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The census of 2010 was concluded in April 2010, the first estimate released is from July 2011, then July 2012, then July 2013. 39 months rather than 36 months.
2020 projections using raw number trajectory in growth (infinitely more consistent than rates over the long term):
Greater New York:
2010: 23,076,664
2013: 23,484,225
Difference: 407,561
407,561 (new residents since the census) divided by (/) 39 months (3 years and 3 months since the census) is equal to 10,450.2821 (new residents per month), multiplied by 12 (the number of months in a Calendar year), is equal to 125,403.385, again multiplied by 10 (number of years in a decade), is equal to 1,254,033.85 (new residents for the decade), and finally round up or down using the .5 rule.
Greater New York's projected population in 2020: 24,330,697
Rank in the United States: 1
Greater Los Angeles:
2010: 17,877,006
2013: 18,351,929
Difference: 474,923
474,923 / 39 is equal to 12,177.5128. Multiplied by 12 comes out to 146,130.154, which in turn is then multiplied by 10 comes out to 1,461,301.54, which I'll round up to 1,461,301 using the .5 rule.
Greater Los Angeles' projected population in 2020: 19,338,308
391,219 / 39 equals 10,031.2564, multiplied by 12 is equal to 120,375.077, multiplied by 10 is equal to 1,203,750.77. .5 rule applies so outcome will be 1,203,751.
Greater Washington-Baltimore's projected population in 2020: 10,255,712
Rank in the United States: 3
* Displaces Greater Chicago by 2020. Will this be called "megacity" or no? It's a multinodal place with two cities. So I'm lost what it's designation will be.
71,801 / 39 equals out to 1,841.05128, multiplied by 12 is equal to 22,092, multiplied by 10 is equal to 220,926.154. The .5 rule does not apply, so will remain constant.
Greater Chicago's projected population in 2020: 10,061,855
Rank in the United States: 4
* Designation will move up to megacity, officially if actual numbers hold to "present trends". Again, color me skeptical if these estimates are to be trusted but fun to look at nonetheless.
Greater San Francisco Bay Area:
2010: 8,153,696
2013: 8,469,854
Difference: 316,158
316,158 / 39 equals 8,106.615, multiplied by 12 is equal to 97,279.3846, multiplied by 10 is equal to 972,793.846. .5 rule applies, so 972,794.
Greater San Francisco Bay Area's projected population in 2020: 9,126,490
393,761 / 39 equals 10,096.4359, multiplied by 12 equals 121,157.231, multiplied by 10 equals 1,211,572.31. The .5 rule is not applicable for a round up.
Greater Houston's projected population in 2020: 7,326,134
-4,581 / 39 equals -117.461, multiplied by 12 equals -1,409.538, multiplied by 10 equals -14,095.38. The .5 rule is not applicable.
Greater Detroit's population projection in 2020: 5,304,649
* According to "estimates" the region has reversed the decline, did so in 2012 and followed suit in 2013. These projections are with present data, but if the estimates are to be believed, like we're led on to be, then Detroit will see a small increase overall by decades end rather than any sort of decline.
-790 / 39 equals -20.2564103, multiplied by 12 equals -243.076923, multiplied by 10 equals -2,430.76923. The .5 rule is applicable, so new number is -2,431.
Greater Pittsburgh's population projection in 2020: 2,658,296
* Again, like metropolitan Detroit, I doubt Pittsburgh will finish the decade in a decline if the trends of the last two years apply for the remaining seven years of the decade.
Rank in the United States: 24
Greater Salt Lake City:
2010: 2,271,696
2013: 2,389,225
Difference: 117,529
117,529 / 39 equals 3,013.5641, multiplied by 12 equals 36,162.7692, multiplied by 10 equals 361,627.692. The .5 rule applies.
Greater Salt Lake City's population projection in 2020: 2,633,324
* Displaces Greater Kansas City (already has) and Greater Sacramento by 2020
That does it for places that will be over 2 million people by projection trajectories in 2020. To keep in mind, the estimates and projections are to be taken with caution, they may or may not pan out as the estimates unveil but we've come a long way since the census (April 2010) and we can no longer use the 2010 numbers for these cities. It wouldn't be fair to cities like the San Francisco Bay Area, Southeast Florida, Washington-Baltimore, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, New York, or Los Angeles that have all added between 300,000-500,000 people (yes, nearly half a million people in only 39 months) to keep using definite outdated numbers. We have to move with the time, not look back, in my personal opinion.
Also, I showed the work on purpose, so that way people from each place can check it, follow along with it, and if I made any mathematical errors, please feel more than free to point it out.
Enjoy: Moderator cut: link removed, linking to competitor sites is not allowed
I'll also do this for places above 1 million in a bit.
Last edited by Yac; 04-08-2014 at 07:08 AM..
Reason: Bringing up population density and urban area opened up a whole new can of worms.
Interesting - only thing is extrapolating 3 year data longer term.
If you used 2000-2003 for example wouldn't Atlanta have been much larger in 2010 for example
Or if you used 2007-2010 for the Bay as another example it would be much lower
For DC its coming off its most explosive time frame - not sure DC is sustainable in this growth as it mostly migratory (will still grow but is that rate realistic as job adds are slowing)
DFW and Houston have more organic growth which is likely to sustain more consistently shorter term (say to the 2020 time frame) - My question for these two is how to keep up with infrastructure and a large population that will be looking for jobs in 10-20 years. Just a thought on Houston; today I believe with the higher population and lower unemployment rates it has roughly the same number of jobs as Philly (actually believe slightly fewer in aggregate; they are very close on MSA size today - Philly's population is much older and far fewer births) - So in 10 to 20 years Houston needs to increase job growth to facilitate the 140K births per year that will be coming of employment age. To me its interesting to watch these dynamic play out and how places adapt.
But I do find it at least intellectually interesting, I do like numbers regardless
Last edited by kidphilly; 04-05-2014 at 07:35 AM..
I say that Atlanta doesn't have rapid transit rail either, just because.
Light rail is not rapid transit, except in very rare cases such as the DLR in London when it's a hybrid, completely grade-separate system, and even then that's stretching it. You can say that Dallas has the largest mass transit system in Texas and there'd be no problem with it, but it isn't rapid transit by any means. Dubai and Shanghai have rapid transit systems that incorporate light rail, but they are fundamentally different than DART. MARTA is rapid transit and is comparable to Metro in DC and BART.
Also, this thread just shows how much MSAs are better measurements of cities/metro areas than CSAs. I don't know why people bother with CSAs except maybe for media markets, but grouping cities such as DC and Baltimore together is patently ridiculous. The only CSA that I can think of that makes any sense is the Bay Area, but even then that's very much an exception to the norm and really solely due to San Franciscans working in the Valley. A few other strange problems when you have CSAs:
Atlantic City falls under the Philadelphia area.
Central New Hampshire falls under the Boston area.
East-central Florida falls under the Miami area.
Olympia falls under the Seattle area.
Those are just some of the anomalies that make CSA comparisons and measurements messed up. The concept of "Boston" and its surrounding region is smaller than Dallas and Houston, for example, but the CSA's counting mechanism places it above both the latter two because of towns that have only a faint connection at best, usually cultural. MSAs work because they measure labor, commuting and "infrastructure-related" (for lack of a better word) markets, and are thus better comparisons.
It's really not that complicated and yet I continue to LOL at the uproar.
MSAs and CSAs are defined by a simple formula.
A MSA is created when 25%+ of residents in one county work in another county.
A CSA is created when 15%-24.99% of residents of one MSA work in another MSA.
And it makes sense as we 're talking in some cases, hundreds of thousands of outsiders driving to another metro area to work, clogging the freewaya there and taking billions in earned income to spend somewhere else.
There is no nefarious campaign to have certain cities supplant others through fuzzy math. Some people really need to check their egos at the door.
Light rail is not rapid transit, except in very rare cases such as the DLR in London when it's a hybrid, completely grade-separate system, and even then that's stretching it. You can say that Dallas has the largest mass transit system in Texas and there'd be no problem with it, but it isn't rapid transit by any means. Dubai and Shanghai have rapid transit systems that incorporate light rail, but they are fundamentally different than DART. MARTA is rapid transit and is comparable to Metro in DC and BART.
It's a hybrid. Parts of DART is indeed a rapid transit system. It runs on it's own row grade separated in tunnels and elevated. Systems like Metrolink in St. Louis I would consider to be rapid transit.
Also, this thread just shows how much MSAs are better measurements of cities/metro areas than CSAs. I don't know why people bother with CSAs except maybe for media markets, but grouping cities such as DC and Baltimore together is patently ridiculous. The only CSA that I can think of that makes any sense is the Bay Area, but even then that's very much an exception to the norm and really solely due to San Franciscans working in the Valley. A few other strange problems when you have CSAs:
Atlantic City falls under the Philadelphia area.
Central New Hampshire falls under the Boston area.
East-central Florida falls under the Miami area.
Olympia falls under the Seattle area.
Those are just some of the anomalies that make CSA comparisons and measurements messed up. The concept of "Boston" and its surrounding region is smaller than Dallas and Houston, for example, but the CSA's counting mechanism places it above both the latter two because of towns that have only a faint connection at best, usually cultural. MSAs work because they measure labor, commuting and "infrastructure-related" (for lack of a better word) markets, and are thus better comparisons.
Atlantic City being part of the Philly area isn't strange as it has traditionally been part of the Philly area. The census removed it from the Philly area back in the 1990's but was added back recently. Atlantic City has always been culturally tied to the Philly area regardless of what the census designations say. I do agree that CSA measurements a better suited for areas like the Bay Area and the Delaware Valley as well.
It's really not that complicated and yet I continue to LOL at the uproar.
MSAs and CSAs are defined by a simple formula.
A MSA is created when 25%+ of residents in one county work in another county.
A CSA is created when 15%-24.99% of residents of one MSA work in another MSA.
And it makes sense as we 're talking in some cases, hundreds of thousands of outsiders driving to another metro area to work, clogging the freewaya there and taking billions in earned income to spend somewhere else.
There is no nefarious campaign to have certain cities supplant others through fuzzy math. Some people really need to check their egos at the door.
No, but apart from the Bay Area (which is really two MSAs due to San Francisco and San Jose both acting as CBDs and metro-specific employment patterns) there isn't a CSA that makes much sense to use as a measure of looking at growth, particularly in regards to comparisons, which this thread is based on. I never said there isn't a contingent of people that commute in patterns that would cause a CSA to exist, but in counting those you're really distorting the size of these conurbations. Should Boston be given such a high ranking because some people from central New Hampshire commute into the furthest reaches of Massachusetts such as Lowell or the like, thereby inadvertently crossing MSAs? Seems a bit of a reach to me.
Also, MSA/CSA definitions are more complex than that. Commuting is one factor, but plenty of MSAs are a single county, such as San Diego, which would invalidate the idea that an MSA exists based on 25% of people commuting into another county. Rather, it looks at a CBSA with a population of at least 50,000 and any adjacent counties with a specific commuting or other link unless those also have a CBSA over 50,000 people, in which case another MSA is formed, the best explanation that I can come up with.
It's really not that complicated and yet I continue to LOL at the uproar.
MSAs and CSAs are defined by a simple formula.
A MSA is created when 25%+ of residents in one county work in another county.
A CSA is created when 15%-24.99% of residents of one MSA work in another MSA.
And it makes sense as we 're talking in some cases, hundreds of thousands of outsiders driving to another metro area to work, clogging the freewaya there and taking billions in earned income to spend somewhere else.
There is no nefarious campaign to have certain cities supplant others through fuzzy math. Some people really need to check their egos at the door.
I think it's fair to question the methodology, but I do agree that this isn't some sort of campaign to boost the status of certain cities.
CSAs, like many MSAs, differ in their makeup.
Some CSAs are just an MSA + a few micropolitan areas, which end up adding a lot of land area, but not a lot of population. Others combine two or more sizable metropolitan areas and end up adding a significant amount of population.
In the end, it's just a measure, and I find it an interesting way to better understand how a city interacts with the larger surrounding area.
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