Which city is becoming less relevant as its population increases? (safe, living)
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In the post you responded to, Losfrisco IMO is actually talking about something far different from the thread topic, which is about cities gaining population but losing relevance, which could also be interpreted as "losing their relative influence or standing among cities" at the same time.
What Losfrisco is focusing on is cities expanding their territory to take in land that lacks urban form. That is a tragedy indeed but not the tragedy we're talking about here.
The question is how is he or she defining “relevance”? There’s no clear definition in the thread.
The question is how is he or she defining “relevance”? There’s no clear definition in the thread.
I think this concept is inherently fuzzy, like "soft power" or pornography (Justice Potter Stewart: "I can't tell you what it is, but I know it when I see it.")
You could define it somewhat based on mentions in the media or in conversations. Are people talking more about this city, talking less about it, or was there not much change? This is a volatile metric, however, and it may reflect more the importance of events than of the city itself: After that shooting at the end of the Super Bowl victory parade, Kansas City was on everyone's tongue, and not in the way its boosters would have wanted it to be (the Super Bowl itself was that sort of conversation-starter).
But this category also includes events or developments that locals or promoters characterize as "putting <name of city> on the map." Being the site of a widely known annual event, snagging a major league sports team or landing a major corporate headquarters also fall into this category.
It could also include how often people mention a certain city, either in general or when certain topics come up. It would be impossible to measure how often people think of a place without mentioning it, but that would be something that would be included in that term "mindshare" — the amount of attention paid to a place in the course of one's life. To use my hometown again, barbecue buffs probably spend a fair bit of time paying attention to it, since it's famous for that cuisine.
And while the tiers are strongly correlated with metropolitan population, when we do things like rank cities according to a hierarchy, then we are also assessing their influence. Cities known for certain activities — Nashville for country music, Detroit for autos, LA for the movie industry, San Francisco for information technology, and so on -— are also considered "influential" in those activities (and are often said to be the "capitals" of those activities, placing them at the top of the heap.
And that brings us to the anomaly posed in the thread topic and OP. Usually, as cities grow in size, they also grow in importance (or "relevance"). But since cities also grow or shrink relative to other cities, a city can become less important even as it becomes bigger because some other city that may have been smaller than it becomes bigger. This last describes many Northeastern and Midwestern cities relative to Sunbelt cities since World War II. Those modest cities that grew by absorbing their surrounding counties (Jacksonville, which leads this poll, seems to be a poster child for this) also tend to quailfy.
I don't know whether this has made the subject clear as a bell or clear as mud, but I hope it helped.
I kind of feel like San Jose is the answer here just because it is so swallowed by the SF Bay Area as a whole. Of course it was always a secondary city in the region but I feel like in the 90s and early 2000s San Jose was at least Silicon Valley. But then when millennials entered the workforce SF proper absorbed a lot of the tech boom and nowadays I really don't hear anything about San Jose having its own identity as a city.
Other than that, San Antonio definitely seems flat nationally and negative in Texas (the latter because of Austin's growth). Jacksonville was never super relevant but maybe you can argue it peaked when the Jags came into town.
Phoenix I wouldn't say has declined at all but it feels fairly flat. (Weirdly I feel like "Scottsdale" has almost matched Phoenix in relevance outside of sports).
I can't see how any of the others could be described as losing influence.
I kind of feel like San Jose is the answer here just because it is so swallowed by the SF Bay Area as a whole. Of course it was always a secondary city in the region but I feel like in the 90s and early 2000s San Jose was at least Silicon Valley. But then when millennials entered the workforce SF proper absorbed a lot of the tech boom and nowadays I really don't hear anything about San Jose having its own identity as a city.
Other than that, San Antonio definitely seems flat nationally and negative in Texas (the latter because of Austin's growth). Jacksonville was never super relevant but maybe you can argue it peaked when the Jags came into town.
Phoenix I wouldn't say has declined at all but it feels fairly flat. (Weirdly I feel like "Scottsdale" has almost matched Phoenix in relevance outside of sports).
I can't see how any of the others could be described as losing influence.
I picked San Antonio simply because all the other cities in the poll are becoming more relevant in some way or another. Maybe Jacksonville is another but as it is the lone Northeast Florida metro it is become somewhat more relevant, like a San Diego with its military/Navy presence. San Jose as you mention has Silicon Valley, but many other cities are growing as tech capitals including Austin, which is also as you and many others mentioned is what is drawing away from San Antonio.
I picked San Antonio simply because all the other cities in the poll are becoming more relevant in some way or another. Maybe Jacksonville is another but as it is the lone Northeast Florida metro it is become somewhat more relevant, like a San Diego with its military/Navy presence. San Jose as you mention has Silicon Valley, but many other cities are growing as tech capitals including Austin, which is also as you and many others mentioned is what is drawing away from San Antonio.
To be clear with SJ I'm not saying that "Silicon Valley" or the SFBA as a whole are losing relevance. More that San Jose itself feels like one of many medium-sized cities in a decentralized region, whereas in the 90s I thought of it more as a standalone city that happened to be located fairly close to San Francisco. Effectively it went from being a Baltimore or Milwaukee to being a Fort Worth or St Paul.
Jacksonville leading in this poll expresses an unfamiliarity with the city and its growth influences. Within the healthcare sector alone Jacksonville is among a small handful of cities nationally known for top-quality medical care and research with the presence of a Mayo Clinic, University of Florida-Shands Medical Center and the massive Baptist Health medical complex with Wolfson Children's Hospital.
It won't change it's perception of "becoming less relevant " But recently Memphis has quietly done something it has never done. Outpaced the U.S in average economic growth
While I don't really look into reports coming from Chambers of Commerces with much seriousity because of their propensity of cheerleading, whitewashing and seeing things through Rose colored lenses, Memphis is indeed on the verge of becoming the 2nd Tennessee city to cross $100,000,000 Billion economy
I think this concept is inherently fuzzy, like "soft power" or pornography (Justice Potter Stewart: "I can't tell you what it is, but I know it when I see it.")
You could define it somewhat based on mentions in the media or in conversations. Are people talking more about this city, talking less about it, or was there not much change? This is a volatile metric, however, and it may reflect more the importance of events than of the city itself: After that shooting at the end of the Super Bowl victory parade, Kansas City was on everyone's tongue, and not in the way its boosters would have wanted it to be (the Super Bowl itself was that sort of conversation-starter).
But this category also includes events or developments that locals or promoters characterize as "putting <name of city> on the map." Being the site of a widely known annual event, snagging a major league sports team or landing a major corporate headquarters also fall into this category.
It could also include how often people mention a certain city, either in general or when certain topics come up. It would be impossible to measure how often people think of a place without mentioning it, but that would be something that would be included in that term "mindshare" — the amount of attention paid to a place in the course of one's life. To use my hometown again, barbecue buffs probably spend a fair bit of time paying attention to it, since it's famous for that cuisine.
And while the tiers are strongly correlated with metropolitan population, when we do things like rank cities according to a hierarchy, then we are also assessing their influence. Cities known for certain activities — Nashville for country music, Detroit for autos, LA for the movie industry, San Francisco for information technology, and so on -— are also considered "influential" in those activities (and are often said to be the "capitals" of those activities, placing them at the top of the heap.
And that brings us to the anomaly posed in the thread topic and OP. Usually, as cities grow in size, they also grow in importance (or "relevance"). But since cities also grow or shrink relative to other cities, a city can become less important even as it becomes bigger because some other city that may have been smaller than it becomes bigger. This last describes many Northeastern and Midwestern cities relative to Sunbelt cities since World War II. Those modest cities that grew by absorbing their surrounding counties (Jacksonville, which leads this poll, seems to be a poster child for this) also tend to quailfy.
I don't know whether this has made the subject clear as a bell or clear as mud, but I hope it helped.
The OP mentioned cities that annex to inflate growth numbers and lack of light rail would make them less “relevant”. Based on those two criteria alone not one city listed would qualify as “relevant” as only three of the cities listed currently have light rail and all of the cities have used annexation and or consolidation at one point in their history to boost population growth. Based on the OP’s own definitions no city on the poll would qualify.
They specifically chose to single out Nashville and Columbus using vague criteria in order to air out their rhetoric.
Jacksonville leading in this poll expresses an unfamiliarity with the city and its growth influences. Within the healthcare sector alone Jacksonville is among a small handful of cities nationally known for top-quality medical care and research with the presence of a Mayo Clinic, University of Florida-Shands Medical Center and the massive Baptist Health medical complex with Wolfson Children's Hospital.
This sounds like things every major city in the US is booming in.
Health care has boomed greatly the last few years, and every city has created state of the art facilities.
Sure Jacksonville may have increased their presence, but the top cities for medical has also further upped their game.
Boston, Baltimore, Houston, Rochester, Cleveland, NY, LA Philadelphia , SFare all top cities for medical care and research and all are increasing also. Not sure if Jacksonville's boom in the sector resulted in it moving up the ranks in the sector.
I see that Newsweek Ranks Mayo Jacksonville 52 in the best hospitals worldwide, which is quite high if you think of it.
But the top 4 in the world were also US Hospital s
1. Mayo Rochester
2. Cleveland Clinic
3. Mass General
4. Johns Hopkins
Not to be all negative, Mayo Jacksonville is consistently ranked the best hospital in Florida and Jacksonville scores high marks in concentration of quality hospitals and research in Florida. So in terms of relevance in that sector in Florida Jacksonville does have increasing relevance. My issue is Florida isn't a heavy hitter in the health industry so it's easy to shine. In California, Texas, New York, Pennsylvania, Boston, Maryland or even Minnesota and Ohio it wouldn't shine in that department.
Not quite sure how Florida got so large but not as competitive in medicine and education in general.
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