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Huntington Proper has a population almost as large as Charleston Proper (49K/51k) and Huntington is growing (slightly) while Charleston is shrinking (slightly). Huntington will probably be the largest city in the state within a few years (technically).
Morgantown is growing (from 29k-31K in 3 years), but the real population boom has been in Monongalia, which has grown by 8K in 3 years (up to 102K).
So when comparing WV's largest cities and the counties in which they reside, we're looking at total population figures of:
Huntington Proper has a population almost as large as Charleston Proper (49K/51k) and Huntington is growing (slightly) while Charleston is shrinking (slightly). Huntington will probably be the largest city in the state within a few years (technically).
Morgantown is growing (from 29k-31K in 3 years), but the real population boom has been in Monongalia, which has grown by 8K in 3 years (up to 102K).
So when comparing WV's largest cities and the counties in which they reside, we're looking at total population figures of:
Conclusions ? Morgantown and Huntington are a lot closer than Charleston and Huntington in terms of population stats.
That is a fun site to play around with for sure. I hate the WV lost around 2,000 people (est.). I really hope that, if anything, that turns around.
Anyway, I want to throw this thought your way. This may or may not help your conclusions, but I believe that it is a very important figure that many people forget about when studying population statistics: population density.
Population density is defined by how many people are found to live per square mile (sq mi), or square kilometer (sq km). Just divide the county's population by its land area to receive its population density. If you do so then you find that Cabell, Monongalia, Kanawha, and Berkeley (just adding this in for comparision purposes) counties have the population densities: 346, 284, 212, and 339 people per sq mi. (Disclaimer: I used each county's "Land Area" found on Wikipedia and not just the county's overall area, which includes both land and water area. I did this because if one county had a lake or a multitude of rivers, creeks, etcetera, then it would skew their respective statistics.)
This may be a much better point of comparison as it is obvious that a county with more land area should have a larger population. Using population density eliminates this factor. On the other hand, everyone should be reminded that population densities can vary drastically in a large area, such as a county. This is most certainly going to be the case when comparing cities, as they are just pockets of high population densities. Also, keep in mind that there are pockets lacking population densities, such as parks and farms. So is Berkeley county's population density really going to be 339 people/sq mi everywhere? No, because there is an increased population density in Martinsburg and a decreased population density in Sleepy Creek. The population density is an average over an entire area, but I still believe it is a much better representation of an area than its sole population.
I am not going to make any conclusions here, but I will point out that Monongalia county is larger in area than Cabell and Kanawha county is much larger in area than both Monongalia and Cabell counties.
That is a fun site to play around with for sure. I hate the WV lost around 2,000 people (est.). I really hope that, if anything, that turns around.
Anyway, I want to throw this thought your way. This may or may not help your conclusions, but I believe that it is a very important figure that many people forget about when studying population statistics: population density.
Population density is defined by how many people are found to live per square mile (sq mi), or square kilometer (sq km). Just divide the county's population by its land area to receive its population density. If you do so then you find that Cabell, Monongalia, Kanawha, and Berkeley (just adding this in for comparision purposes) counties have the population densities: 346, 284, 212, and 339 people per sq mi. (Disclaimer: I used each county's "Land Area" found on Wikipedia and not just the county's overall area, which includes both land and water area. I did this because if one county had a lake or a multitude of rivers, creeks, etcetera, then it would skew their respective statistics.)
This may be a much better point of comparison as it is obvious that a county with more land area should have a larger population. Using population density eliminates this factor. On the other hand, everyone should be reminded that population densities can vary drastically in a large area, such as a county. This is most certainly going to be the case when comparing cities, as they are just pockets of high population densities. Also, keep in mind that there are pockets lacking population densities, such as parks and farms. So is Berkeley county's population density really going to be 339 people/sq mi everywhere? No, because there is an increased population density in Martinsburg and a decreased population density in Sleepy Creek. The population density is an average over an entire area, but I still believe it is a much better representation of an area than its sole population.
I am not going to make any conclusions here, but I will point out that Monongalia county is larger in area than Cabell and Kanawha county is much larger in area than both Monongalia and Cabell counties.
I hope that this adds to discussion.
Good point. Going by that measure, Huntington and Morgantown proper are nearly equal, and both about double Charleston.
Probably not much of a surprise about Charleston though, as there's a clearly defined business district that not many live in, unlike the sort of mixed residential/commercial downtowns of the other two cities.
So given that Motown and Huntington each have around 3000/square mile, how does that stack up to larger cities? Off the top of my head... DC, Arlington and Alexandria are all around 10K-11K/Square mile. Manhattan is around 29K a square mile and Pjhilly is around 11K.
For another college town about the same size as Morgantown and Huntington, Charlottesville is about 4.2K/Square mile
Good post. FYI the county totals include the numbers of the cities located in those counties so no need to add together. Here's an article talking about this subject as well:
The report found 41 counties lost population and 14 gained last year. Eight of the 10 counties that lost the most population were in southern West Virginia, led by Kanawha and McDowell.
The Eastern Panhandle counties of Berkeley, Jefferson and Morgan also saw growth. Cabell and Putnam counties were the only two gaining population in southern West Virginia.
Good post. FYI the county totals include the numbers of the cities located in those counties so no need to add together. Here's an article talking about this subject as well:
I must be confused, as I'm familiar with the model in Virginia where the population of the cities is actually separate than the population of the counties, so it's usually a City + County method for the total population. That's probably because cities in virginia are actually separate entities than the counties in which they reside, but that's a pretty unique system.
Everything I've ever seen for the Census info counts the total population of the county, including the municipalities in that county. Now in certain places like some Kentucky cities, the city and county have merged making them one and the same. That makes things even more confusing.
I must be confused, as I'm familiar with the model in Virginia where the population of the cities is actually separate than the population of the counties, so it's usually a City + County method for the total population. That's probably because cities in virginia are actually separate entities than the counties in which they reside, but that's a pretty unique system.
Yes, that can be confusing. Virginia is the only state that operates ALL of it's cities independently. There are 41 independent cities in the USA and 38 of them are in Virginia. The others include Baltimore, St. Louis, and Carson City, NV. There are some other special cases like Washington, D.C., the five boroughs of NYC, and consolidated city-counties, such as those found in KY (mentioned by tbailey1138).
In WV, the municipalities are a part of the counties themselves. Some actually operate in multiple counties, such is the case in Huntington and Wheeling. The Westmoreland neighborhood in Huntington is in Wayne county and not Cabell county. In Wheeling, a very small portion of the city is located in Marshall county and not just Ohio county.
Good article. I believe the major problem for the southern part of the state is coal demand has declined somewhat so the narrow seams found there are less profitable to mine. The decline has been reflected in job losses there while the northern tier of the coal belt has deeper coal seams and for the most part is still being mined. With the government's assault on coal though, most of the coal is being shipped by rail to Baltimore and sent overseas to cheap labor countries.
Huntington Proper has a population almost as large as Charleston Proper (49K/51k) and Huntington is growing (slightly) while Charleston is shrinking (slightly). Huntington will probably be the largest city in the state within a few years (technically).
Morgantown is growing (from 29k-31K in 3 years), but the real population boom has been in Monongalia, which has grown by 8K in 3 years (up to 102K).
So when comparing WV's largest cities and the counties in which they reside, we're looking at total population figures of:
Conclusions ? Morgantown and Huntington are a lot closer than Charleston and Huntington in terms of population stats.
There is no question that more than half the population growth in the Morgantown area has been outside the city limits. Huntington and Morgantown are already easily the largest cities in our state considering ALL residents, and it would be very difficult to determine which of the two is larger than the other.
Your figures are flawed in that you added the populations within city limits to the county populations. Those people are already included in the counties numbers.
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