Central, Utah
16 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1885 and the latest in 2002. It stands in the St. George census division. It lies in ZIP code area 84722. It lies near California Hollow. The Survey maps it on the Central East quadrangle. 656 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 5,216 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresCentral grew from 613 to 656 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 613 | |
| 2020 | 656 | +43 (+7%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
8 surveys from 16 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1885 USGS St. George quadrangle1:250000
- 1891 USGS St. George quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
- 1953 USGS Cedar City quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1958 USGS Cedar City quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1962 USGS Cedar City quadrangle1:250000
- 1972 USGS Central East quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
- 1980 USGS St. George quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
- 2002 USGS Central East quadrangle1:24000
Photographs
1 photograph, 1940Taken for the Office of War Information and the Farm Security Administration, who photographed the country between 1935 and 1944. Works of United States government photographers, with no known restriction on use. Each opens its catalogue record.
Lee, Russell, 1940. Library of Congress
Fires near this place
131 since 1992Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 131 fires within 5 miles of Central between 1992 and 2020, burning about 4,393 acres in total. 92 started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Natural | 92 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 24 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 8 |
| Other causes | 2 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 2 |
| Firearms and explosives use | 1 |
| Debris and open burning | 1 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 September 2004 | Natural | under an acre | Dixie National Forest | INDIAN HOLLOW |
| 9 September 2004 | Natural | under an acre | Cedar City Field Office | DAM |
| 7 September 2013 | Natural | under an acre | Cedar City Field Office | BAKER |
| 3 September 2009 | Natural | under an acre | Dixie National Forest | KANE |
| 28 September 2004 | Natural | 2.5 acres | Dixie National Forest | MAGOTSU |
| 27 September 2005 | Natural | under an acre | Utah Division Forestry Fire State Lands | VOLCANO |
| 16 September 2008 | Natural | under an acre | Cedar City Field Office | TURKEY |
| 16 September 2008 | Natural | under an acre | Utah Division Forestry Fire State Lands | TURKEY |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
10 of 15 shownRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 15 workings within 5 miles of Central: 13 past producers, 1 occurrence, 1 prospect. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Volcanic Materials, Pumice, Manganese. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Section 12 Prospect | Copper | Past Producer | ||
| Unknown | Manganese | Occurrence | Replacement | |
| Unknown | Manganese | Prospect | ||
| Cinder Pit #1 | Volcanic Materials | Past Producer | Surface | |
| Cinder Pit #2 | Volcanic Materials | Past Producer | Surface | |
| Cinder Pit #27070 | Volcanic Materials | Past Producer | Surface | |
| Cinder Pit No. 1 | Pumice | Past Producer | ||
| Cinder Pit No. 2 | Pumice | Past Producer | ||
| Ut Dept Hwys Cinder Pit No.27070 | Pumice | Past Producer | ||
| Borrow Pit #27071 | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Past Producer | Sand |
Storms near this place
1 since 2025Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Central in 1 storm report in 2025: 1 flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| December 2025 | Flood | Central | $30,000 | There was more than four inches of rain in portions of northern Washington County, with a water rescue at Baker Dam, flooded roads, and flooding of homes in Brookside.||A group of four tourists were in a van and did not realize they were driving on to a dam. When first responders arrived, there was around a foot of water in the vehicle. They were able to rescue everyone, and no injuries were reported.||The road into Pine Valley was blocked for a time with debris and water, along with some damage to a newly constructed culvert at Meadow View and Main St.||Black Ridge Road and Old Highway 91 in the New Harmony area were closed because the reservoir that is usually dry filled up.||There was also a lot of water in Brookside. Several homes got water in basements and were very close to flooding. |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pine Valley | 6.1 miles | 16 | |
| Veyo | 6.5 miles | 16 | |
| Dammeron Valley | 8.1 miles | 16 | |
| Gunlock | 11.6 miles | 16 | |
| Enterprise | 11.9 miles | 14 | |
| New Harmony | 17.2 miles | 19 | |
| Shem | 17.3 miles | 16 | |
| Ivins | 17.4 miles | 19 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Central | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q5060194 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 1439624. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.







