How would your state be without its largest city?

[bhj867]

Originally Posted by 1greatcity

And the comment about Rockford, Aurora or Peoria stepping in, if Chicago was removed from Illinois, is wrong. The Metro East area of St Louis is the second-biggest urban area in Illinois by FAR with some 650,000 people. This area would dominate in about every category. It's already the healthiest part of Illinois economically.

I agree Belleville would dominate, the Metro East now has a population of 730,000 btw, according to the latest census. Its growing by leaps and bounds.

[SonySegaTendo617]

Originally Posted by 1greatcity

And the comment about Rockford, Aurora or Peoria stepping in, if Chicago was removed from Illinois, is wrong. The Metro East area of St Louis is the second-biggest urban area in Illinois by FAR with some 650,000 people. This area would dominate in about every category. It's already the healthiest part of Illinois economically.

Maybe it's just me, but I thought when I was looking at some Bureau of Labor stats on unemployment and other economic factors, that Bloomington-Normal had at least the lowest unemployment rate in the entire state of Illinois, if not economic climate. I'm very sure you are right that the Metro East area is probably very healthy as well, if not healthier economically than B-N, and am not trying to ridiculously split hairs over this.

Something still makes me think that if the biggest city were to be in this part of the state, the city with biggest population would be split between Belleville and East Saint Louis, say like how Hammond and Gary both grew to be major cities in NW Indiana. And maybe for all I know, East Saint Louis wouldn't have declined the way it did. Still though, I don't look at economic data too often, so you might be better able to predict a theoretical scenario than myself, for all I know.

[Java Jolt]

Without metropolitan Phoenix the state of Arizona would only have about two million people, and about a million of that would be in the Tucson area.

It would be a very sparsely populated rural state without Phoenix, that goes without saying.

[1greatcity]

Originally Posted by SonySegaTendo617

Maybe it's just me, but I thought when I was looking at some Bureau of Labor stats on unemployment and other economic factors, that Bloomington-Normal had at least the lowest unemployment rate in the entire state of Illinois, if not economic climate. I'm very sure you are right that the Metro East area is probably very healthy as well, if not healthier economically than B-N, and am not trying to ridiculously split hairs over this.

Something still makes me think that if the biggest city were to be in this part of the state, the city with biggest population would be split between Belleville and East Saint Louis, say like how Hammond and Gary both grew to be major cities in NW Indiana. And maybe for all I know, East Saint Louis wouldn't have declined the way it did. Still though, I don't look at economic data too often, so you might be better able to predict a theoretical scenario than myself, for all I know.

This is from a separate C-D thread on the economically strongest urban areas in Illinois (found in the Illinois forums):

2010 Illinois Best Performing Cities
Information is from the Milliken institute

Illinois Top 5 Metros
1. St. Louis, MO-IL MSA
2. Peoria, IL MSA
3. Davenport-Moline-Rock Island, IL-IA MSA
4. Chicago -Naperville-Joliet, IL MD
5. Lake County-Kenosha County, IL-WI MD

Illinois Top 5 Small Metros
1. Bloomington-Normal, IL MSA
2- Champaign-Urbana, IL MSA
3- KanKakee-Bradley, IL MSA
4- Springfield, IL MSA
5- Decatur, iL MSA

______________

The city with the biggest population in the Metro East is indeed Belleville, which grew in the 2010 census. It's also the largest city in Southern Illinois. But Belleville alone isn't driving the Metro East area's economy. Fairview Heights is actually the prime city for retail. O'Fallon has the fastest-growing population. Edwardsville is the major university town. And so on. Each city in the Metro East has its own special niche.
And I'm pleasantly surprised that the total population is now over 700k.

[CravingMountains]

Hmmm.....Depends on if we are talking about city limits or Metropolitan area.
Florida wouldn't change much if it lost Jacksonville.

If it lost Miami, its REAL largest city, then the state (and the whole country) would lose a huge chunk of cultural richness.

[313Weather]

Michigan's already devastated.

The city's still there, but considering the intentional mass disinvestment of it Detroit might as well not be a part of Michigan.