It might look like Rochester has a surplus of bank branches, but the number is actually dropping
Jan. 29—I would like to know how many individual bank branches are in Rochester.
It seems in recent years whenever a new building goes up, odds are, it is a new bank. Curious as to the ratio of banking establishments to RST citizens!! Don't we have enough?
Thanks!
Dear Branch Hater,
I appreciate your interest in bank branches. It's compounded by many other readers with similar questions.
There are a lot of bank and credit union branches in Rochester. However, the number is actually dropping instead of increasing. It's true that many have been built in recent years, but more have closed.
In fact, more U.S. bank branches have been closing every year than new ones opening every year since 2009. More and more customers now manage their money online, so trips to a branch are fewer every year.
In 2016, the Post Bulletin's venerable business writer Jeff Kiger wrote
an article looking at Rochester's branches.
By mining data from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the National Credit Union Administration, he found that Rochester had 46 bank branches and five credit union branches at the end of 2015. That calculated to one financial branch for every 2,093 residents of Rochester's population of 106,769.
In 2023, Rochester had 39 bank branches. That's a decrease of seven in the past eight years. However, Rochester added six more credit branches during that same time to tally up to 11 in 2023. So the number of Med City financial branches in 2023 was 50, down by just two from 2015.
While the total number of financial branches have been dropping, Rochester's population has been growing. The city sign now displays a population total of 121,395, up from 106,769 in 2015.
Using that population number, there is now one bank or credit union branch for every 2,427 people.
So don't fret the next time you see a bank or credit union branch being built. You can bank on the fact that more branches are being withdrawn from Rochester's account.
You can bank on Answer Man knowing the right answer. Send questions to Answer Man at
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