Next U.S. City With Over 1 Million People?

[rnc2mbfl]

Originally Posted by Vatnos

This one is particularly mind-boggling because of all the counties in NC, guess which two have the most commutes between them (by far)? What definition of MSA could split Wake and Durham without splitting every other county in the state?

With Wake (Raleigh for those who don't know) being between 3 and 4 times more populated than Durham County and with commuting patterns that probably send more Wake residents to Durham County than vice versa, I'm guessing that the dynamic of how the Triangle works (no pun intended) falls between the cracks in the objective way MSA's are established. Nonetheless, the area continues to become more intertwined as Cary (Raleigh MSA) pushes into Chatham County (Durham MSA) and their residents actually being more convenient to DT Durham than DT Raleigh. The Brier Creek area continues to expand on the county line between Wake and Durham and blurs the lines even more as Raleigh crosses into Durham County.
Whether or not Raleigh and Durham MSAs (re)merge, I suspect that the two separate urban areas will combine as the holes between them fill up around the non-resident areas associated with the airport and RTP between Raleigh and Durham.
As a side note, the current Raleigh urban area alone is now projected at 1.085 million in the new urban area report. That's up 200K from the 2010 report.
Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not allowed

[JayJayCB]

The size of the metro matters, not so much the population of the city IMO. The city of Atlanta has around 400,000 but the entire metro is 5 million and growing.

[JayJayCB]

Originally Posted by rnc2mbfl

With Wake (Raleigh for those who don't know) being between 3 and 4 times more populated than Durham County and with commuting patterns that probably send more Wake residents to Durham County than vice versa, I'm guessing that the dynamic of how the Triangle works (no pun intended) falls between the cracks in the objective way MSA's are established. Nonetheless, the area continues to become more intertwined as Cary (Raleigh MSA) pushes into Chatham County (Durham MSA) and their residents actually being more convenient to DT Durham than DT Raleigh. The Brier Creek area continues to expand on the county line between Wake and Durham and blurs the lines even more as Raleigh crosses into Durham County.
Whether or not Raleigh and Durham MSAs (re)merge, I suspect that the two separate urban areas will combine as the holes between them fill up around the non-resident areas associated with the airport and RTP between Raleigh and Durham.
As a side note, the current Raleigh urban area alone is now projected at 1.085 million in the new urban area report. That's up 200K from the 2010 report.
Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not allowed

I seriously can't wait for the growth in Raleigh to slow down, it's getting ridiculous.

[ashpelham]

this is still a relevant metric for marketing purposes and private business planning. Almost every retailer reviews this info before building another store or opening a distribution center. Still very relevant info.

I would think it's one more thing that pols brag about when it's convenient, and gripe about alternatively.