed growth, a slew of new projects are underway, including an extension to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery by OMA/Shohei Shigematsu. 

In 2017, Deborah Berke Partners completed work on a renovation and expansion of the H.H. Richardson-designed Buffalo State Asylum, which has been converted into a hotel.