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or just some sort of wishful thinking/shady marketing tactic?
aren't the cities too far apart and too different culturally to be considered together?
Disclosure: as the Huntington forum regulars know, I've been contemplating moving from the Charleston Area to Huntington for a while now, and it's nearly time for me to make a move, at the very least, out of the place I am living now (Rand, right outside Charleston proper). I may go ahead and move to Huntington, or I may move into Charleston proper.
If you post something about this "so-called" Huntington/Charleston "Metro Valley" Metroplex area we might have something to talk about, but calling it a Metro Valley Metroplex doesn't make it one, whatever that is.
I do believe that there is a connection between the two cities, and that would include culturally, economically, and physically by development. Yes, both are unique enough and strong enough to support themselves and run simultaneously without having to feed off of the other. However, both cities are close enough to be considered within the same metropolitan area, and are literally connected by development anyways. In my opinion both cities should promote themselves individually as well as together as a "twin cities" approach. Businesses are more attracted to locating in larger markets, and one 500k metro is more impressive than two 250-300k metros.
The "Metro Valley" is a designation by the state as it splits things into areas to promote, mostly for tourism. They tried to take similar and close in proximity counties to combine them and promote their strengths. Here's the state map containing these regions:
For the cities themselves, each has their own Metropolitan Statistical Area with Huntington now being the larger of the two after the 2010 census shifted some of the counties in the Charleston MSA to Huntington. The 2010 census also saw the Charleston and Huntington Urban Area designations be combined, leading many to think that the MSAs combining may not be too far behind. Based on the close proximity of the two cities and the fact that the people in between patronize both frequently for jobs, shopping, etc, you can see how the cities are definitely very connected.
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