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Yes, I was talking more so as Spartanburg is the king whereas they’re the peasants. And Columbia most certainly is. It sits on the border of the Piedmont and Sandhills. That’s what the fall line is, where the Piedmont turns into the Sandhills. If you were from SC you’d have learned that in history class. Look up the American Piedmont on wiki. Don’t argue with me on this as I’m literally a college history major, which is where a section of geography falls. Also, this reply seems very cynical. Like you’re looking down on most of these places. All of these cities are wanting to grow, it’s the means to do it that makes it hard for some of them. Just like you say there’s a sea of parking downtown Cola, but did you care to know that two of these lots are being turned into hotels and one student housing as we speak?
Yeah I took history class, thanks, even made a topographic map for class, and I was taught Columbia is in the Sandhills. Nowhere have I seen Columbia lumped in with the Piedmont. You say wiki, but wikipedia doesn't put it in the Piedmont either, but whatever, who cares.
And no I'm not being cynical, I answered your points. Not all cities want to grow. Montgomery is not growing. And you can't say "well because it's in Alabama" because Huntsville is growing. Macon I simply don't see it. Atlanta is a force to be reckoned with, and Savannah is getting the coastal boom. Augusta, Columbus, and Macon have to put in extra effort to get noticed by companies and people. Greensboro and Winston Salem used to be the metro to beat in NC, but they got too conservative and let big tobacco rule too much, and they started losing out to Charlotte and Raleigh. Now they want back in. How is that cynical or looking down. Cities stifling their own growth is nothing new.
Saying Columbia has a sea of concrete is not "being mean", it's true. And it all should be torn up and towers and greenspace should be put in its place. All of SC's main cities should try to densify, and Columbia is in the best position to do it. They're building 2 things, that's great, but I see much bigger things.
Never understood the sprawl thing b/c the largest cities have the most sprawl but people in the bigger cities seem to criticize medium sized cities for sprawl.
The bigger Sunbelt cities tend to get lambasted for sprawl the most, e.g., Atlanta, Houston, DFW, Phoenix, etc.
Columbia and Montgomery are not Piedmont cities, and Augusta, Macon, and Columbus I wouldn't put there either.
They are all fall line cities which, as you know, is the dividing line between the coastal plain and the Piedmont. It may be a technicality, but I think they count.
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Macon I personally don't see any appeal.
One of its biggest advantages is its location between Atlanta and Savannah and its booming port. Also, one thing that a lot of people don't know about Macon is that it has a surprisingly large and well-preserved historic urban core for its size and somewhere between 10-15 historic districts within the city itself. Its downtown is in the middle of a revitalization process and for now, it's still flying under the radar a bit but the word is starting to get out; it reminds me of where Greenville was like 15 years or so ago. It and Winston-Salem would be the closest thing to legacy cities among this group. It will be interesting to see how Macon evolves from here and if it can manage to attract economic investment partially due to its urban revitalization efforts like Greenville.
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Spartanburg is the Winston Salem to Greenville's Greensboro. They both should be split or both be put together.
On its face it can seem like an arbitrary move, but I can actually see the rationale for combining Greenville and Spartanburg but separating Greensboro and Winston-Salem. The Upstate is more like the Triangle than the Triad with their largest regional employment center being located in between their two largest cities in their second-largest counties, tying them together in a way that gives the Upstate a dynamic that the Triad lacks. Greenville and Spartanburg being separated into two MSAs is more of a statistical fluke of sorts since BMW is on the Spartanburg County side of Greer, but BMW has arguably spurred more growth and development in Greenville County than Spartanburg County over the years, with Greer itself having been pulled more into Greenville's orbit. Greensboro and Winston-Salem, on the other hand, really do feel like two cities of the same size with no huge singular jobs center between them (e.g., BMW, RTP) with some residential suburban overlap in Kernersville and similar levels of cross-commuting between the two core cities that happen to be relatively close to each other, so their separate MSA designations make more sense.
Yeah I took history class, thanks, even made a topographic map for class, and I was taught Columbia is in the Sandhills. Nowhere have I seen Columbia lumped in with the Piedmont. You say wiki, but wikipedia doesn't put it in the Piedmont either, but whatever, who cares.
And no I'm not being cynical, I answered your points. Not all cities want to grow. Montgomery is not growing. And you can't say "well because it's in Alabama" because Huntsville is growing. Macon I simply don't see it. Atlanta is a force to be reckoned with, and Savannah is getting the coastal boom. Augusta, Columbus, and Macon have to put in extra effort to get noticed by companies and people. Greensboro and Winston Salem used to be the metro to beat in NC, but they got too conservative and let big tobacco rule too much, and they started losing out to Charlotte and Raleigh. Now they want back in. How is that cynical or looking down. Cities stifling their own growth is nothing new.
Saying Columbia has a sea of concrete is not "being mean", it's true. And it all should be torn up and towers and greenspace should be put in its place. All of SC's main cities should try to densify, and Columbia is in the best position to do it. They're building 2 things, that's great, but I see much bigger things.
Yes, because the places where that has happened (the Kline Steel Site, the SCANA, bus depot) look ten times better than when they were parking lots, not really. And the problem with almost all of those lots is private owners. Especially the two closest to the state house. And Columbia is tearing down buildings for the betterment of nature and aesthetics. Market on Main tore down the old House of Fabrics building. Now it’s outdoor seating with beer on top and a giant TV screen. And the park right next to it used to be even more buildings.
As of 2019, Greenville metro is already estimated to have over 920,000 people and a CSA of over 1.4 million people.
Yep. Right now, the Greenville-Anderson, MSA has almost as many people as the old Greenville-Spartanburg-Anderson MSA had in 2000 (962K) which was the last Census where they were all in one MSA. In the 2003 revisions, each principal city anchored its own MSA and I believe it was in 2013 when Anderson and Greenville were folded into a singular MSA with Spartanburg still remaining separate.
I think the i85 corridor will do the best. GBoro and GVille will do better than WinSal and Columbia.
Don't sleep on Winston-Salem. It has the all the ingredients for a healthy growth snap. If the city can continue to work with what it has, it's in a nice little spot. Raleigh didn't do too bad either, considering 85 doesnt run through the city.
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