Talk:Great Lakes megalopolis

Errors on Megalopolis map

I have always thought of Ottawa, and Montreal to be in the Great Lakes Megalopolis. The Regional Plan Association map doesn't depict this, yet others do. The Regional Plan Association map includes Cities as far away as St.Louis and Kanasa City yet doesn't include citiers which are actually on the Great Lakes ! The boundary shouldn't be based on solely the Regional Plan Associations definition and the article should reflect this. UrbanNerd (talk) 16:04, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Let's stick with the Regional Plan Association source for illustration and population comparision, which also includes Minneapolis - Saint Paul. A note was added to reflect the other source. Thomas Paine1776 (talk) 01:26, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Ummm let's not. Choosing one sources perception due to them having a nice map is absurd. The Regional Plan Associations idea of the mega region includes very little of the most densely populated area of Canada. Yet for some unknown and unexplained reasoning includes Topeka, Kansas ? Ottawa is less than 80 miles from the closest great lake, Lake Ontario. Yet Topeka is more than 460 miles from the closest great lake, Lake Michigan. It also doesn't included Syracuse which is almost on Lake Ontario. The ties between Ottawa, Montreal and the great lakes are vast. I don't think the Regional Plan Association has even the slightest comprehension of the relationship of the mega region north of the border. We should be using a collective of sources to define the area and stats. UrbanNerd (talk) 16:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

But wait! We must consider that megapolis doesn't necessarily mean physical area and such. It may actually may be much more, like lifestyle, economy, and cultural. I think that what they were going for was Midwest Megapolis, not Great Lake Megapolis. They only changed the name to include Canadian metros. I think that this map was made for High Speed Rail and depends on definition weather the Southern Canadian Megapolis is part of the Great Lake Megapolis, the Northeast one, its own Megapolis, or the transition zone: Great Lake-Northeast Megapolis.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 21:19, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Quad-Cities

On the map, we see a small area circled on the Iowa-Illinois border around Davenport IA and Moline IL. That area is a small conglomeration called the Quad Cities, which consists of Davenport and Bettendorf, IA and Moline, East Moline, and Rock Island, IL (oddly enough, is actually five cities). According an article on this site [1], it has a population of about 379,000 people. Since it is illustrated on the map, I think it should be added into this article as well.

Man of the night (talk) 21:35, 14 September 2010 (UTC)

Dayton not included

By metropolitan area, Dayton should rank 18th on the list ahead of Toledo and Rochester.

Airrore (talk 08:57 15 September 2010 (UTC)

Made the necessary changes. Thanks for pointing it out! Texas141 (talk) 16:32, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Lansing, Michigan

Shouldn't Lansing, Michigan be included? The map shows that the Lansing-East Lansing metropolitan region is part of it, yet this page doesn't talk about it. So is it or isn't it included? :s Robster1983 (talk) 10:22, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Lansing, Michigan is a part of the Great Lakes Magalopolis area. But with an MSA population of only 447,728 (as of the 2000 census), its a little too small to be listed or mentioned in the article. The article should list metro areas of at least 500,000. I'm not even sure why the London, Ontario metropolitan area is even included considering its population is only 457,720. Its not really one of the more notable metros in the megalopolis. I hope this addresses your concern. If not, bring it up here. Texas141 (talk) 01:13, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

We should include these metro areas to illustrate the population total for the region The last 5 add more than 2 million people to the total population and are significant. Its informative to see the population totals. They should be included. Thanks. Thomas Paine1776 (talk) 01:31, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

I second the above. Why not drop it to 450,000 or maybe even 400,000?ThisguyYEAH (talk) 21:22, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Detroit-Windsor

Why can't you just combine Detroit Metro with Windsor Metro and make the entire thing complete. You do know Metropolitan areas are don't know any national borders. Now the census will never consider the one across the border since they are government owned. Windsor and Detroit is a continuous Urban Agglomeration. I will also suggest that you do the same with the both Niagaras since they both are a continuous Urban Area. But of course you must also either create a second chart or a side note of the different definitions of Metro Areas. e.g. Niagara Fall could be considered either 2 separate Niagaras, 1 big Niagara, or a metro area known as Buffalo-Niagara-St. Catherine's.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 23:30, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

The Office of Management and Budget works closely with the US Census Bureau and is the department that defines the boundries for metropolitan statistical areas. To determine if the Detroit and Windsor metros can be combined on this list, you must look to see of the OMB or the census bureau combine these metro areas in their statistical analysis projects. If not, the list will need to stay in it's current form. Since they each are already their own MSA, I doubt they can be combined. Even though they are so close together. If a credible source can be found that combines these areas for statistical analysis, then this list may be changed with the proper citation provided. Hope that helps! Texas141 (talk) 02:02, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Again, MSA does not mean metropolitan area (nor CSA). They work for the government of USA therefore they will only create metros with US borders, even though it is not like that in reality. There is even a Wikipedia page on Detroit-Windsor, they must have references there. There are also people that combine Toledo and Detroit (not Windsor) into one metropolitan area. But that doesn't even make sense to include Toledo and Detroit but not Windsor and Detroit. Toledo and Detroit are close to each other; Windsor and Detroit are not even close, they are two halves of the same city.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 01:49, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Again, MSA stands for Metropolitan Statistical Area they are defined the way that they are and only the OMB can change that. I dont like it either how they decide what gets to be a metropolitan area and what does not. For example, Dayton is extremely close to Cincinnati but they have separate metropolitan areas. Akron, Ohio is close to Cleveland but they too are concitered their own metropolitan areas and are not combined. Until the OMB or U.S. Census bureau changes things and makes Detroit-Windsor an official metropolitan area, we unfortunatly cannot change it. I looked at the Detroit-Windsor page, and it is described as a region not an MSA or even a CSA for that matter. Sorry that we can't change anything at this time. I wish we could. Texas141 (talk) 16:25, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Do you know what Urban Agglomeration is. It is a lot more accurate than MSA (which I did know the M stood for Metroplitan, it was quite obvious. CSA stands for Combined Statistical Area). Urban Agglomerations are continous URBAN areas. Metros are Urban areas and emmidiate surrounding rural area. By the Way, the population for metro Ottawa is inaccurate. I know it up to 1,451,415 but according to CMA (Census Metropolitan Area [Canadian]) it is around 1,130,761. I belive you should start updading the list and check regurarly.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 02:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)

Adding Montréal

Considering its really close to Ottawa which is in the Great Lakes Megalopolis and its not really far from the Great Lakes (its only around 170 mi from the nearest Great Lake, Ontario. For comparison Kansas City is around 420 mi from the nearest Great Lake, Lake Michigan). Montréal is related to the Great Lakes region due to the fact it is a major port on the Saint Lawrence River, and if you may or may not have known the Saint Lawrence is the only connection to the (Atlantic) ocean from the Great Lakes and is a very important part of the Great Lakes economy and region. I will consider Montréal however to be right on the boundary/transition zone of the Great Lakes Megalopolis due to the different lifestyle and culture beyond Montréal ( Québec the French speaking people of North America). Montreal however IS part of Québec and DOES speak French and has the Québecois culture (the actual transition zone between the Anglo-American and Canadian French regions is really supposed to be Ottawa - Gatineau BUT Montreal still has many mainstream Anglo-American cultural points simply because Montreal is a large metro, henceforth more has experienced globalization). In Canada however southern Ontario and Southern Quebec are one region only because of shared economy, physical and climatic relationships, and populations. The rest of Quebéc may or may not be part of the Great Lakes Megalopolis however Montréal for sure is part of it. It doesn't really matter if the map fits the article or not just remember this: the picture is supposed to fit the article, not the other way around. I don't encourage using another map though simply because there is no perfect map, only the closest to perfect as possible which is this map.ThisguyYEAH (talk) 23:09, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Oh Yeah, I also updated Canadian Metros according to the site http://www40.statcan.gc.ca/l01/cst01/demo05a-eng.htm which is a government census estimates site so it is official. I also edited the table to fit Montreal and I increased the total population of megalopolis from 54 million to 58 million to adjust to Montréal. I have no idea how to add the reference http://www40.statcan.gc.ca/l01/cst01/demo05a-eng.htm so please do that for me and site it next to all the Canadian Metros. Thank you. ThisguyYEAH (talk) 23:09, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

This whole concept is just a lot of nonsense. I could declare all of Europe to be a city, it probably has a population density comparable to this region. Or how about the whole world! Luwilt (talk) 16:24, 20 February 2011 (UTC)