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The NYC metro area basically encapsulates anything within commuting distance of Manhattan (up to 1hr - 1.5 hrs away from NYC by train). The train lines stretch even further than that, but I don't think those area are usually counted in the Metro area.
The reason NJ and CT are included is simply because of geography. NYC is comprised of 2 islands (Manhattan, Staten Island) part of another island (Brooklyn/Queens) and the Bronx, which I guess could be classified as a peninsula.
The LA metro area is all in one state because California extends for hours in all directions beyond the city. With NY its not the same. I can drive 20-30 minutes east or west from where I currently am located and end up in another state. You can't do that in LA. Nevada is what, 4 hours away? Mexico is 2-3 hours?
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Originally Posted by jessemh431
Ya. I find it funny that NYC Metro is sometimes considered part of 3 different states (NJ,NY, and CT). I don't know if that's true, but I read somwhere that some stastics include those areas. In LA, we keep it all in one state and almost half in one county.
With L.A anything is possible....Remember that this City was once just a Small Village/Town and is now one of the Largest Cities with one of the Largest Economies in the Country.
The projections shows that in another 40 years LA will be largest Metropolitan area in the US... however as city goes which are the smaller municipalities within these metros, it will very difficult for LA the city to catach up with NYC. NYC population doubles the City of Angels.
In order for LA to pass NYC in popuiation it needs two things: a public mass transportation that is capable of handling millions upon millions of people daily 24hrs-7 days a week. And a massive water supply that can handle the need for this mega city. NYC all ready has the largest subway in the world in terms of mileage. The drinking supply is one of the nations largest, too. I don't see that happening anytime soon. So I doubt if LA will topple NYC to the #2 spot. I mean, NYC has been this nation's largest city since the early 1800's
Mexico City (8.6 million within city limits proper, 20.4 million within the greater metropolitan area) is already larger than New York City (8.2 million within city limits proper, 19.75 million within the greater metropolitan area).
It's not inconceivable that LA (3.8 million city, 15.2 million metro) might surpass New York if it's counted by metropolitan area.
City of LA's only growing 1% a year, so unlikely to happen as a municipality with it still being less than half as big as NYC. LA and Orange County aren't growing much either.
Metro area now gets nearly 2/3rds of its growth from SB and Riverside Counties, so it's a question of how many more people squeeze onto the 15/215 corridors, as well as places up to 90 miles away from LA like San Jacinto.
Some of these areas, like Temecula, are closer to San Diego than LA, and San Diego is clearly independent of LA, much like Philly is from NY.
I don't see it happening in our lifetimes, although it could get close enough that some of it will ultimately depend on arbitrary census definitions.
I highly doubt LA will MORE than double in population given it's current city limit constraints.
For the past 100 years LA has been able to grow so quickly because it had hundreds of square miles of land within its huge city limits to build housing. The city is now virtually built-out; like New York was in the 1950's. Of course New York has continued to grow after it was built out by getting more dense, but the levels of growth are much lower. It peaked out right after being built-out at around 7.9 million people. It then went through hell during the 70's, crawled back through the 80's and has been sprinting back since then. The population today is a little over 8.2 million, so it's been able to add over 300,000 people since it ran out of room. It's projected to keep growing to around 9 million.
LA will certainly increase it's population by getting much more dense, but it's going to have serious transportation problems unless it can start implementing much better public transit.
LA will probably have 4.2 million once it's all built out, and then continue growing from there. You're probaby not going to see hundreds of thousands of people moving in each decade as in the past though (when you could just quickly build tens of thousands of housing units on vacant land), but it should continue to grow since there's such a demand to move to the city. Obviously the metro should continue to grow quickly, although the entire LA basin is seeing it's vacant land being squeezed like never before. It's kinda hemmed in by the mountains, and is already starting to jump to the north and east over all the mountains.
So yeah, the city will grow, but you're not going to sprint from 4 million to 9 million without a lot more vacant land, or many many decades of densification. Can you imagine dumping 4 million more people on LA city right now? It would grind to an absolute halt of traffic.
This makes me think how misleading just using the population of a specific city compared to another can be.
Everyone threw a fit that Phoenix is now larger than Philadelphia; yet Phoenix sits on almost three times as much land. Pound for pound Philly is still larger, you're just comparing 125 square miles of population of the Philly urban area to 520 square miles of land in the Phoenix area.
I've always thought urban area comparisons are a much better scale of a Cities true size. In this case the NYC to LA comparison gets much more interesting, the urban areas are closer in size, and LA is growing quite quickly.
What do you think? I think it's possible since pretty much the only desirable area that people want to move to in NYC is Manhattan and there is no more room for Manhattan to grow in population. LA has a lot of room to expand it's downtown area by using emminent domain on those crappy poor cheap homes near DT LA. If we can get more density in LA, we can definitely surpass NYC in a decade or two.
What do you think?
They estimate that by 2030 NYC will have 9.7 million people living in it and I doubt that Los Angeles will triple it's population by than. Also you lack an understanding of geography. You question why parts of NJ and CT are counted in the NYC metro. Since NYC is a city of islands (besides the bronx) boroughs like Staten Island or Manhattan are right across from New Jersey and have an influence on the area. Also thousands of people who live in Northern/Central NJ and CT commute to Manhattan to work, usually if you're making money and you live in Northern or Central NJ you making it in Manhttan. Also Manhattan only has 1.6 million people living in it and at one time it had over 2 million people so it definitley could hold more than it is currently. Also although Manhattan is the cultural and financial center of NYC the majority of the population lives in Brooklyn or Queens. Also you couldn't be more wrong when you say Manhattan is the only desirable place to live in NYC. Many New Yorkers view Manhttan has overly expensive and corporate and love living in nice/affordable neighborhoodsi n other boroughs. Ever here of Todt hill, Brooklyn Heights, Riverdale, Whitestone, or Bayside? I agree that the LA metro area could pass New York's but I doubt the city of L.A will pass NYC in population
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