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Actually, Phoenix is 13th population-wise for urban areas as of that last census count (2000) , but did you even bother looking at the land area and density sections of the page? That's what we were talking about, not population.
I see what the issue is.....
Phoenix is unique in certain ways. It is in desert, there are some mountains, and there is nothing around it at all. It is relatively a newer area to huge populations. There is no existing road and water infrastructure on the edge of the city.
The east coast things are little different. We have alot of already established rural roads, town water systems, ground water supplies for sparsely populated areas. Rural areas have alot of people living in them vs. next to no one. Our furthest suburban neighborhoods also tend to be built with rural areas around them, rather than contiguous. (Developers look for the best deal, some rural families refuse to sell for a generation or two, first time buyers are willing to pay more to feel like their neighborhood is in the country... even though it will eventually be built around).
consequence of this.... In phoenix you can draw clear cut lines of being in an urban area and being in a completely unpopulated area. However, in most other cities, including Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta the growth tapers off and thins as you get further from the city center. Where you draw a line between "urban" and "non-urban" is really artificial. You have alot of lightly populated suburbs/exurbs that just barely make the census definition of "urban" and alot that barely don't. That is why Atlanta has 5000 sq km. or urban areas, Dallas has 3,600 sq km., and Houston has 3,400 sq km.
However, in each case as you get closer to the city center density picks up considerably. In each case alot of that growth included in the "urban" area most people would call suburban. The non-suburban urban area is much smaller and in each case is much more built up than Phoenix.
So I don't think there is a clear cut right or wrong answer... but I think there are semantics issues with what you classify as urban or not.
Phoenix appears to be more homogenous in population density, where as the others seem to have denser cores and taper off from core to country/rural without defined borders.
Just to make this more evident:
----------------------Atlanta --------------------Phoenix
City *2009 ACS----4,000/sq mi ---------------2,900/sqmi
---------------------(540k over 132 sq, mi.)-- (1.6m over 518 sq mi)
UA *2000 Census--1,900/sq mi ---------------3,600/sqmi
---------------------(3.5m over 1,900 miles) -(2.9 over ?too lazy to convert from km)
UA *2009 Estimates 4m -----------------------3.2m
(no spatial updates to measure density)
Metro --------------629/sq mi
---------------------(5.9m over 8,300 sq. miles)
(I would list Phoenix's, but it is an unfair comparison seeing as no on at all lives in most of, because metropolitan areas are measured at the county level and in Phoenix some of the counties are HUGE and contain vast amounts of nothing)
If I start with that City estimate and I make the city smaller that density number will grow quickly and if I make the city size smaller that number will decrease quickly.
Now I realize the same trend would exist in AZ to an extent, but not near as much because of the above mentioned reasons.
I'm really glad you mentioned it though, because this has been really interesting to look at. Because of the non-existent infrastructure on the edge of town, Phoenix has denser suburbs than many cities do and there seems to be little difference between a suburban neighborhood and an in-town neighborhood.
I don't see it having a denser core urban area than these other cities though. To me the the landscape just looks dense suburban/homogenous throughout.
In contrast, Atlanta, Dallas, and Houston have dense areas, dense suburbs, -light density suburbs-, exurbs, country-rural (populated).
Google Aerial image the metros as a whole and look at the different growth patterns and you will see what I mean.
Phoenix is unique in certain ways. It is in desert, there are some mountains, and there is nothing around it at all. It is relatively a newer area to huge populations. There is no existing road and water infrastructure on the edge of the city.
The east coast things are little different. We have alot of already established rural roads, town water systems, ground water supplies for sparsely populated areas. Rural areas have alot of people living in them vs. next to no one. Our furthest suburban neighborhoods also tend to be built with rural areas around them, rather than contiguous. (Developers look for the best deal, some rural families refuse to sell for a generation or two, first time buyers are willing to pay more to feel like their neighborhood is in the country... even though it will eventually be built around).
consequence of this.... In phoenix you can draw clear cut lines of being in an urban area and being in a completely unpopulated area. However, in most other cities, including Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta the growth tapers off and thins as you get further from the city center. Where you draw a line between "urban" and "non-urban" is really artificial. You have alot of lightly populated suburbs/exurbs that just barely make the census definition of "urban" and alot that barely don't. That is why Atlanta has 5000 sq km. or urban areas, Dallas has 3,600 sq km., and Houston has 3,400 sq km.
However, in each case as you get closer to the city center density picks up considerably. In each case alot of that growth included in the "urban" area most people would call suburban. The non-suburban urban area is much smaller and in each case is much more built up than Phoenix.
So I don't think there is a clear cut right or wrong answer... but I think there are semantics issues with what you classify as urban or not.
Phoenix appears to be more homogenous in population density, where as the others seem to have denser cores and taper off from core to country/rural without defined borders.
Just to make this more evident:
----------------------Atlanta --------------------Phoenix
City *2009 ACS----4,000/sq mi ---------------2,900/sqmi
---------------------(540k over 132 sq, mi.)-- (1.6m over 518 sq mi)
UA *2000 Census--1,900/sq mi ---------------3,600/sqmi
---------------------(3.5m over 1,900 miles) -(2.9 over ?too lazy to convert from km)
UA *2009 Estimates 4m -----------------------3.2m
(no spatial updates to measure density)
Metro --------------629/sq mi
---------------------(5.9m over 8,300 sq. miles)
(I would list Phoenix's, but it is an unfair comparison seeing as no on at all lives in most of, because metropolitan areas are measured at the county level and in Phoenix some of the counties are HUGE and contain vast amounts of nothing)
If I start with that City estimate and I make the city smaller that density number will grow quickly and if I make the city size smaller that number will decrease quickly.
Now I realize the same trend would exist in AZ to an extent, but not near as much because of the above mentioned reasons.
I'm really glad you mentioned it though, because this has been really interesting to look at. Because of the non-existent infrastructure on the edge of town, Phoenix has denser suburbs than many cities do and there seems to be little difference between a suburban neighborhood and an in-town neighborhood.
I don't see it having a denser core urban area than these other cities though. To me the the landscape just looks dense suburban/homogenous throughout.
In contrast, Atlanta, Dallas, and Houston have dense areas, dense suburbs, -light density suburbs-, exurbs, country-rural (populated).
Google Aerial image the metros as a whole and look at the different growth patterns and you will see what I mean.
I've been to Phoenix and know exactly what you are talking about and I don't think a lot of people take this into consideration when comparing east coast and west coast cities. You see the same kind of thing in Southern California, as there is a clear line between what is "urbanized" and what is not. On the east coast that is much harder to define as the density tapers out slowly, and there is a sweet spot where what is suburban to one person may be rural to another and vice versa. Then there are some metropolitan areas (Little Rock being an obvious one) where more than 50% of the metro population lives in the surrounding country communities, that have no visible connection with the city and still feel very country townish. The metropolitan area has near 700k people but the urbanized population is around 350k. Anybody who has been to Little Rock can attest that the city feels more like one of 350k than one of 700k. This is why I am a big fan of "urban area" populations rather than "metropolitan area" as determining how big a city truly feels.
Anyways, back on Phoenix, I've heard the reason they don't have a very big skyline is because its directly in the flight path into the airport, so they cannot go too tall because of landing planes. I don't necessarily see a problem with that as a huge, dense, urban skyline is not consistent with the Phoenix lifestyle, and any attempt at it would more than likely end up feeling very un-authentic.
I've been to Phoenix and know exactly what you are talking about and I don't think a lot of people take this into consideration when comparing east coast and west coast cities. You see the same kind of thing in Southern California, as there is a clear line between what is "urbanized" and what is not. On the east coast that is much harder to define as the density tapers out slowly, and there is a sweet spot where what is suburban to one person may be rural to another and vice versa. Then there are some metropolitan areas (Little Rock being an obvious one) where more than 50% of the metro population lives in the surrounding country communities, that have no visible connection with the city and still feel very country townish. The metropolitan area has near 700k people but the urbanized population is around 350k. Anybody who has been to Little Rock can attest that the city feels more like one of 350k than one of 700k. This is why I am a big fan of "urban area" populations rather than "metropolitan area" as determining how big a city truly feels.
Anyways, back on Phoenix, I've heard the reason they don't have a very big skyline is because its directly in the flight path into the airport, so they cannot go too tall because of landing planes. I don't necessarily see a problem with that as a huge, dense, urban skyline is not consistent with the Phoenix lifestyle, and any attempt at it would more than likely end up feeling very un-authentic.
I think what you are trying to research/figure out is important too. Metropolitan boundaries are often drawn by how people commute and are economically tied together as much as population density.
In Atlanta alot of the exurbanites commute into suburban job centers.
While that might not have as much to do with the residential feel, it does have an impact on the business/industrial market.
No one measurement seems perfect at describing a place either.
Phoenix's downtown is smaller spatially in the aerial photos too. It isn't just height. Mostly I think it has been mentioned on here, because of the look of dull boxy buildings.
I think it might be, because alot of its growth is newer and in cities across America there has been alot of suburban office growth, so Phoenix's job cores would be more decentralized being a newer major city. (?)
What are Phoenix's economic drivers? Is it spill over growth from an expensive Southern California? or is there more to it logistically?
What are Phoenix's economic drivers? Is it spill over growth from an expensive Southern California? or is there more to it logistically?
I believe it was much like Las Vegas, a lot of it was real estate speculation. Phoenix is one of the hardest hit cities of the housing bubble, and by some estimates is now losing population. According to city-data, manufacturing and tourism are the base of the Phoenix economy.
I believe it was much like Las Vegas, a lot of it was real estate speculation. Phoenix is one of the hardest hit cities of the housing bubble, and by some estimates is now losing population. According to city-data, manufacturing and tourism are the base of the Phoenix economy.
I don't believe that Phoenix is losing population; however, I do believe that the population increase was over-estimated for the entire valley.
I think the best is Chicago,even over New York,its more beautiful in my opinion. The worst would have to be Milwaukee, it has 3 tall one, then nothing to back it up, or Cincinatti.
You guys have shown me nothing in the five months since I first posted in this thread. Fresno has the worst skyline for a city of 500,000. Nothing can touch its high rise mediocrity.
Wanna see how it looked 40 years ago? No problem - its more or less the same as today!
Last edited by JMT; 06-15-2011 at 08:39 AM..
Reason: Removed copyrighted image
Location: Cleveland bound with MPLS in the rear-view
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IDK....Dayton, OH isn't that great either....
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Pathetic
