Will the concept of a metro area become obsolete? (suburbs, crime, downtown)
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A metropolitan area is simply a cluster of counties that have an identifiable relationship of commuting patterns between adjacent counties. However, as time goes by, more and more people are working remotely or from home and not commuting. The current threshold by the Census Bureau is that at least 25% of the residents of a county must commute to a nearby county for that county to be included in the metro area. However, that threshold is rather low. If just enough people shift to working from home in the coming years, many metro areas will shrink in size because of outlying counties falling below the 25% threshold due to so many people working from home. These counties would then be excluded from the metro area they were once a part of.
But even in spite of COVID, more and more people are working remotely as the years ago by.
I agree. The company my friend wishes for gave up their lease a month after they were sent to work from home.
It seems a lot of companies were going that way already and covid was just the last push.
When you give up the lease a month after, before you even know how this will go, just shows that they had long made their decision to work through possible problems but there is no going back.
They had probably gave notice that they were not continuing the lease before they even sent workers home.
I know so many people who have been doing this before covid. It was already getting more and more common.
But Some version of metros will always be around. I just think the commuting patterns will change.
Is the reason why malls in some areas are thriving. People still need that human connection. So some brick and motor stores will adapt and live on
No the concept of a metro area will not become obsolete. There's too much benefit from having large areas share infrastructure even if some arbitrary number of people don't have to drive across the metro every day for their job. I do agree that commuting patterns will change in general, it was happening before covid but now it has accelerated in a way that will not be reversed
You're only taking into account commuting for work. There's much more to consider when it comes to what constitutes a metro area. The relationship between the central city, its ring suburbs, and surrounding counties in terms of recreational assets, cultural assets, media marketing, etc. all come into play, not just driving back and forth from a job. working. I haven't commuted to work in 25 years, but still experience the benefits and effects of my central city and my metro area as a whole. The central city benefits from its suburbs as well. So, no, the metro concept, IMO, will always be there to properly convey what the area has to offer its residents and visitors.
No, this is a strange question when those people will still commute to the city for other amenities.
or will they? I used to love going into the city on occasion, but with all the chaos and crime today, no thanks!
I think major cities will hollow out over time, but suburbs will remain about the same, continuing to grow outward. Downtowns are no longer needed and as mentioned, the crime rates are out of control.
If anything a metro area will only define places more, as rural America continues its decline and slow death out of existence.
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