Let's build an relevant "urban/suburban/rural county" map

[mieastwick]

Here's my stab at things for Michigan

Blue is urban, yellow is suburban, red is rural.
I'm still iffy on Berrien and Isabella counties.

[muon2]

Here's my stab at things for Michigan

Blue is urban, yellow is suburban, red is rural.
I'm still iffy on Berrien and Isabella counties.

I assume that some of the urban counties would be mini-metros by Griffin's definitions, and some of the rurals near Detroit would be exurban.

[mieastwick]

Livingston County is exurban, and is counted as suburban in my map. I seriously doubt you can define St. Clair and Monroe as exurban; they're more like mini-metros. Monroe has a small exurban element, there is less in St. Clair.

Yes; a lot of the urban counties would be mini-metros by Griffin's definitions.

[Del Tachi]

Here's what I've come up with so far. There are several counties where I'm not particularly happy (lots of the exurbia in NE AL; Tuscaloosa, AL; some county on the MS Gulf Coast I already forgot; FL was quite frustrating, etc), but this was the output:

Not that this is a big deal, but the red-to-green color scheme works terrible for maps like these because those colors have strong associations with value judgement (i.e., green="good" and red="bad").  Even sticking with the red-to-green scheme, it would make more sense for the urban areas to be red because red suggests "higher intensity" or "heat" which would be more associated with cities in this context.  However, I would suggest adopting a more neutral color scheme.

Also, I think you're being too stingy with the "Mini-Metro" category and too generous with "Exurbia" (which, if you're from Metro Atlanta, I can definitely understand haha).  Tuscaloosa, AL is definitely more like a Mini-Metro even if it is close to Birmingham, and Fort Payne definitely feels more rural than Oconee County, GA even though DeKalb County has an Interstate and is close to "urban" Huntsville.  Maybe adjust the population caps?

[mieastwick]

Second try, using Griffin's definitions. Brown is exurban, dark blue is Small Metro.

Kalamazoo is right at the border between Small Metro and Urban. I'm counting it as Urban, but just barely.

St. Clair, Midland, and Berrien counties are all on the border between Small Metro and Rural. There's no way the home of Dow Chemical can be counted as rural, so I guess Berrien and St. Clair, which are less rural, fall under Small Metro.

Monroe can be considered an exurb of Toledo, I guess.

[Adam Griffin]

So I've just been messing around, applying my standard to more and more states. There are plenty of issues I'm running into, as expected.

Places like NW AR and Collin County TX being "urban" (because of the large county populations/everybody living in municipalities), the large counties out west and large distances between populated areas making too many counties "mini-metro", etc.

In addition to that, I have been running into some issues with none of my categories applying in some situations; namely, areas that are between 50-75k, have large percentages of their populations in a city but that do not qualify for suburban/exurban/mini-metro by my definitions. In these situations (for example, Pope County, AR), I've given them "mini-metro" classification. I was a bit lenient with NM, for instance (several of its SE counties were in this boat), but in AZ, I followed the rules strictly just to show the problem.

Feel free to continue critiquing: hopefully we can refine these standards and come up with something more uniform, but I'm not confident of a standard emerging that'll deal with all areas.

[Adam Griffin]

Not that this is a big deal, but the red-to-green color scheme works terrible for maps like these because those colors have strong associations with value judgement (i.e., green="good" and red="bad").  Even sticking with the red-to-green scheme, it would make more sense for the urban areas to be red because red suggests "higher intensity" or "heat" which would be more associated with cities in this context.  However, I would suggest adopting a more neutral color scheme.

Also, I think you're being too stingy with the "Mini-Metro" category and too generous with "Exurbia" (which, if you're from Metro Atlanta, I can definitely understand haha).  Tuscaloosa, AL is definitely more like a Mini-Metro even if it is close to Birmingham, and Fort Payne definitely feels more rural than Oconee County, GA even though DeKalb County has an Interstate and is close to "urban" Huntsville.  Maybe adjust the population caps?

Well, the color scheme would apply in a literal assessment of value: green = "high-value" or "money". I'm just using this tentatively, though, and red/green contrast so I thought it was relevant.

I stressed about Tuscaloosa, namely because its boundaries and Birmingham's was just within 40 miles of each other and therefore was excluded from being its own metro area. Additionally, it just barely missed the cut-off for "urban"; its county population is 202k and its city population is 96k, falling just short of a majority of a county's 200k residents residing in one municipality.

[Gass3268]

So I've just been messing around, applying my standard to more and more states. There are plenty of issues I'm running into, as expected.

Places like NW AR and Collin County TX being "urban" (because of the large county populations/everybody living in municipalities), the large counties out west and large distances between populated areas making too many counties "mini-metro", etc.

In addition to that, I have been running into some issues with none of my categories applying in some situations; namely, areas that are between 50-75k, have large percentages of their populations in a city but that do not qualify for suburban/exurban/mini-metro by my definitions. In these situations (for example, Pope County, AR), I've given them "mini-metro" classification.

Feel free to continue critiquing: hopefully we can refine these standards and come up with something more uniform, but I'm not confident of a standard emerging that'll deal with all areas.

Curious as to why you labeled Knox Count, TN a mini-metro? I've driven through there multiple times and it definitely looks and feels like an urban county.

[Adam Griffin]

Curious as to why you labeled Knox Count, TN a mini-metro? I've driven through there multiple times and it definitely looks and feels like an urban county.

It missed the cut-off for my initial "urban" definition.

Code:

URBAN               a) county with at least one city of >200k residents
		or
                        b) county with >200k residents; majority residing in one city and/or two-thirds residing in all municipalities

While it's a county of more than 200k, Knoxville has 185k residents, barely missing the threshold; 60% of Knox County lives outside the city limits. This fairly clumsy configuration - with such large segments of the metro living in the outer boundaries of Knox County and the inner boundaries of all surrounding counties - is a large part of why it has such a large "suburban" ring compared to other mini-metros and even "urban" areas like Chattanooga (which is almost identical in population) while having no exurban counties.

[Sol]

County lines also make a big difference in NC; Rocky Mount's a big place but is split in half by the Nash-Edgecombe county line. This makes both counties categorization a little stupid but that's kind of unavoidable when the county is the unit of analysis.

I'm a little confused about the situation in the Hickory area. I don't quite get why Caldwell County is a mini-metro when Catawba County, where downtown Hickory is located, is shunted to exurbia--is it because of the Charlotte sprawl in the SE corner? Because Hickory, while definitely in Charlotte's orbit, is probably better put as a separate thing. It seems like this is a similar case for Tuscaloosa and Gainesville, GA as well, though both seem more integrated into the neighboring metropolis.

I also don't get Rutherford County, NC at all--what is it a suburb of? Asheville (lol)?

[publicunofficial]

Washington:



Walla Walla, Grays Harbor, Cowlitz, and Chelan were the ones I had the most trouble categorizing.

[RI]

Washington:



Walla Walla, Grays Harbor, Cowlitz, and Chelan were the ones I had the most trouble categorizing.

That map really doesn't feel right to me... Island, Walla Walla, Lewis, Kitsap, maybe Chelan... Whitman's territory is very rural but it's population is very mini-metro (68% in Pullman). I just don't think I really buy this metric we're using, and I don't know if the county level is the proper level of aggregation to be looking at this anyway.

[publicunofficial]

Washington:



Walla Walla, Grays Harbor, Cowlitz, and Chelan were the ones I had the most trouble categorizing.

That map really doesn't feel right to me... Island, Walla Walla, Lewis, Kitsap, maybe Chelan... Whitman's territory is very rural but it's population is very mini-metro (68% in Pullman). I just don't think I really buy this metric we're using, and I don't know if the county level is the proper level of aggregation to be looking at this anyway.

Yeah this was kinda made to show how a formula that works for most of the country doesn't 100% work with Washington. Because other states have small, uniformly sized counties and Washington's counties were very much drawn with the attitude of "Well, we have to put this mountain range SOMEWHERE"

Specifically, we could use a category for counties that occupy a large area but have most of the population packed into a small city. Chelan, Cowlitz, Grays Harbor,  and Walla Walla fall into this category, and I don't feel comfortable calling any of those mini metros.

Whitman county has just under 50K people, so I felt rural was appropriate.

Island I think falls into rural but I'm willing to hear an argument. Most of the county lives in unincorporated area, and from my experience the county feels very similar to Clallam or Jefferson.

[Goldwater]

I'm not an expert on these things, but I would think that if a county has multiple types of areas in it you typically go with the larger type of area, so for example a county with both urban and suburban areas would be classified as urban, a county with both both exurban and rural would be exurban, etc. Using that logic, I would call places like Chelan mini-metros, though admittedly they don't quite have the same feel as someplace like a collage town.

[Ban my account ffs!]

This is interesting, but I have no desire to start using paint programs, which I have generally hated with the exception of KidPix for the Macintosh in elementary school which could provide minutes of entertainment before finding something better to do.

This is so hard to do because counties were not divided in any way that is meaningful in the modern world.  For example, the Duluth MSA includes all of St. Louis County, Minnesota which is just shy of 7000 sq. miles.  In contrast, the size of the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island put together is about 100 sq. miles smaller.  The entire state of New Jersey is only 1800 sq. miles larger!

I can tell you right now that the vast swaths of wilderness or even the bulk of the Mesabi Iron Range are not part of Duluth and the county should not be considered urban by any means.

Instead we should be drawing a map using the states but then using urban cluster maps with delineations in density to determine whether an area is urban, suburban, exurban, "mini-metro"/micropolitan, or truly rural first.. then see if there's a way to further subdivide the rural areas into geographical chunks that make "cultural" sense.  It would be a big project that would take close team work.. but it might result in something more meaningful for this discussion.

Edit:  Media markets might be a good way to divide the rural areas.  The area I grew up in was in a media desert since there were local stations in Duluth, Grand Forks, and Fargo.. but Duluth's coverage ended east of us and the NoDak stations west of us (though they did mention us more)... so we just watched Twin Cities news media.  This is also interesting because this "belt" of Twin Cities media market that sticks way up north between the Duluth/NoDak markets are also the only area of greater northern MN that are growing.

[mieastwick]

By Griffin's definitions, pretty much all the mini-metros, suburbs, and urban areas are classified as Urbanized Areas by the Census (of which there are 486 in the United States). Small towns are considered by the Census Urban Clusters (of which there are 3087 in the United States). 71.2% of the US lives in Urbanized Areas and 8.5% lives in Urban Clusters. Urbanized Areas are substantially less White than the U.S. as a whole.

[Adam Griffin]

Well, my initial attempt at definitions was mainly a way to fuse some of the prior recommendations together, but it's obvious we're going to need a different set(s) of standards for doing this.

One thought that occurred to me: should we consider breaking up the country into various groupings of states (in part based on county size/populations)? I obviously have a Southern-centric view of looking at these things and while I think my definitions actually work very well for a state like GA (lots of counties that are geographically small, with sprawl), it's not going to be ideal elsewhere.

Maybe something like this?

[The_Doctor]

I would be happy to assist with this. I'm solid at data gathering. (Just saying)

[jimrtex]

So I've just been messing around, applying my standard to more and more states. There are plenty of issues I'm running into, as expected.

Places like NW AR and Collin County TX being "urban" (because of the large county populations/everybody living in municipalities), the large counties out west and large distances between populated areas making too many counties "mini-metro", etc.

In addition to that, I have been running into some issues with none of my categories applying in some situations; namely, areas that are between 50-75k, have large percentages of their populations in a city but that do not qualify for suburban/exurban/mini-metro by my definitions. In these situations (for example, Pope County, AR), I've given them "mini-metro" classification. I was a bit lenient with NM, for instance (several of its SE counties were in this boat), but in AZ, I followed the rules strictly just to show the problem.

Feel free to continue critiquing: hopefully we can refine these standards and come up with something more uniform, but I'm not confident of a standard emerging that'll deal with all areas.

You are mixing up "metropolitan" and "urban". You quibble is not how the Census Bureau classifies population as urban and rural, it is a quibble with how Merriam-Webster defines urban.

It is hopeless to classify counties as urban, suburban, or rural.

The Census Bureau has a workable definition of Urban Area based on population density, which does not depend on political subdivisions, including cities or counties, whose mean varies throughout the country.

Perhaps one could apply a subjective standard when urban areas extend like tentacles along highways, or where Urbanized Areas have been grandfathered and remain separate.

The Census Bureau defines Urban Areas with a population of 50,000 or above as Urbanized Areas. Urbanized Areas form the basis of Metropolitan Statistical Areas. The traditional threshold for a Metropolitan Area was 50,000. This might be a case where areas close to 100,000 were arguably Metropolitan in character and those below 50,000 clearly were not. The Census Bureau considered a classification of Mesopolitan between Micropolitan and Metropolitan. This was rejected, in part because it would have caused a demotion for certain areas.

But there is no reason that Urbanized Areas between 50,000 and 100,000 (125,000 or 150,000) might form a middle group.

Then one could consider the Census Bureau definition of the counties in CBSA (Metropolitan, Mesopolitan, and Micropolitan) incorporate the correct set of counties, or whether there should be a population component, in addition to commuting share, and how are counties within a CBSA classified.

[Tekken_Guy]

Well, my initial attempt at definitions was mainly a way to fuse some of the prior recommendations together, but it's obvious we're going to need a different set(s) of standards for doing this.

One thought that occurred to me: should we consider breaking up the country into various groupings of states (in part based on county size/populations)? I obviously have a Southern-centric view of looking at these things and while I think my definitions actually work very well for a state like GA (lots of counties that are geographically small, with sprawl), it's not going to be ideal elsewhere.

Maybe something like this?

This is weird. Why do Virginia and Florida get their own regions? And who considers MO, KS, NE, and IA to be southern states?

[Bus Wanker]

Took a stab at Illinois. Struggled with Rockford vs Springfield vs Champaign-Urbana, on whether they are urban or mini metros. Mostly based on my own perceptions, I determined Rockford (Winnebago County) to be urban and Springfield (Sangamon County) and Champaign just barely miss the cut. With all the new high rises in Champaign as well as the fairly dense downtown core, I could definitely see the argument for urban though. I'm somewhat comfortable leaving Sangamon as a mini metro.

I don't have the minimum number of posts to link a photo, so here's the url:
ibb.co/e0KiyF

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

How would this work in the case of Texas?

[SATW]

Well, my initial attempt at definitions was mainly a way to fuse some of the prior recommendations together, but it's obvious we're going to need a different set(s) of standards for doing this.

One thought that occurred to me: should we consider breaking up the country into various groupings of states (in part based on county size/populations)? I obviously have a Southern-centric view of looking at these things and while I think my definitions actually work very well for a state like GA (lots of counties that are geographically small, with sprawl), it's not going to be ideal elsewhere.

Maybe something like this?

This is weird. Why do Virginia and Florida get their own regions? And who considers MO, KS, NE, and IA to be southern states?

Virginia has independent cities and Florida has so much population packed into small areas of land, maybe? idk, your guess is as good as mine.

[PragmaticPopulist]

I know this is old, but it looks like an interesting project. Are you still working on this Fmr. Pres Griffin? I could take a stab at Maryland for you.

[RINO Tom]

Took a stab at Illinois. Struggled with Rockford vs Springfield vs Champaign-Urbana, on whether they are urban or mini metros. Mostly based on my own perceptions, I determined Rockford (Winnebago County) to be urban and Springfield (Sangamon County) and Champaign just barely miss the cut. With all the new high rises in Champaign as well as the fairly dense downtown core, I could definitely see the argument for urban though. I'm somewhat comfortable leaving Sangamon as a mini metro.

I don't have the minimum number of posts to link a photo, so here's the url:
ibb.co/e0KiyF

I know there are some arbitrary constraints with this, but it's weird to see Rockford considered urban...



... while Peoria is not: