Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
We go "hocus pocus" three times and the following happens....
• all of the major cities in every metropolitan area go "poof", just disappear into thin air (done humanely, of course )
• that remaining, the areas around that city, the ones that were part of its metro area and now finding themselves "cityless" incorporate into their own city....thus we get New Los Angeles, New Chicago, and New New York (or NY² or is it New York, New York, New York?)
And we find Disneyland, Muir Woods, the Vegas Strip, the Pentagon, the Meadowlands, Valley Forge, the Mall of America, Harvard's campus, South Beach, the Indiana sand dunes, every ballpark, stadium and arena you can stuff into Arlington, and Stone Mountain within the city limits of our quite prominent and new city.
Which one of those "new" cities would be the most prominent? Which would have the most attractions worth seeing. Which could best function without that disappeared city to which it was connected? Which becomes the true "Metropolis of the USA"?
And if you're into lists....how about the top 10
1. New ____________
2. New ____________
3. New ____________
4. New ____________
5. New ____________
6. New ____________
7. New ____________
8. New ____________
9. New ____________
10.New ____________
I'd say Boston or DC. Huge metropolitan and combined statistical areas with relatively small cities (both land area and pop.). Seems like they would lose the least from the their city disapearing. San Fran seems like it too would be a good candiditate.
New Los Angeles: Probably the only major city where its suburbs are equally as strong as its core city. You've got Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, Long Beach, the entire San Gabriel Valley, the entire South Bay, all of Orange County and more. They're all already major job/entertainment centers.
New New York. Obviously the elimination of NYC would ruin most of the Northeast, but NYC has some pretty strong peripheral cities and ones that border the city limits themselves. I'm talking about basically all of Hudson County with Jersey City, Hoboken, and Union City specifically. Newark is still a large city on its own and is a major job and transportation hub. Elizabeth could probably pick itself back up one day too. Paterson not so much lol. On the NY side you have Yonkers, White Plain and New Rochelle to the north. A lot of Nassau County has big job centers as well like Garden City and Hempstead. And in CT, Bridgeport and Stamford have their own economies as well. While these would provide more of the urban experience than LA, I don't think any of these are capable of taking on the role that Santa Monica, the South Bay, Long Beach and OC could.
New Bay Area is hard because while SF is the city name to it, a huge portion of the economy is to the south in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties. And then of course Oakland as well. I think the elimination of just one wouldn't do as much damage, but the elimination of Silicon Valley would probably do the most damage since many of the companies there have spurred the tech growth in SF itself which has pushed others into Oakland. I don't think SF and Oak could take over with the elimination of Silicon Valley because it's so massive. However, the elimination of SF would leave the Bay with really no city to call itself. Idk. The Bay is a weird one and would either survive better than all the rest, or collapse worse than all the rest. It's hard to say.
A lot of this depends on what happens to the primary industry of the main city when it disappears. If the industry disappears too, or relocates elsewhere, the remaining "doughnut" (suburban ring with empty middle) will be more likely to whither and die. But if the industry simply relocates to one of the suburbs, that suburb will become the heart of a newly reconstituted metropolitan area.
Of course, most major cities are pretty well diversified in their economies, so it may be a case of some component moving to one suburb and another component moving to another one, but the area as a whole remains strong. But if the federal government moves away when Washington, DC ceases to exist, its suburbs will soon collapse. Don't let their current prosperity fool you; it is built on the federal government and the spin-off industries that feed off it. If the government moves away, the "DMV" is done for.
How are we defining major cities? Like, for instance, would it just be Dallas for North Texas, Dallas and Forth Worth, or Dallas, Fort Worth, and Arlington, which is in the name of the official metropolitan area?
I started the thread, yet I’m fairly convinced there is one and only one possible:
Los Angeles
Big gap
San Francisco
New York
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
)
