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The City

February 20, 2009 | RSS | EMAIL | PRINT | 5 COMMENTS

Growing up in Connecticut, "the city" was always New York. Of course, if you go somewhere else, though, "the city" changes. With that in mind I've always wanted to build something that found the footprint of different cities around the country. How far into New Jersey can you go until they start calling Philly "the city"? If you're in the middle of the nowhere is the city the next town over with 2,000 people?

I still don't know the answer and still very much want to build the tool/map out, but in the meantime CommonCensus is the closest thing I've seen to an answer. It draws a map based on responses to "On the level of North America as a whole, what major city do you feel has the most cultural and economic influence on your area overall?" I don't think it's perfect, but it's still pretty interesting. Notice, for instance, the influence of Salt Lake City or Denver (both surrounded by not so much) as opposed to New York or Philly (where cities are more clumped together). Good stuff.

Tags: culture, maps


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COMMENTS

1Alan Wolk

Funny- I always wondered where exactly the Mets-Yankees/Red Sox line was or where Phillies World began. Love to see a map that tracked regional sports team fan bases. (Such a thing might even exist.)

February 20, 2009

2rikin

I've wondered this question ever since I met people from "South Jersey" -specifically Vineland, NJ when I went to Rutgers. My answer to this is that most people below Princeton start considering Philly "the city".

I have a nephew who lives in capemay and at the tender age of 3 his daycare friends make fun of him because my family members are Giants' fans. He now has Giants', Jets', and Eagles' pillows on his bed. Poor confused child.

February 20, 2009

3Wesley

It doesn't matter where I go. I will always refer to NYC as 'the city'. or more appropriately 'THE city'. I might be foreign born but I have quickly adopted the new york attitude towards the rest of the world haha

February 20, 2009

4Alan Wolk

Okay, so Noah pointed out that CommonCensus has sports maps of the very sort I was referring to. I will pretend that they just added them today, so I don't look like a total fool for missing them the first time.

February 20, 2009

5Geoffrey Blair

I grew up in Rhode Island, although Boston is closer, it was NYC that we called "The City." My friends shared this POV. I also lived in North Carolina for 8.5 yrs. While living in a small city of 8,000 people, I often heard people say they were going to the city; the city of Winston-Salem, NC...45 min away. I believe it's psychographic variables that pre-determines "the city" and not county lines. Scary as it may be, some people think this 8,000 person city in the foothills of the Appalachians was a big city.

February 26, 2009