BosWash

The BosWash or Bosnywash or Boshington or simply Northeast megalopolis is the name for a group of metropolitan areas in the northeastern United States, extending from Boston, MA to Washington, D.C., including Providence, RI, Hartford, CT, New Haven, CT, Stamford, CT, New York, NY, Philadelphia, PA, Wilmington, DE and Baltimore, MD. The geographic trend was first identified in the 1961 book Megalopolis: The Urbanized Northeastern Seaboard of the United States by French geographer Jean Gottmann. The cities are also linked economically, and by transportation and communications.

Population-density map of BosWash

According to Gottmann, BosWash "provides the whole of America with so many essential services, of the sort a community used to obtain in its 'downtown' section, that it may well deserve the nickname of Main Street of the nation." He also envisioned the development of two similar megalopoleis in the US: ChiPitts from Chicago to Pittsburgh, and SanSan from San Francisco to San Diego. However, a more accepted definition in California is Bajalta California, comprising just the southern end of SanSan.

Extent

BosWash theoretically extends from extreme southern Maine and New Hampshire all the way south to Virginia, where recently, with the explosion of population in the Hampton Roads area, the megalopolis now includes the three largest cities in southeastern Virginia: Virginia Beach, Norfolk, and Chesapeake. The megalopolis contains a reported population of 44 million, or 16 percent of the population of the United States (about 0.7 percent of the world population), three world cities (New York, Washington, and Boston), and four of the world's 70 largest metropolitan areas (New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Baltimore-Washington), as well as the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ, the White House and United States Capitol, the UN Headquarters, the headquarters of ABC, NBC, CBS, and the New York Times Company as well as the Washington Post, and six of the eight Ivy League schools. Amtrak's fastest train, the Acela Express, runs on the Northeast Corridor, an electrified rail line extending the length of the BosWash area. Interstate 95, arguably one of the most vital highways in the country, is also a major transportation route for the BosWash area.

As large as Boswash is, internationally there are other larger megalopoleis, such as Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka-Hiroshima-Fukuoka containing 75 million people (being itself part of the larger Taiheiyo Belt of almost 83 million people), the very reason for the success of the bullet train (Shinkansen). The Pearl River Delta in China could also be considered a developing megalopolis as it is home to several cities with more than a million people in a small area.

The major cities in the BosWash megalopolis include the following (north to south):

Portland, Maine Manchester, New Hampshire Nashua, New Hampshire Lowell, Massachusetts Cambridge, Massachusetts Boston, Massachusetts Providence, Rhode Island Pawtucket, Rhode Island Warwick, Rhode Island Cranston, Rhode Island Worcester, Massachusetts Springfield, Massachusetts New Bedford, Massachusetts Fall River, Massachusetts Hartford, Connecticut Waterbury, Connecticut New Haven, Connecticut Bridgeport, Connecticut Stamford, Connecticut White Plains, New York Yonkers, New York New York City, New York (Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, The Bronx) Long Island, New York (Nassau and Suffolk Counties) Jersey City, New Jersey Newark, New Jersey Paterson, New Jersey Edison, New Jersey New Brunswick, New Jersey Allentown, Pennsylvania Princeton, New Jersey Reading, Pennsylvania Trenton, New Jersey Bensalem, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Camden, New Jersey Atlantic City, New Jersey Wilmington, Delaware Newark, Delaware Towson, Maryland Baltimore, Maryland Columbia, Maryland Annapolis, Maryland Silver Spring, Maryland Washington, D.C. Arlington, Virginia Alexandria, Virginia Richmond, Virginia Norfolk, Virginia Virginia Beach, Virginia Chesapeake, Virginia

Several small and medium-sized metropolitan areas near the southwestern end of the corridor, including Lancaster, Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, York, Pennsylvania, Hagerstown, Maryland, and Frederick, Maryland, are also sometimes considered part of the region, though opinions vary from geographer to geographer as to which cities are included or excluded.

Population statistics

Rank	Combined Statistical Area	State(s)	2004 Estimate	2000 Population	1990 Population	Percent Change (1990-2000)
1	New York-Newark-Bridgeport	NY-NJ-CT-PA	21,858,830	21,361,797	19,710,239	8.4
4	Washington-Baltimore-Northern Virginia	DC-MD-VA-WV	8,026,807	7,538,385	6,665,228	13.1
6	Philadelphia-Camden-Vineland	PA-NJ-DE-MD	5,951,797	5,833,585	5,573,521	4.7
8	Boston-Worcester-Manchester	MA-NH	5,809,111	5,715,698	5,348,894	6.9
	Combined		41,646,545	40,449,465	37,297,882	8.4

Included or neighboring MSAs not in a CSA

Rank	Metropolitan Statistical Area	State(s) and/or Territory	1 July 2004 Population Estimate
33	Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News	VA-NC	1,644,250
34	Providence-New Bedford-Fall River	RI-MA	1,628,808
44	Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford	CT	1,184,564
46	Richmond	VA	1,154,317
59	Albany-Schenectady-Troy	NY	845,269
63	Allentown - Bethlehem - Easton	PA-NJ	779,816
70	Springfield	MA	687,973
86	Scranton--Wilkes-Barre	PA	551,531
91	Harrisburg-Carlisle	PA	519,331
96	Portland-South Portland-Biddeford	ME	510,791
99	Lancaster	PA	487,332
117	York-Hanover	PA	401,613
121	Reading	PA	391,640
164	Atlantic City	NJ	268,693
183	Barnstable	MA	228,683
216	Charlottesville	VA	180,901
254	Bangor	ME	148,196
268	Dover	DE	138,752
275	Pittsfield	MA	132,486
288	Lebanon	PA	124,489
311	Harrisonburg	VA	111,284
327	Lewiston-Auburn	ME	107,022
	Combined non-CSA MSAs		12,224,733
	Combined CSAs and MSAs		53,871,278

References

• Gottmann, Jean (1961), Megalopolis: the Urbanized Northeastern Seaboard of the United States. ISBN 0-527-02819-3
• Gottmann, Jean (1987), Megalopolis Revisted—25 Years Later. ISBN 0-913749-04-4
• Swatridge, L.A. (1971), The Bosnywash megalopolis: A region of great cities. ISBN 0-07-092795-2

See also

• List of U.S. multistate regions
• Highways along the BosWash corridor
• Megacity
• Mega-City One, another science fiction megalopolis based on BosWash from the Judge Dredd series
• Northeast Corridor, the railroad line that runs through the region.
• Overpopulation
• Quebec City-Windsor Corridor, the Canadian equivalent of the Northeast Corridor/BosWash
• The Sprawl, a science fiction extension of BosWash which extends from Boston to Atlanta from the books of William Gibson
• Urban sprawl

External links

• About.com article on BosWash