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Urban wise-I feel like I agree on New Orlenas-but then OTOH, as I think others have alluded to, while New Orleans definitely feels big deal/urbane within the core, it's actual core feels quite compact. Like, driving 15 minutes out of New Orleans, you most certainly have left it. But, in the case of Raleigh, you have Durham, RTP, etc. City of Raleigh doesn't feel quite as big (though it's status as a state capital adds as well), and I feel like when you actually drive around Raleigh for a not too long it's apparent that it has the biggest CSA population out of any of these we are discussing (at least, I'm pretty positive of that).
But I get the sense we are talking more about "what feels biggest" in terms of actually wandering around the core, and among these cities, that is certainly New Orleans. It manages to have a core that matches cities several times it's size in that instance (like, Tampa's core downtown and adjacent neighborhoods still feel like a small scale, more modern version of New Orleans actually I think even though Tampa is easily the larger and quite probably the bigger deal metro/city at this point).
I'll also qualify this statement by saying that out of these, I only have a solid recollection of having been to/exploring about half (Richmond, Birmingham, Louisville, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Raleigh and Hampton Roads outside of Va Beach, I couldn't tell you a lot about).
Hampton Roads has, by far, the largest Urbanized Area of this group. They're at about 1.5 million. Louisville, Raleigh, Richmond, Memphis, and Jacksonville all are around 1.1 million. The rest don't reach a million.
Hampton Roads has, by far, the largest Urbanized Area of this group. They're at about 1.5 million. Louisville, Raleigh, Richmond, Memphis, and Jacksonville all are around 1.1 million. The rest don't reach a million.
That in itself doesn't necessarily correlate with major city feel in a number of ways. 1) HR's urbanized area population is geographically split by a large body of water and is scattered among several municipalities, thus diluting the true feel of the UA size. 2) New Orleans became a major city in the antebellum area and was the South's largest city for a good while which affords it advantages when it comes to structural density and the built environment. Also its UA doesn't include the hordes of tourists that are a fixture at any given moment and it doesn't account for the city's relative isolation which makes it a bigger regional anchor than just about every other city on the poll--both of which give the city venues and amenities that would normally be found in cities/metros twice its size. 3) Because of the rules governing UA's, there can be some smaller UAs in the vicinity of a primary UA that are technically independent but are practically part of and largely contiguous with the larger primary UA.
Out of the list, New Orleans in the French Quarter feels the most dynamic, vibrant and bustling, and seems like it's the "center of the party." But the metro area itself is sort of meh.
Also, downtown Memphis has a vibe of a city that is a bit larger than Memphis actually is. I think the rise of Memphis in the 20s, 30s, 40s was making it on its way to the size of a Cleveland, St Louis or Pittsburgh, but it stopped short in the 60s after the death of MLK and the civil rights movement. Crime rose and businesses flocked to the suburbs of Memphis or just left.
I'd rank the list on the poll like this:
14. Savannah
13. Greenville
12. Charleston
11. Columbia
10.Tulsa
9. Virginia Beach/Norfolk
8. Jacksonville
7. Louisville
6. Raleigh
5. Oklahoma City
4. Birmingham
3. Richmond
2. Memphis
1. New Orleans
The massive infrastructure/engineering of Hampton Roads makes it feel like the biggest metro to me.
The bridges, tunnels, seawalls, dry docks, ports, shipyards and large interstate interchanges make the area feel more significant than it is (“I see billions of dollars in infrastructure, this place must be significant”).
Raleigh doesn’t feel big at all to me. If doesn’t feel small either and suburban Raleigh certainly feels bigger than suburban Richmond (my home, for example). My measure for a large metro area is wether roads are laid atop geographic features or carved into them. If there’s a gentle hill in Raleigh (or Richmond, or Columbia or Charlotte) the road will follow the hill. In large cities the road will be cut through the hill. Of course all of these cities have examples of how land has been cleared and reengineered to accommodate roadways but in big cities, even exurban roads are carved out of the land, not simply built upon it. I noticed this years ago 30 miles outside of DC and now I can’t unsee it lol. Every time I come home from Philadelphia, New York, Washington, Denver etc I’m saddened by how small town our suburban roads look (downtown Richmond has elevated highways, elevated trains, large bridges).
Raleigh has large shopping areas which tells you that a lot of people live there but between those areas is rolling, wooded hills (which makes for a beautiful place to live).
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