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As others have pointed out, city population is not as important as Metro (MSA) population when ranking cities and their surroundings. While I am all in favor of a city population doing well, it really has little impact on the area that surrounds. So while city populations are fine, the metro (MSA) population really is the logical total population of a city and its surroundings.
What is your reasoning for placing Columbus above Charlotte?
Now that I look at growth rates you're correct. It seems like that while Columbus is currently the larger city, Charlotte will likely overtake it during the 2020's. My apologies. Mentally I was thinking Columbus was about ~100,000 larger than Charlotte, so that even with the higher growth rates it wouldn't be passed up until the 2030's. Charlotte will likely pass it up in the early-to-mid-2020's. I expect both cities will hit 1,000,000 in their city propers by around 2030, with Charlotte being closer to 2026 or so and Columbus being closer to 2030 or so.
1 New York
2 Los Angeles
3 Chicago
4 Houston
5 Phoenix
6 San Antonio
7 Philadelphia
8 Dallas
9 San Diego
10 Austin
11 Ft Worth
12 San Jose
13 Charlotte
14 Columbus
15 Jacksonville
16 Indianapolis
17 San Francisco
18 Seattle
19 Denver
20 Las Vegas
21 Boston
22 Washington DC
23 Nashville
24 Oklahoma City
25 Portland
26 El Paso
27 Memphis
28 Louisville
29 Mesa
30 Milwaukee
Note: Does not account for future annexations that may happen
Where is Atlanta, Miami, New Orleans, Detroit, etc. etc.
I think so, for the most part. It'd be good with numbers, so folks could see the 2030 estimated projections you made.
It's crazy to me that Mesa is going to be so much larger. Hopefully they are working on building out their downtown. When I was there many years ago in 2004, they had a minimal "downtown" and it was basically a commercial area with a cluster of a few buildings/shopping areas.
Do you project that the "1,000,000 mark" for population starts at #12 San Jose or #13 Charlotte?
I was thinking at the time it's a little bland without the numbers. I just didn't feel like keeping track of my estimates at the time and I think it would have taken me longer to refine the whole list. If it was just a top 10 list that would be pretty easy though.
Off the top of my head, and without looking at all of the data for each of the 30, these seem to be the cities with large land areas and relatively low or modest densities. These cities have an opportunity to be much larger than they are currently, if rapid population growth comes to their region (or continues to come in some cases). Of course, this more likely to be true for some than for others.
My idea was to also leave my opinion on some rankings that would change in the early 2030s. For instance I think San Antonio could pass Phoenix by 2040.
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