Charlotte or Columbia? (Rock Hill, Sumter, Orangeburg: live in, assess, statistics)

[Carolina_1690]

Thats why I said to look for a good job in either place, then go where that job is. Both cities are excellent choices. You can't go wrong with either one.

[sandlapper]

Originally Posted by friendnc

They are two nice, but different places.

Charlotte is MUCH (not "slightly") larger (city pop. Charlotte about 687,000; Columbia about 115,000 -- metro pop. Charlotte about 2 million; Columbia about 560,000. 2007 est.)

Okay slow down with the defining metro populations there. Dont list Charlotte's CSA population and pass it off as its true metro, and list Columbia's metro from I'm not sure what year that was 560,000 as of 2007? Where did that come from? Anyway both cities metro area population according to the census are as follows:

Columbia 703,771 (2006)

Charlotte 1,583,016 (2006)

No offense or malice towards you but that's just one of my pet peeves.

[waccamatt]

Originally Posted by sandlapper

Okay slow down with the defining metro populations there. Dont list Charlotte's CSA population and pass it off as its true metro, and list Columbia's metro from I'm not sure what year that was 560,000 as of 2007? Where did that come from? Anyway both cities metro area population according to the census are as follows:

Columbia 703,771 (2006)

Charlotte 1,583,016 (2006)

No offense or malice towards you but that's just one of my pet peeves.

Thanks Sandlapper, I was about to make the same post until I saw yours. City populations are hard to compare because cities in NC can annex with almost reckless abandon while cities in South Carolina almost require an act of congress. The metro population comparison is very accurate - Charlotte is a little more than twice the size of Columbia.

[sandlapper]

No prob I'm always there to keep the facts straight!

[Akhenaton06]

Originally Posted by waccamatt

You mean this one?

Yep, that would be the one.

I agree with Carolina_1690: let the job decide.

[moedog]

Ha Ha---Columbia's metro population 706,000? That's quite a stretch---not even if you included Sumter and Orangeburg!!!! 560k is the correct figure. OTOH, Charlotte's metro is estimated at 1,850,000 and is growing by about 85,000 a year, so it probably will be over 2,000,000 by 2010. Yes, there is a huge difference in the sizes of the two cities...

[sandlapper]

Originally Posted by moedog

Ha Ha---Columbia's metro population 706,000? That's quite a stretch---not even if you included Sumter and Orangeburg!!!! 560k is the correct figure. OTOH, Charlotte's metro is estimated at 1,850,000 and is growing by about 85,000 a year, so it probably will be over 2,000,000 by 2010. Yes, there is a huge difference in the sizes of the two cities...

Well moedog, I guess the jokes on you then because it is quite readily accessable information that Columbia's metro is indeed 703,771. Heck even USA today published this information ( I have the article right in front of me Thursday April 5th 2007 in USA Today) from the US census Bureau that most anyone with a computer may access. For example I just googled Columbia, SC metro population 703,771 and found this link http://mcdc2.missouri.edu/data/popes...ts_uscbsas.pdf not hard. But everyone is entitled to their opinion I guess?

[sandlapper]

And then there is this link from the actual census bureau that once again confirms what they have already concluded. http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/...b07-51tbl2.pdf Columbia is #69 here.

Regardless population has nothing to do with whether or not a city is the right place for someone. Visit see what each place offers and make the decision based on what works best!

[Akhenaton06]

Originally Posted by moedog

Ha Ha---Columbia's metro population 706,000? That's quite a stretch---not even if you included Sumter and Orangeburg!!!! 560k is the correct figure. OTOH, Charlotte's metro is estimated at 1,850,000 and is growing by about 85,000 a year, so it probably will be over 2,000,000 by 2010. Yes, there is a huge difference in the sizes of the two cities...

Columbia's metropolitan population (MSA) is indeed just over 700,000. Check out this source. If you want to use the consolidated metropolitan figure, it comes closer to 750,000. And both of these are at the exclusion of both Orangeburg and Sumter counties. No stretch at all.

Charlotte's stands at 1.58 million according to that same source (consolidated metropolitan figure at 2.19 million).

[moedog]

Are you kidding? You continue to quote two DIFFERENT measures of metro areas when comparing Charlotte and Columbia. For Columbia you use CSA which is a new US Census term which takes in metro areas plus nearby rural areas. Can you sit, with a straight face, and tell me Newberry is a part of the Columbia metro area? Please, Sumter or Orangeburg would have made more sense (and according to this chart both are their own "metro" areas, and both are losing population). For Charlotte, you use figures for MSA, a much more restricted area which does not even include many close-in highly populated areas. But ok, if you want to compare apples to apples---the CSA population of the Columbia metro is 760,000 and the CSA population of the Charlotte metro is 2,194,000 which I believe is a sizable difference---using the same definition, Columbia has grown by 8.5% between 2000-2006 while Charlotte has grown by 15.5%, one of the highest of any large city in the country. The more traditional definition of metro areas, however, would be Charlotte 1,850,000 and Columbia 630,000, as I mentioned originally. Using either definition, Charlotte is almost three times as populous as Columbia.