Comments on: New York Still #1; Phoenix overtakes Philly

By: prianca

prianca — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 16:31:41 +0000

We are a group of volunteers and starting a new scheme in our community. Your website offered us with valuable information to work on. You’ve done an impressive job and our entire community will be grateful to you.

By: Richard

Richard — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 19:14:16 +0000

Norris – Great comment. Of course the city populations reflect the different eras of development. Older cities can no longer annex their suburbs while younger, southern cities do. So, yes, metro population (and economic activity) is better. Still, there is great hype around this, so we need to report and discuss. In Who’s Your City, we have developed the first ever estimates of economic activity for metro and mega-regions world wide. This is a better calibration.

By: Norris

Norris — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 06:33:34 +0000

Keep in mind that when we’re comparing the populations of various US cities we’re essentially comparing apples to oranges. Better to compare metropolitan areas to metropolitan areas due to the fact that city lines – more often than not – are drawn along arbitrary lines as opposed to population centers. Not only that, but a metropolitan population will probably fluctuate less over a given period of time than the population of a single city. Therefore, a city with a generous town line will have a disproportionately larger population than a city that has historically more conservative town lines, even though the “smaller” city has the larger metropolitan population.

On this list, Jacksonville, FL ranks #12 at 794,000 while Boston, MA (my favorite city) comes in at #22 with 590,00. However, when I consult my trusty World Almanac, I see that (metropolitan wise) Boston is the 10th largest metro area in the country (at 4.4 mil) while Jacksonville is the 45th largest (at 1.1 mil). So to break this down into a baseball analogy, if Jacksonville is so big, why don’t they have a major league baseball team? And if Boston is so small, how are they able to field a competitive team year after year and win the World Series in 2004? The simple answer my dear friends, is that Boston has roughly four times the larger metropolitan population than Jacksonville.

That and we’re the most dedicated baseball fans!

Norris

By: Stephen Downes

Stephen Downes — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 00:28:31 +0000

> seven of the top 10 — and three of the top five — are in states that border Mexico.

eah, but global warming and drought will drive people back north again.

By: DJM

DJM — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 17:57:38 +0000

Really interesting stuff Kevin. Interesting that San Jose is a gainer to given all the hype over loss of competitiveness visa via China and india and the cost of doing biz/living in the Bay Area….