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Mutiny77 I dont know why you keep bringing up other state cities, the discussion is about SC. SC cities are different than other states. Greenville is technically the same size as Greensboro, Augusta, and Birmingham, but becasue of SC annex laws yada yada...
I dont care what Atlanta and DC are doing. Those are areas with 5 million+ people, more than the state of SC, so its not the same thing. I agree with Woodlands that N Chas WAS a bedroom community like Mt P back in the 60's-70's, but it has blossomed into its own thriving city that relies on Charleston AND Charleston relies on it. If you can tell me why N Chas cant be considered its own thing, in SC terms, then we'll talk. Why is it such a big deal anyway? What has N Chas done to you and whens the last youve been?
Give me a reason, but none of this "it has no downtown", "its young", "theres no land". I wont accept that. Theres plenty of land left in Charleston County for Charleston. The no land argument is people thinking Charleston is only downtown, and people looking at the fact that Charleston is trying to get as dense as possible. Chas has land in Berkeley. And N Chas has land in Dorchester. Its an easy fix.
And redcliffe Im from Anderson, I know alot of people there work in Greenville, like my dad, but we are still an independent city. We dont count on Greenville for things. The northeastern half of Anderson County never comes to Anderson unless its really for Lake Hartwell or NewSpring. Otherwise its more accurate calling them Greenville and Easley residents. Even Piedmont is technically Anderson County, but nobody associates Piedmont with Anderson. Anderson, Gville, and Spartanburg are apart the same region, and do share a lot of things, but Anderson is not a suburb of Greenville just like Spartanburg isnt.
If Anderson is a suburb of Greenville, then Aiken is a suburn of Augusta.
Mutiny77 I dont know why you keep bringing up other state cities, the discussion is about SC. SC cities are different than other states. Greenville is technically the same size as Greensboro, Augusta, and Birmingham, but becasue of SC annex laws yada yada...
I dont care what Atlanta and DC are doing. Those are areas with 5 million+ people, more than the state of SC, so its not the same thing. I agree with Woodlands that N Chas WAS a bedroom community like Mt P back in the 60's-70's, but it has blossomed into its own thriving city that relies on Charleston AND Charleston relies on it. If you can tell me why N Chas cant be considered its own thing, in SC terms, then we'll talk. Why is it such a big deal anyway? What has N Chas done to you and whens the last youve been?
Give me a reason, but none of this "it has no downtown", "its young", "theres no land". I wont accept that. Theres plenty of land left in Charleston County for Charleston. The no land argument is people thinking Charleston is only downtown, and people looking at the fact that Charleston is trying to get as dense as possible. Chas has land in Berkeley. And N Chas has land in Dorchester. Its an easy fix.
And redcliffe Im from Anderson, I know alot of people there work in Greenville, like my dad, but we are still an independent city. We dont count on Greenville for things. The northeastern half of Anderson County never comes to Anderson unless its really for Lake Hartwell or NewSpring. Otherwise its more accurate calling them Greenville and Easley residents. Even Piedmont is technically Anderson County, but nobody associates Piedmont with Anderson. Anderson, Gville, and Spartanburg are apart the same region, and do share a lot of things, but Anderson is not a suburb of Greenville just like Spartanburg isnt.
If Anderson is a suburb of Greenville, then Aiken is a suburn of Augusta.
That was a lot of writing. I know you're from Anderson and I never said it was a suburb. I was just explaining how the census bureau designates cities and towns to msa's. Work travel. I think it's 25 percent or more traveling to another city from that city to work. Even Spartanburg was barely under that.
Mutiny77 I dont know why you keep bringing up other state cities, the discussion is about SC. SC cities are different than other states. Greenville is technically the same size as Greensboro, Augusta, and Birmingham, but becasue of SC annex laws yada yada...
Suburbs are suburbs no matter where you go, and I fail to see how SC cities are different. Complexities regarding annexation don't make cities fundamentally unique, and even in that sense, you have independent cities such as those in Virginia, Baltimore, St. Louis, etc., Washington, DC (which would have been larger than it is now have it not retroceded land given to it by Virginia), etc.
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I dont care what Atlanta and DC are doing. Those are areas with 5 million+ people, more than the state of SC, so its not the same thing.
It's the exact same thing in concept, but I'll play along for your sake. Let's take Fort Mill/Indian Land in York and Lancaster counties for example. Over the years, they have landed scores of jobs, many of them jumping the state line from Charlotte: Domtar (the state's ONLY Fortune 500 company), LPL Financial, Lash Group, Continental Tire North America, INSP headquarters, Red Ventures, Shutterfly, and a bunch more. These amount to several thousand jobs, with people from Charlotte commuting to Fort Mill/Indian Land and even relocating there for work. The area has tons of subdivisions, a few mixed-use developments (Baxter Village being the most notable), recreation facilities (it hosted Charlotte's minor league baseball team before they moved to Uptown not too long ago), a growing retail scene, etc.--yet it's the very definition of suburban, which leads me to...
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I agree with Woodlands that N Chas WAS a bedroom community like Mt P back in the 60's-70's, but it has blossomed into its own thriving city that relies on Charleston AND Charleston relies on it. If you can tell me why N Chas cant be considered its own thing, in SC terms, then we'll talk. Why is it such a big deal anyway? What has N Chas done to you and whens the last youve been?
A municipality (or a group of municipalities) can be suburban and still have its own thing going on; these two things are not mutually exclusive. Again, you have to be knowledgeable of the history of suburbia in the U.S. to understand this. It's puzzling to me that you think North Charleston has "done something" to me because of the position I hold; if that was the case, then there are MUCH easier ways to do this, such as bringing up its high crime rate. I have absolutely nothing against the city and I'm not emotional about the issue as you seem to be. As far as the last I've been, that was Black Friday of last year, a little over three months ago. I'm quite familiar with North Charleston; I've actually been there for the past three Black Fridays, have visited family in the hospital there (Trident), have stayed with a fried that lives there, have immediate family that has worked there, grew up visiting the area on a regular basis, etc.
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Give me a reason, but none of this "it has no downtown", "its young", "theres no land". I wont accept that. Theres plenty of land left in Charleston County for Charleston. The no land argument is people thinking Charleston is only downtown, and people looking at the fact that Charleston is trying to get as dense as possible. Chas has land in Berkeley. And N Chas has land in Dorchester. Its an easy fix.
I think you're getting tripped up because you think of suburbs exclusively as bedroom communities that rely completely and totally on the central city, but this would be an incomplete understanding of suburbia. Some suburbs are purely bedroom communities where the vast majority of people work in the central city. Some are historic towns with some history that eventually became engulfed in the sprawl of a larger neighbor (e.g., Summerville, Lexington, Greer, etc.). Some are post-war sprawlburbs that have drawn municipal boundaries on or near important regional assets and have lured many jobs, shops, restaurants, etc., acting as an extension of the central city, and North Charleston falls into this category. Classic characteristics of post-war suburbs include a proliferation of office parks, lack of an urban grid system, the presence of auto-oriented shopping center and strip malls, segregation of uses (strict zoning), etc. They also typically have no traditional center (urban core/downtown), history, or identity of their own. The Wiki entry on suburbs in the U.S. does a good job of laying out the characteristics of post-war, as well as books about urban planning like This Land: The Battle over Sprawl and the Future of America by Anthony Flint; Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, and Jeff Speck; Cities Back from the Edge: New Life for Downtown by Roberta Brandes Gratz; and Inside Game/Outside Game: Winning Strategies for Saving Urban America by David Rusk--all of which I have in my own personal library.
As far as land goes, Charleston didn't have all of that additional land at the time North Charleston incorporated and now that that area has begun industrializing due to the infrastructure that was in place before there ever was a city of North Charleston (especially the airport and naval base) and the available land, it has created a lot of momentum which is a good thing.
It's probably not even #2, GCSD has over 9k employees
I worded my statement deliberately; I specifically said that BMW is probably the region's singular largest jobs center--meaning it's the probably the biggest on-site employer in the Upstate. Just about any county probably has its school or hospital system as its biggest employer, but every county doesn't have a rapidly-expanding private jobs engine such as a behemoth automobile manufacturing plant. All of those jobs, plus all the distributions centers and other manufacturers in Spartanburg County, will probably prevent its MSA from rejoining Greenville's in the near future (under current OMB standards) although I expect it to happen eventually.
I haven't heard much as far as growth at the BMW plant goes, currently 8k are employed there. Comparatively Boeing has 8.2k employed at that plant with quite a few plans divulged already
I haven't heard much as far as growth at the BMW plant goes, currently 8k are employed there. Comparatively Boeing has 8.2k employed at that plant with quite a few plans divulged already
Well about a year ago, BMW announced $1 billion investment at the plant in Greer, spread out over two years, which will add at least 800 more jobs. This is the fifth expansion the plant has undergone since it was built.
I haven't heard much as far as growth at the BMW plant goes, currently 8k are employed there. Comparatively Boeing has 8.2k employed at that plant with quite a few plans divulged already
They are still building and there are plans to build even more.
To put this is perspective since 2000 Charleston county has grown nearly 70k, Berkeley county by 50k and Dorchester county by 40k
Yes, those counties population growth is a lot more significant than Florence county yet you also have to consider the factors those counties have over Florence. You also have to consider the advantages those counties have which is Charleston. Rather people want to admit to it or not, Charleston and Greenville are anchors that other cities like North Charleston, Anderson and Spartanburg benefit off of. If you would even look at the bigger picture, that area of the state benefits from being in between Charlotte and Atlanta. You can look at the 3 major coastal areas (Charleston, Myrtle Beach, and Hilton Head) and they all benefit on being coastal cities even though Charleston is the only actual city out the three. Charleston has done a great job marketing itself for people to move there and also attract major companies. I use to work at Boeing and you can see on theres ads where it doesn't say, come to Historic North Charleston or Summerville, its saids Charleston. Just not everyone wants to live in Charleston but still within the vicinity and thats how Summerville and North Charleston has flourish. Same can be said about Anderson and Spartanburg. Florence doesn't have those luxieries so it has to do something to make it stand out rather that's attracting a major company to change the whole dynamic of the city and the surrounding area. Myrtle Beach is a prime example of a city that has grown a lot in the last 20 years but is not structured for that growth.
Myrtle Beach is a prime example of a city that has grown a lot in the last 20 years but is not structured for that growth.
no city in sc is structured the right way for growth. Ill say columbia is prolly the only city that is built like a city to handle growth. Example is the highways. but thanks to the people that run the state
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