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Old 07-11-2019, 12:18 PM
 
Location: Chicago
6,359 posts, read 8,763,571 times
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It will be interesting to see how much benefit Milwaukee will get from what looks like it should be a darned interested DNC next year. It comes to town at a time when the extended downtown area is seeing some pretty spectacular growth.

No, I'm not about to put Milw up there in "the four after Chicago." Yet. But I definitely sense this to be a city on the rise.
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Old 07-11-2019, 12:29 PM
 
3,733 posts, read 2,849,627 times
Reputation: 4908
Quote:
Originally Posted by edsg25 View Post
It will be interesting to see how much benefit Milwaukee will get from what looks like it should be a darned interested DNC next year. It comes to town at a time when the extended downtown area is seeing some pretty spectacular growth.

No, I'm not about to put Milw up there in "the four after Chicago." Yet. But I definitely sense this to be a city on the rise.
Agreed. Also, Milwaukee has lost, not recently, some of its MSA, to Chicago. That will continue to happen, I think, until the cities become, pretty much, one big CSA. Milwaukee, though, HUGELY, benefits from being adjoined to Chicago by suburbs.

Obviously, Minneapolis and Detroit are the first two, and as far as the other two....there are no definite 3 and 4. As far as GDP per capita, Milwaukee and Cleveland are the top, after Minneapolis and Detroit. Population doesn't mean a lot, when cities annex to make their numbers bigger.

I think a 3 or 4, would be Cleveland, but that's not in stone, either. Numbers 3 and 4, are any of these cities, depending on the criteria. People may say their favorite city is definitely 3 or 4, but I'd say, if you believe that, you're just a homer.
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Old 07-11-2019, 07:00 PM
 
Location: La Jolla
4,185 posts, read 3,223,112 times
Reputation: 4096
Quote:
Originally Posted by edsg25 View Post
It will be interesting to see how much benefit Milwaukee will get from what looks like it should be a darned interested DNC next year. It comes to town at a time when the extended downtown area is seeing some pretty spectacular growth.

No, I'm not about to put Milw up there in "the four after Chicago." Yet. But I definitely sense this to be a city on the rise.
The convention is a big deal plus Mke opened a small light rail recently.
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Old 07-11-2019, 07:18 PM
 
Location: La Jolla
4,185 posts, read 3,223,112 times
Reputation: 4096
Quote:
Originally Posted by mjlo View Post
If Columbus is the number 2 city in the Midwest due to it's ability to annex then it is a fraud. City pop is a worthless comparison metric. New York, LA, and Chicago are also 1,2,3 as far as MSA's go, if you continue down that list name recognition follows MSA's, not city pop, which tells you nothing about a cities clout or amenities. Columbus' 220 sq mi civic boundaries push its city pop past every other city in the midwest on paper. That foot print is only 10sq mi smaller than Chicago which has more people within it's boundaries than Columbus' entire metro area.

Any city can artificially inflate it's population numbers by annexation. Their prominence will still follow their position among MSA rankings. Columbus is right about where it should be when that's considered.
Yes, its a fraud, and it begets hilarious booster pieces like this:

https://www.dispatch.com/news/201906...-san-francisco

When you have to play this card, you might say you aren't that important and kind of desperate to be noticed.

CLE, STL, MKE, CIN and Indy all have known tangible things that exceed considerably bigger MSA's. To make a case for Columbus you have to get down in the weeds and really look for things. Also, should the 4th most important city in a large region have a hub-capable airport or Amtrak station? Columbus has neither.
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Old 07-11-2019, 07:35 PM
 
992 posts, read 762,233 times
Reputation: 1717
It seems like a lot of people are basing rankings off of MSA population/GDP, though IMO, that's not the best way to look at it. Instead, I sized down (or up in Milwaukee's case) roughly what each would look like if the others in the running had an MSA the same size as Cleveland (about 2,000 square miles). Then, since Cleveland can add both the adjacent Akron and Canton MSAs (which are connected to each other) and still it would be one of the smaller MSAs at that point, I resized what the others would look like then (roughly 3,500 square miles).

Here is population at roughly 2,000 square miles (I used wikipedia and some of the numbers for some of the smaller counties were updated to 2018, but I don't think it would change anything):

1. Detroit - 3,387,853 (1,959 square miles)
2. Minneapolis - 2,878,045 (2,075)
3. Cleveland - 2,057,009 (1,996)
4. St. Louis - 1,944,490 (2,172)
5. Cincinnati - 1,915,412 (2,132)
6. Columbus - 1,827,744 (2,162)
7. Kansas City - 1,799,522 (2,046)
8. Milwaukee - 1,754,784 (1,790)
9. Indianapolis - 1,677,323 (1,822)

By density:
1. Detroit - 1,985
2. Minneapolis - 1,373
3. Cleveland - 1,027
4. Milwaukee - 980
5. Indianapolis - 921
6. Cincinnati - 898
7. St. Louis - 895
8. Kansas City - 880
9. Columbus - 845

* Density for Milwaukee and Indianapolis would decrease but adding another county would've pushed them well over the 2,000 square miles; vice versa, the densities of Columbus, Cincinnati and St. Louis would slightly go up if I was able to get them closer to 2,000. But with that said, it wouldn't drastically change anything.

Detroit and Minneapolis (the consensus top 2) are, to not big surprise, 1 and 2. After that, it's pretty close with all the rest closer to each other than to Minneapolis, which is way behind Detroit.

To figure out rest, I didn't consider MSA boundaries, instead added the contiguous ares of the Cleveland CSA/Media market. I then did the same for other cities where it was the same situation (adding Ann Arbor to Detroit; adding Dayton's Montgomery and Greene counties to Cincinnati; hypothetically giving Racine back to Milwaukee and adding a couple adjacent counties that aren't in the MSA).

Here it is at roughly 3,500 square miles
1. Detroit - 4,538,068 (3,873)
2. Minneapolis - 3,235,356 (3,446)
3. Cleveland - 3,131,673 (3,470)
4. Cincinnati - 2,746,650 (3,689)
5. St. Louis - 2,471,997 (3,546)
6. Milwaukee - 2,074,152 (3,576)
7. Indianapolis - 1,986,804 (3,509)
8. Kansas City - 1,984,341 (3,206)
9. Columbus - 1,979,207 (3,561)

* Kansas City easily passes Indianapolis but adding another county would've put it well over 3,500

Density
1. Detroit - 1,172
2. Minneapolis - 939
3. Cleveland - 902
4. Cincinnati - 745
5. St. Louis - 697
6. Kansas City - 619
7. Milwaukee - 580
8. Indianapolis - 566
9. Columbus - 556

I didn't add up GDP but I'm guessing it would pretty much follow in the same order. Adding Ann Arbor would push Detroit past Minneapolis; Cleveland's would go to 192 billion, easily going to third. Adding Dayton would move Cincinnati above St. Louis as well.

So, I would rank it:

1. Detroit
2. Minneapolis

3. Cleveland

4. Cincinnati
5. St. Louis ... could be flipped, it's close.

The rest could be in pretty much any order.

BTW, this map illustrates why I included other areas outside MSA boundaries. Really, outside of Detroit (and Chicago obviously), none of the Midwest cities should have "Metro" areas larger than 3,500 square miles.

St. Louis, for example, is at 2.8 million at over 8,000 square miles. Yet, about 2.5 million of that is within 3,500 square miles. So it adds about 300,000 and 4,500 square miles by lumping in a bunch of low population counties.

Kansas City is right around 2 million at 3,500 square miles. Its total MSA is 2.1 million at 8,400 square miles. So it only adds 100,000 total and nearly 5,000 square miles of land.

Minneapolis adds about 500,000 in 4,600 additional square miles (density of 109 per mile), etc.
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Old 07-11-2019, 07:54 PM
 
251 posts, read 153,782 times
Reputation: 426
Quote:
Originally Posted by ClevelandBrown View Post
It seems like a lot of people are basing rankings off of MSA population/GDP, though IMO, that's not the best way to look at it. Instead, I sized down (or up in Milwaukee's case) roughly what each would look like if the others in the running had an MSA the same size as Cleveland (about 2,000 square miles). Then, since Cleveland can add both the adjacent Akron and Canton MSAs (which are connected to each other) and still it would be one of the smaller MSAs at that point, I resized what the others would look like then (roughly 3,500 square miles).

Here is population at roughly 2,000 square miles (I used wikipedia and some of the numbers for some of the smaller counties were updated to 2018, but I don't think it would change anything):

1. Detroit - 3,387,853 (1,959 square miles)
2. Minneapolis - 2,878,045 (2,075)
3. Cleveland - 2,057,009 (1,996)
4. St. Louis - 1,944,490 (2,172)
5. Cincinnati - 1,915,412 (2,132)
6. Columbus - 1,827,744 (2,162)
7. Kansas City - 1,799,522 (2,046)
8. Milwaukee - 1,754,784 (1,790)
9. Indianapolis - 1,677,323 (1,822)

By density:
1. Detroit - 1,985
2. Minneapolis - 1,373
3. Cleveland - 1,027
4. Milwaukee - 980
5. Indianapolis - 921
6. Cincinnati - 898
7. St. Louis - 895
8. Kansas City - 880
9. Columbus - 845

* Density for Milwaukee and Indianapolis would decrease but adding another county would've pushed them well over the 2,000 square miles; vice versa, the densities of Columbus, Cincinnati and St. Louis would slightly go up if I was able to get them closer to 2,000. But with that said, it wouldn't drastically change anything.

Detroit and Minneapolis (the consensus top 2) are, to not big surprise, 1 and 2. After that, it's pretty close with all the rest closer to each other than to Minneapolis, which is way behind Detroit.

To figure out rest, I didn't consider MSA boundaries, instead added the contiguous ares of the Cleveland CSA/Media market. I then did the same for other cities where it was the same situation (adding Ann Arbor to Detroit; adding Dayton's Montgomery and Greene counties to Cincinnati; hypothetically giving Racine back to Milwaukee and adding a couple adjacent counties that aren't in the MSA).

Here it is at roughly 3,500 square miles
1. Detroit - 4,538,068 (3,873)
2. Minneapolis - 3,235,356 (3,446)
3. Cleveland - 3,131,673 (3,470)
4. Cincinnati - 2,746,650 (3,689)
5. St. Louis - 2,471,997 (3,546)
6. Milwaukee - 2,074,152 (3,576)
7. Indianapolis - 1,986,804 (3,509)
8. Kansas City - 1,984,341 (3,206)
9. Columbus - 1,979,207 (3,561)

* Kansas City easily passes Indianapolis but adding another county would've put it well over 3,500

Density
1. Detroit - 1,172
2. Minneapolis - 939
3. Cleveland - 902
4. Cincinnati - 745
5. St. Louis - 697
6. Kansas City - 619
7. Milwaukee - 580
8. Indianapolis - 566
9. Columbus - 556

I didn't add up GDP but I'm guessing it would pretty much follow in the same order. Adding Ann Arbor would push Detroit past Minneapolis; Cleveland's would go to 192 billion, easily going to third. Adding Dayton would move Cincinnati above St. Louis as well.

So, I would rank it:

1. Detroit
2. Minneapolis

3. Cleveland

4. Cincinnati
5. St. Louis ... could be flipped, it's close.

The rest could be in pretty much any order.

BTW, this map illustrates why I included other areas outside MSA boundaries. Really, outside of Detroit (and Chicago obviously), none of the Midwest cities should have "Metro" areas larger than 3,500 square miles.

St. Louis, for example, is at 2.8 million at over 8,000 square miles. Yet, about 2.5 million of that is within 3,500 square miles. So it adds about 300,000 and 4,500 square miles by lumping in a bunch of low population counties.

Kansas City is right around 2 million at 3,500 square miles. Its total MSA is 2.1 million at 8,400 square miles. So it only adds 100,000 total and nearly 5,000 square miles of land.

Minneapolis adds about 500,000 in 4,600 additional square miles (density of 109 per mile), etc.
This was very interesting. Thank you for doing this. I previously had my own ranking of Detroit, Minneapolis, St Louis and then a tie between Cleveland and Cincinnati. You have me thinking Cleveland is above St Louis now.
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Old 07-11-2019, 08:37 PM
 
Location: In the heights
36,917 posts, read 38,864,790 times
Reputation: 20949
Quote:
Originally Posted by Losfrisco View Post
Yes, its a fraud, and it begets hilarious booster pieces like this:

https://www.dispatch.com/news/201906...-san-francisco

When you have to play this card, you might say you aren't that important and kind of desperate to be noticed.

CLE, STL, MKE, CIN and Indy all have known tangible things that exceed considerably bigger MSA's. To make a case for Columbus you have to get down in the weeds and really look for things. Also, should the 4th most important city in a large region have a hub-capable airport or Amtrak station? Columbus has neither.
Well, it's a contention for 5th most important in the Midwest. Yea, you do have to get down in the weeds and look at things. I think if the topic were about which city is better known among the general populace, then Columbus wouldn't be in the running. However, the topic asked which was the most important which I took to be actually looking at its clout and its effects. I do think St. Louis and Cleveland come right after Detroit and the Twin Cities, but Columbus and Cincinnati have arguable cases. I don't see very compelling cases for Milwaukee or Indianapolis since Milwaukee is smaller than the others even if you went the CSA route and then threw in Kenosha and a case for Milwaukee would ride on its corporate presence where Cincinnati and St. Louis would do better and any methodology putting Indianapolis up would probably put Columbus higher given Columbus is the capital of a much more populous and economically significant state, has a larger MSA, and more Fortune 500 headquarters.

I do agree that not having passenger rail service sucks. Kasich really flubbed that one.

Last edited by OyCrumbler; 07-11-2019 at 08:47 PM..
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Old 07-11-2019, 09:15 PM
 
Location: La Jolla
4,185 posts, read 3,223,112 times
Reputation: 4096
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler View Post
Well, it's a contention for 5th most important in the Midwest. Yea, you do have to get down in the weeds and look at things. I think if the topic were about which city is better known among the general populace, then Columbus wouldn't be in the running. However, the topic asked which was the most important which I took to be actually looking at its clout and its effects. I do think St. Louis and Cleveland come right after Detroit and the Twin Cities, but Columbus and Cincinnati have arguable cases. I don't see very compelling cases for Milwaukee or Indianapolis since Milwaukee is smaller than the others even if you went the CSA route and then threw in Kenosha and a case for Milwaukee would ride on its corporate presence where Cincinnati and St. Louis would do better and any methodology putting Indianapolis up would probably put Columbus higher given Columbus is the capital of a much more populous and economically significant state, has a larger MSA, and more Fortune 500 headquarters.

I do agree that not having passenger rail service sucks. Kasich really flubbed that one.
Cincinnati has a much stronger case than Columbus and is emerging as a leader of that state. In what other state does being the capital mean anything? It only meant something in Ohio because Columbus, not having industry of their own, was surrounded by industrial beasts that underwent massive deindustrialization and population loss.
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Old 07-11-2019, 11:36 PM
 
Location: Chicago, IL
105 posts, read 93,547 times
Reputation: 169
Quote:
Originally Posted by ClevelandBrown View Post
It seems like a lot of people are basing rankings off of MSA population/GDP, though IMO, that's not the best way to look at it. Instead, I sized down (or up in Milwaukee's case) roughly what each would look like if the others in the running had an MSA the same size as Cleveland (about 2,000 square miles). Then, since Cleveland can add both the adjacent Akron and Canton MSAs (which are connected to each other) and still it would be one of the smaller MSAs at that point, I resized what the others would look like then (roughly 3,500 square miles).
This is the most arbitrary and useless comparison I've ever seen.

What is the point of making up some arbitrary square mile cut-off? MSA has a clearly defined definition and calculated values. You clearly just made up some definition that made your city look better...
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Old 07-11-2019, 11:57 PM
 
Location: West Seattle
6,325 posts, read 4,862,875 times
Reputation: 8363
Detroit, Columbus, Indianapolis, MSP
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