would you consider a suburb a town? (largest, transportation, names)

[Chicago60614]

It totally depends on the situation.

Here in Chicago there are some municipalities with 10,000 to 20,000 that are fully within the "suburbs", but definitely feel like smaller towns within themselves. A small downtown, a community feeling, trees and some open areas on the outskirts.

Then there are areas with municipalities of 10,000 to 50,000 that are all smashed together, have large apartment buildings, 6 lane highways, office parks, etc. Areas where you might pass within the boundry of 4 different municipalities, but haven't the slightest clue - you're just submursed within suburban sprawl.

The actual size of the "towns" or whatever you want to call them many times has NOTHING to do with having a "small town feel" or a "big city feel". You can have little municipalities smashed together to form a huge urban area that certainly doesn't feel small at all, or you can have a suburb of 40,000 that's split slightly from the urban area and has its own little downtown.

I think people are getting caught up in the exact definition of TOWN in their state, and not what I think the OP was going for. That feeling of being in a town or in some random suburb of a large city that just overflows into other suburbs.

[ckhthankgod]

I think it depends. In my area we have towns(aka townships in some other states) and villages(more like small urban communities) that are suburbs. Within a town you might have what are called "hamlets" that are more suburban in character. For instance, I grew up in a hamlet in the town of Onondaga called Onondaga Hill. It is right next to Syracuse and even had a Syracuse zip code/mailing address. You also get some hamlets that are considered to be cdp's or census designated places. They are generally hamlets that are more built up and recognized by the census bureau as a concentrated community similar to a village, but without the governmental designation and are governed by town supervisors. An example of this is a suburb in my area by the name of Mattydale. It is a hamlet that is a cdp, but is governed by supervisors in the town of Salina. If you search for Mattydale though, you can find information on it in terms of demographics, etc.

Another thing in NY is that if you live in a village, you are taxed not only by the village but by the town too. So, your village's population I believe is figured in with your town's population too. So, if I live in the village of Fayetteville, I get taxed by the village and by the town of Manlius, as well as being considered within the town's total population.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by Chicago60614

The actual size of the "towns" or whatever you want to call them many times has NOTHING to do with having a "small town feel" or a "big city feel". You can have little municipalities smashed together to form a huge urban area that certainly doesn't feel small at all, or you can have a suburb of 40,000 that's split slightly from the urban area and has its own little downtown.

Case in point, Bedford Park, population 500. Small town? Well, doesn't feel like it because you can't tell where Chicago stops and Bedford Park starts. Of course, that part of Chicago looks and feels like inner suburbia in its own right..

[tahiti]

i have a hard time saying a place like Union City with 50K density is a "small town" or "suburb" while Oklahoma City is generally thought of as a city.

[thePR]

I think determining what is a suburb and what is it's own city is explained well here:

How big does a city have to be to have suburbs?

[Thomas R.]

Originally Posted by tahiti

i have a hard time saying a place like Union City with 50K density is a "small town" or "suburb" while Oklahoma City is generally thought of as a city.

I don't think the term "city" is defined by density alone. People on CD are really obsessed with density. I understand their arguments, but at a gut-level density still seems like a bad thing to me. You pack to many animals in a small enclosure they get stressed or violent. People are different than animals, but still...

[ckhthankgod]

This might help: Suburb - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Katiana]

From the link:

Some suburbs have a degree of political autonomy, and most have lower population density than inner city neighborhoods.

Suburbs tend to proliferate around cities which ideally have an abundance of adjacent flat land.

AFIK, all suburbs have political autonomy. They are either towns, townships, or cities, all of which have their own forms of government separate from the main city. They may buy police, fire protection, etc, from the big city.

The second sentence makes no sense. The western suburbs of Denver are all hilly, due to the nature of the topography.

[tvdxer]

A suburb is a town or city connected to a (usually) much larger city and (usually) several other suburbs. A suburb can have any population, though it is almost always smaller than the city it is connected to. A good example would be the Minneapolis - St. Paul area. Minneapolis and St. Paul are the "cities", and 50+ municipalities varying in size from 500 to 90,000 are its suburbs. Often the combined population of all the suburbs is several times that of the city (or cities).

A town is a free-standing or paired municipality. I'd put the population limit for a town at 50,000, then it becomes a small city. An example of a "town" would be Worthington, MN, International Falls, MN, or Aitkin, MN.

[dem3456]

Originally Posted by Nomah

In Massachusetts you're "in town" when you're in Boston. Speaking technically most of the suburbs surrounding Boston have a town meeting form of government. The "cities" are mostly inner-ring communities.

Right. Most of the places I would consider suburbs of Boston ARE towns, aside from the ones immediately outside of Boston, like Quincy, Somerville, Lynn, Medford, etc., which are cities. I would say the suburbs of Boston stretch as far as 30 miles or more from Boston itself, into towns with small populations (ex - Dover is a town with a population of 7,000 only 15 miles from the city).