Cities that are a lot bigger or smaller than you thought they were

[TheStranger]

From my multiple trips to the Philippines in recent years:

- the extreme density of the Metro Manila area (with 13 million people in just the metro region) means that some ostensible "suburbs" are pretty large in size:

Caloocan (granted, essentially two non-contiguous areas that border Manila and Quezon City) at 1.6 million
Las Pinas at 600K (just a bit smaller than the actual destination city/financial center of Makati)
Paranaque at 689K (larger than Makati)
Pasay at 440K (though a friend of mine doesn't consider Pasay as a suburb at all)
Malabon at 380K
Marikina at 456K
Muntinlupa at 543K (this city includes the suburban commercial district of Alabang)
Valenzuela at 714K

- My family's hometown in Concepcion, Tarlac was described to me over the years as some sort of small town, when it is more like a Modesto-type big town amidst a farming area.  Current population: 169K

- The largest city in the province of Bulacan (partially rural, partially Manila suburbs) is San Jose Del Monte...at...651K!

- I've known for years that Quezon City is larger than the actual City of Manila, but it's wild that this is by a factor of about 170% (Manila at 1.8 million, Quezon City at nearly 3 million) - it's not obvious that QC has more people than Chicago!

[epzik8]

Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Tampa are mine, since their metro areas are all pretty broad.

[Sctvhound]

Most people don't realize how large of a metro area Charleston, SC is. A lot of tourists don't stray outside the Peninsula, which is about 40-45K population plus tourists.

But the urban area population is 63rd in the 2020 census at close to 700K, and the metro is 74th at 813K (probably already has passed Dayton for 73rd).

Greenville, SC's urban area is much smaller than its metro population (over a million). It was only 387K in the 2020 census, smaller than such metros as Augusta, Syracuse, Stockton CA, and even Daytona Beach.

Yet its arena has pulled NCAA regionals and major concerts.

Driving through Charleston, WV you'd think it is a much larger area than it is. The city has less than 50K and the urban area is ranked 248th. Yet being the capital of WV it has outward importance.

Morgantown is only at 77K, the same size as Wausau WI and smaller than Florence SC and St. Augustine FL. Yet when WVU football is good they get 60K fans into that small area, most not from Morgantown.

SM-G998U

[hotdogPi]

Most people don't realize how large of a metro area Charleston, SC is. A lot of tourists don't stray outside the Peninsula, which is about 40-45K population plus tourists.

Are you sure about this? It's probably the first city in South Carolina someone will name. I've always imagined Charleston, Columbia, and the upstate conglomerate to all be about the same size.

[Rothman]

Ottawa had a reputation has being the City that Fun Forgot for years.  However, its population is right at 1,000,000, with some boundaries extending a decent distance away from the urban core.

[JayhawkCO]

I just played Panama City, Panama in the Guess That CITY thread, and if you would have asked me about its population before I played it, I would have guessed probably 800K-1 mill. It's only 477K. It's just such a hub in Central America it feels bigger.

[silverback1065]

Indianapolis is the 15th largest city but the 33rd largest metro area, so it is a lot larger than it seems.

That's what happens when your growth is just absorbing the suburbs.

that's not really true anymore, indy's current suburbs didn't exist back when unigov passed, they were tiny towns with no real connection with Indy. The current suburbs have a pretty good sized population. both carmel and fishers are over 100k, westfield is over 50k Noblesville 70k. the other donut county suburbs are comparable in population. Indy proper is around 800k. the metro is around 2.5 mil.

[roadman65]

Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Tampa are mine, since their metro areas are all pretty broad.

All of Central Florida is getting to be one big metro area. Thankfully the Green Swamp in Northern Polk is protected to keep somewhat of a buffer between Polk City and Davenport on I-4 to keep it becoming like Jupiter to Homestead in South Florida.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

Most people don't realize how large of a metro area Charleston, SC is. A lot of tourists don't stray outside the Peninsula, which is about 40-45K population plus tourists.

Are you sure about this? It's probably the first city in South Carolina someone will name. I've always imagined Charleston, Columbia, and the upstate conglomerate to all be about the same size.

I don't think he's arguing about the name recognition of the city - I think his point is the average outsider/tourist vibe of Charleston is generally a quaint seacoast town, which is what I think he's saying people don't know it's a significant hub.

[bing101]

From my multiple trips to the Philippines in recent years:

- the extreme density of the Metro Manila area (with 13 million people in just the metro region) means that some ostensible "suburbs" are pretty large in size:

Caloocan (granted, essentially two non-contiguous areas that border Manila and Quezon City) at 1.6 million
Las Pinas at 600K (just a bit smaller than the actual destination city/financial center of Makati)
Paranaque at 689K (larger than Makati)
Pasay at 440K (though a friend of mine doesn't consider Pasay as a suburb at all)
Malabon at 380K
Marikina at 456K
Muntinlupa at 543K (this city includes the suburban commercial district of Alabang)
Valenzuela at 714K

- My family's hometown in Concepcion, Tarlac was described to me over the years as some sort of small town, when it is more like a Modesto-type big town amidst a farming area.  Current population: 169K

- The largest city in the province of Bulacan (partially rural, partially Manila suburbs) is San Jose Del Monte...at...651K!

- I've known for years that Quezon City is larger than the actual City of Manila, but it's wild that this is by a factor of about 170% (Manila at 1.8 million, Quezon City at nearly 3 million) - it's not obvious that QC has more people than Chicago!

San Fernando and Angeles City Pampanga they are like the twin cities of Pampanga and they are at 300-400k each. But they are part of the Clark area. Pampanga gets described as the Sacramento type area of the Philippines.
However, places like Cebu and Davao are listed as the next largest metro area outside of Manila.

[dvferyance]

Bowling Green KY and Clarksville TN are bigger than I thought. They are the 3rd and 5th most populated in their states. However cites like Charleston WV and Harrisburg PA are smaller than I thought. They have even less people than Waukesha the county seat of my home county. I was really surprised when I heard Harrisburg only had around 50,000 I thought it would be like 150,000. Also I would think Wausau WI would have more than just 40,000.

[tdindy88]

Well, Harrisburg does have a metro area that appears to have a population of nearly 600,000. That would make it appear bigger than the physical city itself. If I recall, Bowling Green and Clarksville are mainly just those cities themselves, so the suburbs get counted in with them. Clarksville from what I remember was very widespread as a city. Charleston WV is hemmed in by the river valleys, so it appears dense but not too spread out for topographically reasons.

[Flint1979]

The dense part of Charleston, WV is like 5 miles by maybe a mile. You can pretty much see everything from the Interstate. They do have that little area out on US-119 with stuff like Walmart, Target, Best Buy and those kind of stores but it's not a very big area.

[Rothman]

The dense part of Charleston, WV is like 5 miles by maybe a mile. You can pretty much see everything from the Interstate. They do have that little area out on US-119 with stuff like Walmart, Target, Best Buy and those kind of stores but it's not a very big area.

So...a third of the size of Manhattan, very roughly.

[sprjus4]

I didn't know Virginia Beach (VA) and Long Beach (CA) are as large as they are.  I would have guessed Norfolk was the largest city in Virgina.

Interestingly, both Chesapeake and Virginia Beach have larger populations than Norfolk. All three are large cities though, and combined with the smaller sized Portsmouth and Suffolk, compromise altogether South Hampton Roads which has over a million population.

[Takumi]

Norfolk used to be the largest city in Virginia, but was overtaken by Virginia Beach in the 1980s.

[KCRoadFan]

Another city that just came to mind for me: Wheeling, West Virginia. I've been through there on many trips out east along I-70, so I can picture it pretty well.

Coming in eastbound along I-70, it seems like a major city: the great views from the big bridge over the Ohio River, looking out at the casino and the downtown, followed by an Interchange Sequence Sign, a couple exits, a tunnel, and a few more exits. It just seems, you know, big - definitely not as big as nearby Pittsburgh, of course, but at least a decently mid-sized city. The fact that Wheeling is used as the eastbound control city on I-70 in Columbus, Ohio, seems to back that assertion up.

Given all that, I was rather shocked when I looked up the population of Wheeling the other day and found out it was only 26,500. (Not a typo)

[SkyPesos]

A lot of cities that are just suburban sprawl with no real downtown are larger in population than I initially thought.

[wriddle082]

Asheville, NC feels a lot bigger than 94k.  Or at least their traffic issues do.

Jackson, TN also feels bigger than 68k, but Murfreesboro, TN doesn't feel like 152k.

Bowling Green KY and Clarksville TN are bigger than I thought. They are the 3rd and 5th most populated in their states.

Yeah Bowling Green is surprising since it has finally surpassed Covington.  It's growth is slightly more apparent along I-65 since it has had two new exits added in the past ~20 years, but none of the growth is really very apparent along I-165 (though it might be one day now that it's not just another KY Parkway).  Their growth seems to mostly be closer to downtown centered on WKU or along the arterial bypass that US 231 and US 68 is now routed along.

Clarksville has been over 100k for going on 30 years now, but I wouldn't be surprised if Murfreesboro surpasses it by 2030.  Though new industrial ventures not tied to Ft. Campbell do play a big part in Clarksville's growth.  Murfreesboro's growth is mostly tied to MTSU and to Nashville residential sprawl.

[Ted$8roadFan]

Stamford is now the second largest city in Connecticut, and Hartford has fallen to the fourth largest city in the state. Bridgeport is still the largest city in the state, with New Haven at No. 3.

[bing101]

I've found that Fresno (population 542,107) seemingly is far larger than most people thought it was (largely because of the Fresno Road Meet).

Yes one would think Sacramento would be the largest city in California's Central Valley given the attention it gets when in reality it's only 524k population. In Sacramento case it's suburban sprawl from Vacaville to somewhere in the Sierra Nevada mountains give the impression that Sacramento is much larger city. This is like when San Jose is officially the largest city in the Bay Area at 1 million people and San Francisco whose population is really 815k gets most of the attention.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacramento%2C_California


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacramento_County,_California

[dvferyance]

Norfolk used to be the largest city in Virginia, but was overtaken by Virginia Beach in the 1980s.

What is usual about that is Norfolk is considered to be the principle city of Hampton Roads since it's the most urban and is the only one with a real downtown. Virginia Beach is more of a suburb yet it's bigger. While we are on Virginia cities another one which I thought would be bigger is Roanoke. It's just over 100,000 yet they even have a little bit of a skyline unlike other cities of it's similar size like Rockford or Green Bay. I think that having a freeway going through the middle of it also gives it a bigger feel. That is something Rockford doesn't have. Even Lexington KY which has 3 times the population(which I would think also would surprise some) does not have.

[sprjus4]

Norfolk used to be the largest city in Virginia, but was overtaken by Virginia Beach in the 1980s.

What is usual about that is Norfolk is considered to be the principle city of Hampton Roads since it's the most urban and is the only one with a real downtown. Virginia Beach is more of a suburb yet it's bigger. While we are on Virginia cities another one which I thought would be bigger is Roanoke. It's just over 100,000 yet they even have a little bit of a skyline unlike other cities of it's similar size like Rockford or Green Bay. I think that having a freeway going through the middle of it also gives it a bigger feel. That is something Rockford doesn't have. Even Lexington KY which has 3 times the population(which I would think also would surprise some) does not have.

While the city of Roanoke only has a population of 100,000, the entire Roanoke-Salem metropolitan area has over 300,000 population, which includes a lot of suburbs that make up the area outside the city limits proper.

[kurumi]

Providence, RI metro population: 1.67 million
Rhode Island total population: 1.1 million

[roadman65]

Providence, RI metro population: 1.67 million
Rhode Island total population: 1.1 million

Manhattan in NYC is 1.7 million.