If you mentioned Toronto in the Great Lakes región, you should’ve mentioned Tijuana in the California region. The cultural and economic connection is important
@@openranks4519hmmm. Many people in SoCal speak Spanish (not just Hispanics) & many people in TJ speak English. You like it or not, SD and TJ are more culturally related in many ways than SD and the Midwest
Nice that you mentioned the immense rail hub in Chicago. Im a locomotive engineer and rail is a huge industry here. Not to mention a big employer. Seems everyone knows someone here who works for the rail in some capacity. Another good vid. Thanks!
Once railroads came into existence a major city located at the southern end of Lake Michigan was inevitable. It could have been in a slightly different location but it was going to happen. The amount of freight that travels by rail is hard for alot of people to understand. Most of it is out of sight, out of mind. One sad thing today is a lot of industrial parks no longer have rail service.
@@mpetersen6not really. Chicago got it's start due to the waterways. The Mississippi River system and lake Michigan connect there and it's only a few miles away from each other.
For the northeast corridor the amtrak trains, as flawed as they are sometimes, are a godsend. Not only is it a comfortable and fun way to travel but it saves you the stress of driving/parking in the city. If I were to drive into Boston it would take about 2 hours, plus you would need to find and pay a hefty price for parking. With amtrak, I drive 20 minutes to my station to board a 1 hour and 10 minutes ride with free wifi, a relatively cozy chair, and a cafe car if you're hungry. The price of the ticket is cheaper than the price of parking alone, the comfort and stress-free experience of it is the cherry on top.
As someone who lives in the Great Lakes region I'm praying for Biden to juice up Amtrak out here. The Great Lakes is the only other region in the US that has the infrastructure to have Northeast levels of public transit.
Having been to all fifty states, the only mega region that actually legit feels like a mega region is the northeast corridor. The other ones just don't feel as continuously connected or large enough.
Based on your criteria, Tijuana should have been included in the SoCal megaregion. There is a lot of cross-border cooperation, and thousands of families live on one side of the border, but work or go to school on the other side (in both directions).
but there’s no mutually beneficial cooperation in that. families on the US side aren’t also sending their kids to tijuana. ppl also aren’t going to tijuana to work. there’s no cultural or economic reciprocity
@@polyphonicdavid I live in San Diego. I know a lot of people that have moved to Tijuana from San Diego and Los Angeles counties because it's a whole lot more affordable to live there. They cross the border back to the US to go to work and to visit friends and family. Additionally, a lot of people in the region go down to Tijuana to go see doctors and dentists because it's way more affordable than going to see them in the US.
I think this was a really helpful video especially as I try to explain to new immigrants how North America really works. Looking forward to the next video where you hopefully address Silicon Valley and the SF Bay Area.
@@TheUrbanOrganismI'd argue Toronto is part of the separate region of the Quebec-Windsor Corridor. Chicago is much more connected to Milwaukee and Indianapolis
Seems like a major oversight not to include Tijuana (1.9 million pop) and northern Baja California in the Southern California megaregion given that there are multiple major border crossings (San Ysidro, Otay Mesa, Tecate, Calexico and Calexico East) with one of them being the busiest US border crossing
You could add Tecate, Rosarito and Ensenada to the Mix, still fairly minor Cities in comparisson but still integrated to the region as a whole. I would Say 2.3 Mill in total. In the past few years they've had a major influx of American expats mainly because of the housing affordability. Not to mention the amount of manufacturing and logistics occuring in Baja California that serves directly the american market. Funny how he avoided Tijuana but mentioned Vancouver and Toronto though.
@@alankingdmv Um tijuana abuts the border and metropolitain San Diego also abuts the border. The southernmost San Diego Trolley (light rail) station is at the San Ysidro border crossing so thats about as contiguous as you can get. Or are you referring to Phoenix? If so there are some arguments, albeit tenuous ones, for its inclusion based on how warehouses in Phoenix are used as a first offloading point for trucks coming from the ports of LA and Long Beach. That said there is a lot of nothing on I-10 between Indio Ca and Buckeye Az that is tempting call a megaregion border.
The northeast corridor of the country is just so densely populated compared to the rest of the country it’s crazy. The Baltimore metro area alone has 2mil+ people and getting Amtrak tickets anywhere in the area is stupid expensive. It’s great to live driving distance from so many cities here!
You can get cheap Amtrak tickets but you have to travel at odd times usually very early in the morning or late at night. That’s the only time I ever take Amtrak actually.
I'm lucky I live at the end of the corridor and for me if I want to hitch a train to Boston I can get it for $19 if I order a day in advance. I've checked out prices to washington out of curiosity and I was astounded at seeing hundreds of dollars.
I feel outside of the northeast corridor, no other region in the US would fit the definition of mega region in the international sense. They are all too spread out with poor public transportation connecting them
Great job, Geoff! The growth of megaregions in the US has to be one of the most misunderstood (and politically ignored) occurrences in the 21st century. You seldom hear politicians address their existence and while many are still in their early stages of development, it wouldn't surprise me if several, if not all of them, will begin to rival the power of many states in the near future, especially as these areas begin to coordinate responses to various common needs. Another interesting outcome may be their role in re-awakening a new localism moving away from the states only. New institutions could arise to address many problems facing urban centers that state legislatures are ill-equipped to provide.
The Great Leakes Megaregion incorporates part of the Quebec-Windsor corridor in Canada. Considering a lot of the trade from the Great Lakes goes up the St-Lawrence through the Montreal area, you could argue for the inclusion of the whole Quebec-Windsor corridor into the Great Lakes Megaregion. Usually the reason the Quebec portion is excluded is the linguistic difference, but that has never stopped trade in the past.
It's really not though. Yes there is ample economic and trade activity, but culturally the "Great Lakes" region (bad name) is completely different from Quebecoise and even Finger Lakes and North country culture.
I live in Ottawa, it's very empty between here and Toronto, the night sky has so much stars there. To the east, it might be only small villages, but there's continuous population between Ottawa and Montreal. Montreal might be more connected culturally to the East Coast than the midwest. The St. Lawrence Seaway to the Great Lakes effectively bypasses Montreal. The Quebec-Windsor corridor is two regions, basically Upper and Lower Canada.
Something I’d suggest is doing some more research from the Canadian sides of the mega regions as the cascade mega region goes up too Campbell river. And as far east as hope. But should include all the cities along the east coast of Vancouver island as well as Powell river and the Sunshine Coast. Same goes from the Great Lakes which should go all the way to Quebec City as they are all connected.
I partially disagree. It should go all the way to hope just so that it incompasses the lower mainland, and yes it should have metro Victoria, and maybe up to Courtenay, but not Powell river and sunshine Coast. They feel bigger as I'm assuming you also live in British Columbia, but they are really small towns that he would have no chance of knowing If he does not live in Canada or Washington.
love this kind of stuff... I remember when I was younger and used to collect national geographic magazines, in one issue they had an article about the region from Boston to DC called "Megalopolis". and it included a detailed map of the region that I had hung on my wall for awhile.
I remember that as well. I thought it was pretty cool. Grew up in the Chicago area, never knowing that I'd eventually be moving to the NE Megalopolis for the majority of my life!
I would definitely be more interested in seeing an in depth video discussing and examining certain Mega regions and how integrated and connected the areas are to each other within one.
@@BeaverGeography It's funny because in a different comment I told someone to watch your video on it. I even have your 3 maps on the great lakes saved to my phone.
he also forgot to mention the Sacramento / Bay Area region as well, which is very connected to the LA region with a lot of trucks going up and down the state, it is often forgotten on these kind of lists
Tijuana MX (population 2 million) should included in SoCal mega region. I was delineating the many ways San Diego & Tijuana are integrated, but lost my comment thread. Not willing to rewrite it all again, but if you research it, you will concur. Check it out.
Am I the only one that thought it was out of pocket, or at least a bit odd, that he said one of the main things dallas was known for is the JFK assassination?
I went to the Richardson a few times for schools and there was always someone that wanted to go down to Dealy Plaza to see where JFK was shot. I’ve been there a few times.
Good video. I would include Tijuana and Las Vegas in the San Diego-LA mega area. The san diego Tijuana border is the most crossed border in the world i believe. People cross every day to work or to enjoy cheaper food/healthcare. Tijuana should definately be included. Las vegas is a popular and easy weekend getaway and many people move to and from las vegas. I think it shares the same culture as LA as being an entertainment capital of the world.
I would not include Las Vegas. I live in L.A. and Palm Springs, and I never visit Las Vegas. Better to include Santa Barbara instead of stopping at Ventura.
@@franwex if the Texas triangle cities are considered a mega region, I don't consider a stretch to include las Vegas. Dallas to Houston is 239 miles Los Angeles to Las Vegas is 289.
@@ronnyrueda5926 that’s true. Though I think there’s more population between the major cities on the triangle than LA-Vegas. So it may make more sense. But yeah, I’m guessing adding Vegas to the SoCal region is not out of this world. I used to live in the LA area and used to go to Vegas very often.
I live in Northern Indiana but never knew we were considered to be within a megaregion lol. But it makes sense because it feels like everything is so densely populated here even in the countryside compared to when I've been out to Kansas.
I would've probably added the next two mega-regions here, namely because how nebulous the definitions can be and how close the populations have been to SoCal/Triangle recently (That's assuming I'm guessing them right). A generous Piedmont definition could definitely push it above the Triangle/SoCal, for example. It sits in a sea of small to middle-size metros, and it looks like, on this map, to be a pretty skinny version (particularly in SC and GA). I'm think I see Raleigh, Durham, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Fayetteville and Charlotte in NC; Greenville, Spartanburg in SC; Atlanta, Athens in GA; and Birmingham, Huntsville, Shoals and Tuscaloosa in AL. Chattanooga, Augusta and Columbia SC are surprising omissions. Asheville, Knoxville, Tri-Cities, Columbus GA/Auburn and Montgomery would be pretty easy to include, too. More egregious reaches I've seen include Charleston, Savannah, Nashville, and Memphis, which feel far, but, then again, St. Louis is considered Great Lakes. The other, the Florida Peninsula, had explosive growth recently. While it's less likely to have passed the Triangle, I wouldn't be surprised if it's within surprisingly close spitting distance for the Triangle/SoCal.
I don't think it would qualify, the regions in the video are all centered around 3-4 big cities, and he forgot to mention the Sacramento / SF Bay Area region as well, which is highly connected with the LA region
You Should have added Tijuana on the Southern California Megaregion, at least culturally and demographically, SD and TJ share a whole lot, let alone the daily crossing between countries from each side, its as easy to find Mexicans in SD, as it is to find Americans in TJ, and not only there but in Baja California, but lets keep it simple with TJ I guess
Interesting that St. Louis is included in the Great Lakes megaregion. Makes sense since this post-industrial river city has a lot in common with Chicago, including many years of inter-city economic competition and interaction.
They were once considering moving the capital here long ago. St.Louis was supposed to be the railroad hub but lost to the steamboat industry (obviously the wrong choice in hindsight).
LMAO you did Dallas so dirty. I’m a Houstonian and love seeing them get snubbed, but that was uncalled for. If anyone really wants a more accurate breakdown of the major Texas cities’ economies, it’s: -Houston: Petrochemical/O&G/energy, trade (international shipping), manufacturing, aerospace, medical (largest med center in the world, eat your heart out, Boston); also the only city that anchors two mega regions, the other being the Gulf Coast -Dallas: banking, commerce, entertainment/tourism (eg sports, six flags), some O&G, travel (DFW) -Fort Worth: idk…manufacturing? It used to be a hub for ranchers to get their goods to the rails -Austin: government, tech (Silicon Hills), education, tourism (eg nature, SXSW, ACL) -San Antonio: tourism (eg riverwalk, Alamo, food, other six flags), military/medical (largest VA hospital in the nation and some large bases), trade (specifically with Mexico along I35)
The video was incredible overall I just think that a point was missed nit including TJ to the SOCAL region bc it's intrumental to the san diegan economy and vise versa. (I say this as a local and with personal experience)
I agree. Philadelphia, South New Jersey, Washington and Baltimore are not like points northward such as New York City, Providence, and Boston. People in southern New Jersey in the pine barrens even sound somewhat southern, as do many people within Maryland and parts of Delaware.
I have been reading about megaregions from authors such as Richard Florida, Bruce Lang, and others. I am interested in the mega region of the Southeast. I subscribed for that purpose.
I think this is a good place to start for high speed rail. Texas and California only involve one jurisdiction. The North East is heavily populated and the only area that’s close to high speed rail. The Great Lakes are the least likely as they are spread out, divided by giant lakes and in multiple states. But a Chicago to Philly high speed could be done in 3 states (Pittsburgh to Cleveland to Toledo and Chicago or Columbus to Indianapolis instead) and spurs could be built servicing Detroit, Milwaukee and Cincinnati. It would amazing to loop it back through Detroit and Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and down to Boston forming a high speed ring rail around Erie and Ontario
@@chrise842 similar to the goals of the trillions of taxpayer money spent on roads, highways, bridges,etc for automobiles. Except with less pollution, money, sprawl, congestion, time wasted, etc.
For why parts of Mexico and the st Lawrence river parts weren’t included, it might have to do with cultural & linguistic differences. Or maybe he forgot, idk
It’s quite interesting that the region that is literally the most car-centric of the 4 happens to be the fastest growing ☹️ The Texas Triangle may be growing the fastest but the people that are moving there are just bringing more and more cars to the area with presumably more urban sprawl to boot. It would be nice if these cities really had some good public transit plans to keep up with this. You can’t build a city on freeways alone. Just hurry up and build Texas Central please 🙏
@@lanxy2398San Antonio and Austin are among the fastest growing large cities in the country. San Antonio will pass Philly for 6th largest city by the end of the decade. It's also where loads of Mexican food go before spreading out to the rest of Texas and beyond. The Texas Triangle is home 4 of the 10 largest cities in the country. And Dallas should have been labeled DFW as it's a large metro area itself. Houston is the energy capital of the world and Dallas keeps attracting more and more business from California and others. The region will continue to grow. The one in the worst shape to handle the growth is Austin. It doesn't have the highway infrastructure to handle the growth it's experiencing.
@@dvs620 The growth is a blip at best, these aren’t the fastest growing cities for long. 1-2 years of growth isn’t much on the long term and Texas has already seen it’s population of just new comers drop off. These will never be world class cities because they all are 100% car centric. The downtowns are minuscule and they lack the infrastructure to breed more innovation.
Dallas does have a fairly extensive light rail system, though. The rest of the South is actually worse than Texas, believe it or not. At least here, you can technically take DART to most of the colleges and universities, and to DFW airport.
I recently drove from Detroit to Orlando and it’s interesting that without knowing anything about mega regions before I could almost intuitively sense the borders. After passing southern Ohio it feels a lot more disconnected and like you have left civilization up until you reach central Florida
I'm surprised you didn't mention Grand Rapids, economically it's a pretty important city. Meijer, haworth, amway, steelcase, and herman miller are all based there. I am also surprised that Traverse City wasn't included, because culturally and economically they're tied to chicago, grand rapids, detroit, etc. It'd be great to see a long form video on each region, dealers choice on what aspects to focus on.
Well, he also skipped a number of other large cities in that region. Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Columbus, and Pittsburgh, just to name a few of the cities that are within the map boundaries of the Great Lakes Megaregion that he showed, that weren't included in the list. I think he just did that for simplicity sake, so as to not have to list off a large number of cities.
Minneapolis and Rochester should have been included in the Great Lakes. Minneapolis is a huge hub for some of your highlighted regions and shares all of the cultural and transport links you described.
Being born and raised in STL, I'm surprised to see the amoeba you drew extending to it. I never felt any connection to the great lakes. There is a minor cultural connection to Chicago, as a lot of STLans have family there and like to visit "the big city" but that's about it. The Texas Triangle could extend eastward to include Beaumont/Port Arthur, though those cities had there heyday over 100 years ago and have been slowly dying. They are decent sized cities, though.
well that amoeba incorporates all the fairly large cities on the drive down through Illinois. That also encompasses Springfield and Bloomington/Normal. There is a string of economic ties all the way down. He also drew lines out to grab the largest population centers in Eastern Iowa. I think that its more that the Mississippi River Corridor is so tied to the Great Lakes Economically that you can't really ignore them. It should either be leave St. Louis, Davenport (QC) and Dubuque out of the Great Lakes or include Minneapolis. Also from that hub in the Chicago region you have highways and rail lines shooting straight out to all those large Mississippi river towns.
Strangely, I've lived in 3 of those 4 megaregions (SoCal, Texas, NE Corridor) almost my entire life (except for a few years in Iraq and Afghanistan). Ironic, considering I don't like urban areas.
Toronto rivals or exceeds Chicago's importance, has the second largest finance industry in North America, the provincial Ontario Government, major industry, massive TV and Film industry, and real estate and construction industry, etc...
Rochester is not culturally related whatsoever to Buffalo, Chicago, or Milwaukee. Rochester is culturally closer to the Northeast than the Great Lakes Megaregion. In truth Rochester, Ithaca, and the rest of the Finger Lakes is truly it's own Microregion.
I would actually argue that Buffalo, along with the other cities along the I-90 corridor, belongs in an Upstate NY microregion because, realistically, Syracuse, Rochester, and Buffalo are incredibly similar to each other and have almost identical histories to one another. All three cities also share a bit of an identity crisis in terms of whether they're the Midwest or the East Coast. I'm from Syracuse, went to UB for school, and live in Philly now. I tell people down here all the time that if you've seen Rochester, then you've seen Syracuse and vice versa. However, to your point, I don't think Rochester is a part of the Northeast megaregion. Living in Philadelphia and knowing many people from New York City from college has shown me that the Northeast megaregion is a whole other beast entirely
Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse are all essentially the same city with minor tweaks. He was correct to include Rochester as an off-shoot of the Great Lakes Region. Just like Pittsburgh has way more in common with those Midwestern cities than it does with Philadelphia.
You don't know your geography at all. I am from Cleveland with family in Rochester...ain't no way Rochester is related to any northeast cities. For starters you're in upstate NY which IS NOTHING LIKE THE NORTHEAST AT ALL. You guys are a smaller Buffalo, which in turn is like other Great lakes towns like Flint,Akron and others. You thinking a little far out what your city actually is
Very interesting. Why was Tijuana, Mexico not included in the South West Californian mega region? At one time, the name Megalopolis was favoured and I remember the North East mega region was nicknamed BosWash, ie. Boston-Washington.
It’s in a different country. Mega regions are culturally very simila to the point they could be one city. Tijuana has nothing to do with San Diego or LA
@@sisilotau2185 San Diego and Tijuana are not as similar as Vancouver and Seattle….Not even the language. Plus Chicanos and Mexicans aren’t exactly the same.
I agree. With people leaving over the past few years, local municipalities pivoting away from relying on industry, and the looming climate crisis, the great lakes region is poised to be the safest and cheapest places to live and invest in. Also, logistically it is the most logical place to stage and headquarter logistics companies.
Id say the Southern California megaregion also extends into Tijuana. I knew so many people in San Diego who commuted from Tijuana to work in The States
It would be informative to explain why Tijuana isn't included in the SoCal megaregion, while Vancouver and Toronto are included in their megaregions. I assume it is because the USA-Canada border is basically open while the SW California border is really hard and slow to cross. (also differences between the dominant majority cultures of USA and Mexico are much larger than between USA and Canada.)
Mega-regional heat islands have warmed Barents Sea and the Arctic Ocean. The tipping point on warmth has been passed because of this. In summer, the Arctic cannot balance tropical heat, and will be less able to do so as time passes.
He mentioned Dallas-Fort Worth but didn’t mark Fort Worth on the map. It was a major stop on the Chisholm Trail and has a HUGE loop around it.. kinda hard to miss.
I'd love to see some of the other countries get featured. People don't really have a good idea of the scale of Mexico City or Sao Paulo. Other American regions like The California Bay-Sac, Sea-Tac in Washington, or Phoenix would be cool to see.
In Europe there are many mega regions too: Randstad 9 million the Netherlands, Rhine-Ruhr area 9 million Germany, Paris-Ile de France region 5 million France and Po valley plain, Italy.
Not only is the Northeast Corridor the most economically productive mega region in the US, it’s the most economically productive mega region in the entire world (by nominal GDP). It’s the back bone of the the worlds largest national economy.
I can tell you for China, it is Beijing - Tianjin, Shandong by itself, Nanjing/Shanghai/Hangzhou area, Fujian area, Hong Kong - Guangdong area, and that's just the coastal areas
Really great video, but only thing I would say is that I would consider Tijuana as a part of the Southern California region. As someone from San Diego, there is a lot of consistent movement across the border with trade and people.
10:29..Lol, say what???😂😂😂😂😂😂. It was a tragic event, but what does it have to do with the current economy and culture???????? William McKinley was assainated in Buffalo, why didn't you mention that??
@@abalister6661 good point, yet it begs the question how are the boundaries of a mega region determined. Why would SF be in a separate mega region than Seattle. Similar to DC and NYC, I’m sure there are several daily flights from SF to the Pacific Northwest. I would also include the research triangle in the north east mega region, but that’s just me. Maybe Geoff will address.
No we don’t consider ourselves affiliated with Seattle down here except for the number of tech companies from there that also have a presence here in Silicon Valley.
@@geoffseyon3264 if we are looking at cultural ties or cultural affiliation then I think you should consider North Carolina as part of the NE mega region. Having been in dc for a quarter century there’s a lot migration between NC and DC/Baltimore and I imagine NYC as well. Just my $.02.
I've never been to California in my life. But there's nothing about Cascadia that I can attribute to the Bay Area. The Bay Area is its own unique thing for sure.
Great video, but as a Canadian, found it very odd that you excluded Canada from the title, seeing at it plays a huge role in one of the megaregions you mentioned.
Arizona native here. But from the great lakes originally.we have a smaller megaregion here called the Arizona Sun Corridor. It stretches feom prescott all rhe way down into phoenix, tucson and to nogales in santa cruz county. I live in flagstaff though and due to its high elevation it stays cool here so a lot of people from the "Valley" come up to visit from phoenix and tucson. I love arizona though. Has so much natural beauty and is pretty untouched in some areas.
Megaregions are a concept of the treasonous and globalist UN agenda 21/2030! It's abusing the environment and fringe groups to actively attack the middle class and its economic base via new types of regulation and zoning. It basically works by creating new entities, offices and regions, circumventing the traditional separation of powers of the republic, merging several administration leaders into new units (less democratic control) and usually gets initiated by some urban revitalization programs, rural restructuring programs etc.. For that purpose they initiate fake grassroots looking stakeholder groups while they already have their detailed end goals of city planning ready and manipulate the stakeholder groups to arrive at them without noticing upfront by employing the DELPHI group leading technique. It's all tied into the United Nations and each city or county will need to make payments of tax revenue to a company in Bonn/Germany for the "opportunity" of being allowed to participate in that program! Several cities already cancelled their contracts!
Interesting how Vancouver is considered a part of the Cascadia region, Toronto in the GL region, but Tijuana is not a part of the Southern California region?
Mexico has two megaregions that I'm aware of (let's not count Tijuana, which is more connected to the Southern California). The most important one is the Mexico City Megalopolis. It has the major concentration of people in the country (25% of the country's population). Its major cities include Mexico City (the capital and connected to many other cities in the Mexican Valley), Puebla, Toluca, Cuernavaca, Pachuca and recently Querétaro. The other megaregion is the Bajío Megaregion. It includes major cities throughout the country like León, Zacatecas, Guadalajara, San Luis Potosí, Aguascalientes, Morelia, Celaya and Irapuato. Querétaro is also considered part of it. I wonder if that would unify both the Mexico and Bajio Megaregion
MTY is a megaregion bc a lot of people equate Nuevo Leon with MTY metro area from the amount of municipalities that comprise that area. You could also include it with Saltillo and Tamaulipas/ Texas Rio Grande Valley border cities.
The Texas Triangle also connects tonthe Corpus Christi port through San Antonio and I-37 and Monterrey by way of Laredo to San Antonio through I-35. An argument can be made thay the Texas triangle extends into Mexico, between the rich Mexican history of Dan Antonio and South Texas and the ports of Houston and Corpus (by way of San Antonio). Throw in the oil fracking region South of San Antonio, the oil refineries of Corpus and trade on the Mexican border from Brownsville to Laredo stengthen the entire region.
The Texas Triangle is expected to be the most populated area in the country by 2100 with Dallas-Fort Worth having over 30 million people becoming the most populated metro area in the country and Austin over 25 million people. As someone who lives in Dallas, I can confirm, this place is growing very very fast
There's still a ceiling to that growth. At some point people are no longer gonna be interested in commuting 2 hours each way to get to work. Just like NYC hit that growth ceiling in the 1970s and has remained stabilized ever since, those Sunbelt cities will hit the same ceiling if they don't do something about car-dependent growth.
@@dirtycommie2877 The difference is that the "centers" of Texas cities are growing outside the downtowns. People don't always commute downtown but rather to many of the loops.
@@stischer47 Most major metropolitan areas of over 5 million have "suburban downtowns" in addition to the downtown of the core city. That doesn't necessarily mean that every commuter is gonna live in close proximity to a job that's located in one of those key suburbs. I've lived in the DC metropolitan area my entire life and I've never once had a job working inside of DC proper. But I've only had 1 job that was in close proximity to where I lived (less than 20 minutes).
Interesting enough, the Texas Triangle is the only mega-region contained within the boundaries of one state, although the Dallas-Forth Worth Metroplex is fast approaching the Oklahoma border.
I realize Minneapolis appears to be quite a distance from Milwaukee and Green Bay but it's still only a 5 hour drive from Minneapolis to Milwaukee which is reasonable for us Midwesterners. I haven't studied trade data like you have but culturally the Minneapolis area still shares a lot with the Great Lakes region, and economically Duluth is obviously the most northern Great Lakes shipping port in the US. Even as an Ohioan, I personally include Minneapolis with our region, connected through the small cities of Wisconsin Dells, Wasau, La Crosse, Eau Claire, Rochester, obviously Minneapolis itself, St. Cloud, and Duluth into the economic megaregion.
Great lakes megaregion should be retitled "Rust belt" & should go down into south ohio/very northern west virginia, as both areas face similar economic hardships.
Yah but I mean not in Canada. We call that area the Golden Horseshoe as it’s one of the wealthiest and fastest growing areas on earth. Quite literally the opposite of rust
If St Louis is part of the Steel Belt (Now Rust Belt) then Kansas City should be included. It's designed the same way for manufacturing and has many abandoned factories like every other Midwestern city.
As a STL'n, I've never figured out why STL is lumped in with the Great Lakes Megaregion, but Minneapolis isn't. It just seems culturally, geographically, economically, and climate are much more like CHI than STL is.
The PNW or Pacific Northwest region bears a close resemblance to the East Corridor region, but far far less populated. Vancouver - Seattle - Tacoma - Portland, a simple straight downward line connecting 4 cities, on 3 different states / (2 countries).
Tijuana and Mexicali should have been mentioned as part of the Southern California megaregion. These cities are so integral to the Southern California economy.
Dear Geoff, I am a linguist and a teacher of English in Italy, where are you from? From which US state? I saw the eating of letter T in words like "county" in speaking, I did listen! This eating of T happens in every zone of the US or in certain parts? In which parts? ---- And also: Is more frequent to say "The Us are" or "The Us is"?? Thank you very much! My best regards!
Well the definition includes economic and cultural ties. If the farmland between the cities is what throws you off, you have to acknowledge they play apart in the regions economy and culture. Its why there are skillets at every diner in the Midwest. The Midwest feeds the nation, and in some cases the world.
They should have mentioned that Baltimore is also the foremost Medical Research capital of the country. Johns Hopkins and all the medical schools there.
As someone who has lived in the PNW and traveled between Seattle and Portland but moved back to California, I’m not sure why you’d combine Seattle/Portland but not SF/LA. I’d say that the SF/LA connections are much more significant than that of Seattle/Portland. But also, combining pretty much all of the Midwest cities together? I’ve never lived there but I have driven through and around the Midwest for work and again don’t see the “interconnectivity”. The criteria for these megaregions seem a little arbitrary. Finally, the Southern California megaregion should also include Vegas.
I've lived in LA and the Midwest, and your criticisms are fair. The only real break between LA and SF is the Grapevine, the rest is just as dense as the connections in the Midwest (mostly empty farmland is doing a lot of work there). Once the HSR is built between LA and SF I think it'll be pretty much impossible to argue that LA/SF is not a megaregion and the Midwest is. Vegas, on the other hand, feels a little far to me with too much nothing in between.
@@squirlez6349I would say Los Angeles is more culturally and economically connected to Southern California than the SF Bay Areas. Vegas specializes more in entertainment these days which has more in common with the Film industry of Southern California. Plus there is always traffic on I-15 on weekends at the CA NV border from Californians going to and from Las Vegas.
only OG great lakes people know that Chicago does not have as big a influence as it seems also, all medium sized cities that might not be as influential in other regions are still treated as though they're the same size as Indianapolis or Detroit!
The mega regions borders seem to be a bit inconsistent. Why would you include Maine in NE Corridor. Have the great the Great Lakes go down to Louisville and St.Louis but not included Tijuana in the SoCal region. There’s very significant and longstanding trade and travel between SD and Tijuana.
