Unlike most people who move into age-restricted housing, Doug and Diane Pignet were upsizing, not downsizing. Married in 2004, they met online as cribbage buddies two years earlier. When Doug, a lifelong city dweller from Los Angeles, came east to be with Diane, they settled into her 900-square-foot townhouse in Halifax.
Before long, they wanted more room. In the new house they have 1,600 square feet, and Diane can still commute to her full-time job at a private psychiatric hospital in Brookline.
“This was just a godsend to us,’’ said Doug Pignet. He likes being in a place rural enough that he sees deer and turkeys, yet with quick access to major highways. “It’s close to the city, yet it’s far enough away,’’ he said.
Figures from the 2010 Census show most communities south of Boston gained population over the last 10 years. Communities with the biggest increases tended to have significant new development and good access to trains or highways.
Middleborough Selectman Alfred Rullo Jr. attributed his town’s population increse to the construction of Oak Point, the 55-and-over housing development to which the Pignets moved last year. It can’t account for the entire increase, but Oak Point has grown in phases to about 865 homes since the late 1990s.
“That has been a very positive addition to the town,’’ due in part to Oak Point residents’ willingness to volunteer for community projects, he said.
New commuter train service from Boston to the Lakeville-Middleborough town line, also built in the 1990s, appears to have had a continued effect on surrounding communities, according to Michael Kryzanek, professor of political science at Bridgewater State University. Lakeville’s population grew by 8 percent since 2000, while nearby Raynham grew 14 percent.
To the south, the mostly rural town of Rochester grew 14 percent, while closer to Boston, Hingham grew 11 percent.
