Just a few years ago, my home county of Stafford, Virginia, was in the top 10 list of fastest growing counties in the nation. Neighboring Spotsylvania was lockstep with Stafford as both counties found themselves as bedroom communities of DC because of easy I-95 and train access. Metro Fredericksburg is nothing like what it was when I was growing up - but I'll save that lament for another day.

Now, the "suburbs" of Fredericksburg and ex-urbs of DC are seeing the trend. King George and Caroline are in the top 10, while Culpeper and Orange are up there. Louisa County is even ahead of Spotsylvania, due to it being bedroom communities of Charlottesville, Richmond, and DC/Northern Virginia.

My wife and I personally witnessed the results of the explosive growth in Caroline County. At the beginning of last year when we talked about buying a house we looked there - six months later when we were financially ready to move, we were priced out. Heck, we've been in our house 6 months and our house value has already gone up by nearly 15%.

The quiet and rural Central Virginia that I love is now being over-run by urban refugees.

This can't bode well for anyone:

Federal officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief of possible devastation just before Hurricane Katrina struck.

Six days of video footage from briefings and transcripts were obtained by The Associated Press.The warnings were that the storm could breach levees, risk lives in the New Orleans Superdome and overwhelm rescuers.

....

He assured state officials that the government was fully prepared.

Um... whoops?