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Urbanized Areas Population, 2008
New York-Newark, NY-NJ 18,395,242
Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA 12,175,434
Chicago, IL-IN 8,466,375
Miami, FL 5,237,997
Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 5,193,443
Dallas-Ft Worth-Arlington, TX 4,611,827
Houston, TX 4,397,352
Washington, DC-VA-MD 4,205,492
Atlanta, GA 4,171,166
Boston-MA-NH-RI 4,125,435
Detroit, MI 3,785,613
Phoenix-Mesa, AZ 3,278,843
San Francisco-Oakland, CA 3,266,471
Seattle, WA 2,931,544
San Diego, CA 2,743,739
Minneapolis-St Paul, MN 2,459,603
Tampa-St Petersburg, FL 2,199,423
Baltimore, MD 2,138,711
St Louis, MO-IL 2,102,409
Land Area in Square Miles
New York-Newark, NY-NJ 3,352.60
Chicago, IL-IN 2,122.81
Atlanta, GA 1,962.58
Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 1,799.51
Boston, MA-NH-RI 1,736.18
Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA 1,667.93
Dallas-Ft Worth-Arlington, TX 1,407.04
Houston, TX 1,295.27
Detroit, MI 1,261.45
Washington, DC-VA-MF 1,156.77
Miami, FL 1,116.09
Seattle, WA 953.63
Minneapolis-St Paul, MN 894.22
St Louis, MO-IL 828.95
Tampa-St Petersburg, FL 802.27
Phoenix, AZ 799.01
San Diego, CA 782.29
Baltimore, MD 682.73
San Francisco-Oakland, CA 526.66
Population Density Per Square Mile, 2008
Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana 7,299
San Francisco-Oakland, CA 6,209
New York-Newark, NY-NJ 5,486
Miami, FL 4,692
Phoenix, AZ 4,102
Chicago, IL-IN 3,989
Washington, DC-MD-VA 3,637
San Diego, CA 3,507
Houston, TX 3,395
Dallas-Ft Worth-Arlington, TX 3,277
Baltimore, MD 3,134
Seattle, WA 3,046
Detroit, MI 3,001
Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 2,886
Minneapolis-St Paul, MN 2,750
Tampa-St Petersburg, FL 2,741
St Louis, MO-IL 2.,538
Boston, MA-NH-RI 2,376
Atlanta, GA 2,152
That's true what Chicago said about LA metro and San Bernardino County. It's MILES, and MILES of desert from what I heard. Do they really count those small towns out in the desert as part of the LA Metro?
^ they are one urbanized area. That list looks funky on both the populations, and especially the densities because it's taking sections of urban areas based on how they fall within a MSA.
The San Fran numbers are only including a portion of the actual continuous urbanized area. That's why the population seem so small, and the density is so high. Like how NYC and Phoenix seem out of place.
The US Census doesn't do actual urbanized areas. Metro and CSA's include counties, which are mostly the urbanized area, but sometimes contain hundreds or even thousands of square miles of land which is in no way directly connected to the actual urban area of a city.
I'm in Chicago, and the MSA and CSA contain 12-15 counties, but many of those far out counties contain few people, yet a ton of land. There are small towns and farms, country houses that are within the county and pulled into "Chicagoland" because of how the census designates areas. Just like how you drive out of Las Vegas, and once you enter California and San Bern. county you're actually inside the LA CSA already....even though you have to drive hours before you hit the urban area. There's no one (relatively speaking) in the desert, but CSA and MSA's pull in anyone who might be within a county.
There are websites where you can find actual populations of urban areas. Try googling that, and making sure that you're not just getting US Census MSA numbers. Urban areas are always going to be smaller than what we know as the Metropolitan Areas (MSA's).
That's true what Chicago said about LA metro and San Bernardino County. It's MILES, and MILES of desert from what I heard. Do they really count those small towns out in the desert as part of the LA Metro?
San Bernardino is in the Riverside MSA, which itself is a part of the Greater Los Angeles CSA.
I know that, but all those small towns like Needles CA, are those towns part of the LA metro?
Needles, which is in San Bernardino County, is included in the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA MSA. MSAs and CSAs are county-based, so they also include remote and sparsely populated areas within included counties also.
Needles, which is in San Bernardino County, is included in the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA MSA. MSAs and CSAs are county-based, so they also include remote and sparsely populated areas within included counties also.
Exactly. Calculating density based on urban area boundaries gives you a skewed picture. For example, the Riverside / San B area includes miles of uninhabited desert because a couple of its counties are huge and include desert areas, while the aforementioned San Jose area contains much smaller counties in land area, and they abut other smaller populous counties in the SF urban area.
I would love to but its not possible to link with American Factfinder Community Survey because all the tables there are interactive, which means they time out and expire.
However the 2nd post in this thread explains beautifully how to acquire the data.
For land area, I got that data from demographia.com and then used that to calculate density with data from American Factfinder Community Survey.
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