Houston's 2011 Population Estimates

[savanite]

Originally Posted by Rowdy

I have to laugh. To say Fort Worth and Tarrant County are suburbs of Dallas and not major independent places is absurd to anyone familiar with the area. Coming from my life in West Texas and also the DFW area I am astounded at this. Floored.

I think I can help you find the problem.

You misunderstood what the Federal OMB is really saying.

They say that Tarrant county is a suburb county of metro Dallas.

There are three dallases. . There is the Dallas city government, thn there is Dallas county, and there is the Dallas metro, which includes Collin, Denton, Ellis, Kaufman, Rockwall and Dallas counties.

The OMB added Tarrant to the list of metro Dallas counties because the census bureau found that more than 30% of the Tarrant workers held jobs in one of the Metro Dallas counties.

The OMB ignores city governments. As far as they're concerned, the municipality of Fort Worth has no bearing on their classification of metro areas.

They are only looking at counties. They ignore the local governments within the county as having no bearing on where people travel during the day.

[savanite]

A metro area is actually a definition of a physical city. This is different than a local government, that may call itself a "city" but is just a legal entity.

A metro area takes in the territory around which people commonly travel, for work, entertainment, church, or any other reason. The key is mobility, transportation, access, human contact.

Back during the Communist era, Berlin in Germany was divided into two parts, West and East. They were actually two physical cities, two independent metros, because there was a wall and guards who would shoot to kill to prevent people from traveling across that wall. So, no mobility, no unified metro.

Then one day the wall came down. Now there was a lot of mobility, and people started crossing back and forth in large numbers.

That is how Berlin went from two metros, two physical cities, into one metro, one physical city.

[Spade]

Originally Posted by Trae713

And this is where you are wrong. Dallas may have more of the white collar jobs (while FW is more blue collar). The Fort Worth division has about 1/3 of the people in the Metroplex and has about 1/3 of the number of jobs in the Metroplex. There is a lot of cross commuting between Dallas and Tarrant Counties.

I don't think I'm wrong at all. Could you provide a link stating that more than 25% of Dallas County residents travel to Tarrant for employment or whatever a day. I know its that high the other way around. Most of the large employment centers are not only in Dallas County, but in Dallas division. Like it or not, Dallas county is the hub of the metroplex.

[savanite]

Originally Posted by Spade

I don't think I'm wrong at all. Could you provide a link stating that more than 25% of Dallas County residents travel to Tarrant for employment or whatever a day. I know its that high the other way around. Most of the large employment centers are not only in Dallas County, but in Dallas division. Like it or not, Dallas county is the hub of the metroplex.

The point that Trae might be making is not in terms of percentages, but in absolute numbers. He believes in an absolute equality of theDallas-Tarrant andTarrant-Dallas flow.

If that were true, it would actually strengthen the case for including Tarrant in theDallas metro. The areas would just that much more interdependent.

Actually, Dallas county is not the only consideration. For example, when Tarrant county people commute to theAlliance airport area, the actual job could beinDenton county, officially part ofDallas metro, even if that job is in the FortWorth citi limits.

Yes, you got that right... Part of Fort Worth is in Denton county, in the Dallas metro.

[SouthernBoy205]

Houston Metro grew 323,203 from 2010 to 2012. The gap between Houston and DFW has widened a bit.

Provo in the fastest-growing metro in population rankings - The Business Journals=