Merge the MSA of SF and SJ? (San Jose, San Francisco: live, versus)

[cardinal2007]

The commute percentage is interesting to see. When I worked in Sunnyvale around half the office or more came from either SM Co., CC Co., Alameda Co. or SF. While sure the plurality of people lived in Santa Clara County, I'm not sure if I could say 75%+, that sounds like too much considering.

The fact that the Bay Area is split into 2 MSAs, leads to some weird things, like Silicon Valley in many cases is SM Co + SC Co. but for statistics many people go with MSAs and therefore the city with the most tech jobs are DC and NYC, then San Jose and some point later depending on how you go SF, doesn't sound like Silicon Valley has the most tech jobs that way. A lot of statistics are reported that way, and by having 2 MSAs it makes it hard to gauge things like the tech industry in Silicon Valley, since some companies like FB and Oracle are in "SF", except for their Santa Clara campus, and downtown San Jose office, those jobs are part of "San Jose" and others like Google and Apple are in "San Jose". It really is confusing if you're not from around here, and can tell that FB HQ moving to Menlo Park was not a huge movement of jobs from San Jose to San Francisco, more like from Palo Alto to Menlo Park. I don't even think most people are aware of were Palo Alto and San Jose are relative to SF and all Silicon Valley towns.

[krudmonk]

Originally Posted by WestCoastBestCoast2

I mentioned this on the other forum too, but it will be interesting to see what happens with the BART extension to San Jose. East Bay people may start coming into San Jose and Santa Clara more, and perhaps more people in San Jose and Milpitas will head up to the City. If the percentages are close that would surely throw them over the edge wouldn't you think?

Having traveled by BART from Fremont to MacArthur, I can safely say few will by going all the way from SJ to SF on the regular. Caltrain serves that more directly, and not much more slowly.

[WestCoastBestCoast2]

Originally Posted by krudmonk

Having traveled by BART from Fremont to MacArthur, I can safely say few will by going all the way from SJ to SF on the regular. Caltrain serves that more directly, and not much more slowly.

Don't they simply have to cross the MSA boundary? Crossing over the Freemont from Milpitas and vice versa?

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Originally Posted by WestCoastBestCoast2

Don't they simply have to cross the MSA boundary? Crossing over the Freemont from Milpitas and vice versa?

Correct.

I once had a job where I would cross the boundary multiple times per day, simply walking between different buildings of the company I was at.

[LookToTheWest]

I always though San Jose was just another edge city, just one that happened to have a lot of land annexed haha. I didn't know they were even considered separate metros until I read this poll!

[HockeyMac18]

Originally Posted by BayAreaHillbilly

Interestingly, prior to 1856 San Francisco County stretched from the Golden Gate to San Francisquito Creek. In 1856, the City of SF seceded from its county and formed its current City-County. After a short naming dispute it was decided that the "county" portion of San Francisco County would become San Mateo County and the city part would become The City and County of San Francisco.

Imagine if SF had not been so dumb back then.

Interesting history. I knew something along those lines had happened, but didn't know the whole story. They basically prevented themselves (the city of SF) from ever growing geographically...I'd imagine things would definitely be a bit different had they not split things off that way.

I would imagine the area would be a lot less balkanized than it is now, and we wouldn't have people claiming they live in "an entire different area," even though they're clearly connected seamlessly in almost every way.

I mean, are you people that say "they should be seperate metros" really going to argue that Menlo Park and Palo Alto are in different "metros"? Really?

Sure, SF and SJ are far from each other, physically...but the entire stretch between the two places is seamlessly connected both physically and economically. The same is true on the Oakland to SJ side of things. If that isn't what a "metro area" is, then I don't know what one is. Some arbitrary metric defined by the census isn't going to change that fact.

[orzo]

Originally Posted by BayAreaHillbilly

Interestingly, prior to 1856 San Francisco County stretched from the Golden Gate to San Francisquito Creek. In 1856, the City of SF seceded from its county and formed its current City-County. After a short naming dispute it was decided that the "county" portion of San Francisco County would become San Mateo County and the city part would become The City and County of San Francisco.

Imagine if SF had not been so dumb back then.

Having SF be its own City-County has its advantages, especially on the political. As a counter example, Seattle is part of a huge county with urban, suburban and rural areas, as well as a range of political ideologies. Therefore, it is often harder politically to push through urban-based initiatives that benefit Seattle because more than 2/3 of the County's population doesn't live in Seattle.

[BayAreaHillbilly]

Originally Posted by orzo

Having SF be its own City-County has its advantages, especially on the political. As a counter example, Seattle is part of a huge county with urban, suburban and rural areas, as well as a range of political ideologies. Therefore, it is often harder politically to push through urban-based initiatives that benefit Seattle because more than 2/3 of the County's population doesn't live in Seattle.

I'm sure that today's slow growth crowd in SF love the current arrangement.

[Tomlcsc]

Originally Posted by BayAreaHillbilly

I'm sure that today's slow growth crowd in SF love the current arrangement.

I can't entirely speak for the city but from my experience SF is anything but slow growth these days.

There are plans to build 3-5 buildings around 1,000 ft. tall each, a new subway line, and the waterfront stadium, not to mention countless other development projects going on around the city.

[MarketSleuth]

Originally Posted by cardinal2007

The fact that the Bay Area is split into 2 MSAs, leads to some weird things, like Silicon Valley in many cases is SM Co + SC Co. but for statistics many people go with MSAs and therefore the city with the most tech jobs are DC and NYC, then San Jose and some point later depending on how you go SF, doesn't sound like Silicon Valley has the most tech jobs that way. A lot of statistics are reported that way, and by having 2 MSAs it makes it hard to gauge things like the tech industry in Silicon Valley, since some companies like FB and Oracle are in "SF", except for their Santa Clara campus, and downtown San Jose office, those jobs are part of "San Jose" and others like Google and Apple are in "San Jose". It really is confusing if you're not from around here, and can tell that FB HQ moving to Menlo Park was not a huge movement of jobs from San Jose to San Francisco, more like from Palo Alto to Menlo Park. I don't even think most people are aware of were Palo Alto and San Jose are relative to SF and all Silicon Valley towns.

You make several points that are right on the money.
Many statistics are reported using MSAs. Currently SF-Oakland-Hayward MSA ranks number 11, with San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara MSA down in 34th.
When considered more as a whole, the Nielsen TV market ranks 6th, while the San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland Combined Statistical Area (CSA) is number 5.
Look at how Miami is a mirror image of the Bay Area in some important ways.
Miami's TV market rank is 16th, because it does not contain Palm Beach County, which is in a separate DMA (Designated Market Area).
But the MSA does contain Palm Beach County, which pushes the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach MSA up to 8th place.
So, for all those Top Ten lists which use MSA as the criterion, Miami is solidly in at number 8, while the Bay Area is AWOL.
You are correct: it is weird, and it does make things hard to gauge.
It seems reasonable to speculate that it probably also has some negative effects for the Bay Area.