TV Market size, Truly a great rep for how large a Metro is (map, places)
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The truest measure of a city's relative size is urbanized area population, which measures the population of continuously built-up land around a particular city.
market size is skewed due to some cities' mere proximity to other markets. metropolitan areas often include rural areas that happen to feed into larger cities.
Some of the top TV markets seem to fall in line, but I think the truly misleading data are the ones for the smaller metro areas. I mean, gauging by TV markets alone, one would say that Springfield, MO is bigger than Omaha, NE or that Green Bay, WI is bigger than Rochester, NY. We know these things aren't true. Not all of these data are "truly a great rep for how large a metro is."
A lot depends on how close the nearest major city is....
Cedar Rapids' TV market extends for over 1/3 of the entire state, and has 4 cities with metros of 100,000 to 250,000, but they are all 20-70 miles apart.
TV Markets
1) NYC
2) Los Angeles
3) Chicago
4) Philadelphia
5) Dallas-Ft. Worth
6) San Francisco - Oakland - San Jose
7) Boston
8) Washington DC
9) Atlanta
10) Houston
11) Detroit
12) Seattle - Tacoma
13) Phoenix
14) Tampa - St. Petersburg
15) Minneapolis - St. Paul
16) Miami - Ft. Lauderdale
17) Denver
18) Cleveland
19) Orlando
20) Sacramento
MSA'S
1) NYC
2) Los Angeles
3) Chicago
4) Dallas - Ft. Worth
5) Philadelphia
6) Houston
7) Washington DC
8) Miami - Ft. Lauderdale
9) Atanta
10) Boston
11) San Francisco
12) Detroit
13) Riverside- San Bernardino
14) Phoenix
15) Seattle - Tacoma
16) Minneapolis - St. Paul
17) San Diego
18) St. Louis
19) Tampa- St. Petersburg
20) Baltimore
Any correlation?
So, why is it that DFW isn't considered a big market, but Boston is?
Quite frankly Radio Markets tend to be a misleading barometer. Within Philadelphias TV Market there are 9 seperate radio submarkets.
Philadelphia
Reading
Allentown
Wimington
Trenton
Vineland
Atlantic City
Dover
Lancaster
I believe we should stick with TV Markets for aguments sake.
Actually this looks to me like a far more accurate barometer than TV market. Even if we take Wilmington (to say nothing of Allentown, Reading, etc.) - I have a much easier time seeing it as a completely separate city than as part of one metro area with Philly. That is also reflected in the commuter data. I know there is urban contiguity there but that's far from dispositive. Otherwise the entire stretch from Newark, DE to Springfield, MA would be considered one metro area.
IMO the best way to judge metro size is by looking at the sphere of influence. And the best barometer of the sphere of influence is commuter patterns because that's the best gauge of urban integration -- not media market. The Census has got it right.
Actually, TV media markets aren't a great way to measure a market like DC and Baltimore. Each city has there own media market. The line is drawn northeast of DC and southeast of Baltimore in Howard county. That is about 20 minutes outside DC proper and 15 minutes outside Baltimore proper. An area like Houston, Atlanta, or Dallas with nothing around them for miles is night an day to an area like DC and Baltimore.
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A few ten thousands above 20 million by a quick count.
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Most people stopped watching television after the digital transition almost 3 years ago. FM radio is a good substitute product due to its value proposition of identical coverage area, sound quality comparable or exceeding TV sound, and the fact that everyone has a FM Stereo/AM radio.
