Greater Boston metropolitan area
The Boston-Cambridge-Quincy region (better known as Greater Boston ) refers to the area in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts around the city of Boston in the state of Massachusetts in the United States . However, the term is ambiguous and can therefore in area to any area between the magnitudes of the Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) and the Combined Statistical Area relate (CSA) of Boston, which includes the metropolitan areas of Providence, Rhode Iceland and Worcester in Massachusetts includes .
In contrast, the term Metro Boston is reserved for the "inner core" around Boston, while Greater Boston usually includes at least the North Shore , South Shore and MetroWest regions as well as the Merrimack Valley .
The Greater Boston area was home to more than 4.6 million people in 2008, making it the 10th most populous MSA in the United States. In relation to the CSA, more than 7.6 million people lived there in the same year, which means fifth place in the list of the CSA. The region contains many places and references to personalities from the history of the United States , in particular the American Revolution , civil rights , American literature and American politics . Greater Boston is an essential center of the US education system , the financial industry and tourism and is ranked 12th worldwide in the ranking of productivity (as measured by the Gross Metropolitan Product ).
Definitions
Metropolitan Area Planning Council
The narrowest definition of the Greater Boston region comes from the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC). The MAPC is a regional planning organization created by the Massachusetts General Court to oversee transportation infrastructure and economic development in the Boston area. The definition of the MAPC includes 101 cities and municipalities, which are grouped into eight different regions. The area covers the majority of the area within the highway I-495 that bypasses the region . In the year 2000, approx. 3 million people lived in the MAPC area in an area of 1,422 mi² (3,682.96 km² ), of which 39% consisted of forest and a further 11% consisted of water, wetlands or open terrain.
The eight regions and their main cities are: Inner Core ( Boston ), Minuteman ( Route 2 ), MetroWest ( Framingham ), North Shore ( Peabody ), North Suburban ( Woburn ), South Shore ( Route 3 ), SouthWest ( Franklin ) and Three Rivers ( Norwood ).
The cities of the Merrimack Valley Lowell , Lawrence and Haverhill , a large part of Plymouth County and the entire Bristol County are explicitly excluded by the MAPC , as there is a separate planning office for these places and areas.
New England City and Town Area
The defined United States urban area in the vicinity of Boston serves as the core of the definition with the designation New England city and town area (NECTA) of the United States Census Bureau . The cities in the core of the area as well as the surrounding communities with strong social and economic ties to the core is referred to as Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH Metropolitan NECTA . The Boston NECTA is also divided into various divisions, which are listed below. NECTA's Boston, Framingham and Peabody divisions roughly correspond to the MAPC area. About 4.5 million people lived in the Boston NECTA in 2000.
| designation | Type of division | region | Number of municipalities |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston-Cambridge-Quincy | MA NECTA | 97 | |
| Framingham | MA NECTA | 13 | |
| Peabody | MA NECTA | 7th | |
| Brockton-Bridgewater-Easton | MA NECTA | Old Colony | 12 |
| Haverhill-North Andover-Amesbury | MA-NH NECTA | Merrimack Valley | 25th |
| Lawrence-Methuen-Salem | MA-NH NECTA | Merrimack Valley | 3 |
| Lowell-Billerica-Chelmsford | MA-NH NECTA | Merrimack Valley | 9 |
| Nashua | MA-NH NECTA | 21st | |
| Taunton-Norton-Raynham | MA NECTA | Southeastern | 6th |
Metropolitan Statistical Area
For the alternative definition of the Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), the Census Bureau uses the boundaries of counties instead of cities and towns as building blocks to describe the area. The MSA is divided into four metropolitan divisions and had a population of about 4.4 million in 2005, making it the tenth largest in the United States. The components of the region are:
| designation | Number of inhabitants (as of 2005) | county | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH Metropolitan Statistical Area | 4,411,835 | ||
| Boston-Quincy, MA Metropolitan Division | 1,800,432 | Norfolk County | Massachusetts |
| Plymouth County | |||
| Suffolk County | |||
| Cambridge-Newton-Framingham, MA Metropolitan Division | 1,459,011 | Middlesex County | |
| Essex County, MA Metropolitan Division | 738.301 | Essex County | |
| Rockingham County-Strafford County, NH Metropolitan Division | 414.091 | Rockingham County | New Hampshire |
| Strafford County |
Combined Statistical Area
A more functional definition based on commuter behavior is the Boston-Worcester-Manchester, MA-RI-NH Combined Statistical Area (CSA) of the United States Census Bureau . In addition to the greater Boston area, this area includes the metropolitan areas of Manchester in New Hampshire , Worcester in Massachusetts and Providence in Rhode Island . In 2005 a total of around 7.4 million people lived there. In addition to the MSA described above, the following areas count towards the Combined Statistical Area :
| designation | Number of inhabitants (as of 2005) | county | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Worcester, MA Metropolitan Statistical Area | 783.262 | Worcester County | Massachusetts |
| Providence-New Bedford-Fall River, RI-MA Metropolitan Statistical Area | 1,622,520 | Bristol County | |
| Bristol County | Rhode Island | ||
| Kent County | |||
| Newport County | |||
| Providence County | |||
| Washington County | |||
| Concord, NH Micropolitan Statistical Area | 146,681 | Merrimack County | New Hampshire |
| Laconia, NH Micropolitan Statistical Area | 61,547 | Belknap County | |
| Manchester-Nashua, NH Metropolitan Statistical Area | 401.291 | Hillsborough County |
Selected statistics
The Greater Boston area has a large Jewish community with an estimated 210,000 and 261,000 members, respectively. In mathematical terms, 5 to 6% of the region's population is Jewish, the US average is 2%.
Boston itself has one of the highest LGBT rates per capita with a share of 12.3% and ranks 5th behind San Francisco , Seattle , Atlanta and Minneapolis in a comparison of all major cities in the USA.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Annual Estimates of the Population of Combined Statistical Areas: April 1, 2000 to July 1, 2009 ( CSV ) In: 2007 Population Estimates . United States Census Bureau , Population Division. March 27, 2008. Retrieved April 2, 2008.
- ↑ a b About MAPC . Metropolitan Area Planning Council. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. Retrieved May 14, 2007.
- ^ Transportation Plan - Overview . Boston Region Metropolitan Planning Organization. 2009. Archived from the original on August 29, 2008. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved September 27, 2009.
- ^ New England City and Town Areas and Principal Cities . US Census Bureau. November 2008. Retrieved September 14, 2009.
- ^ Michael Paulson: Jewish population in region rises . In: Boston Globe , November 10, 2006. Retrieved November 29, 2009.
- ^ Cities with the Largest Jewish Population in the Diaspora . adherents.com. Retrieved November 29, 2009.
- ^ Metro Area Membership Report . The Association of Religion Data Archives. Retrieved November 29, 2009.
- ↑ 12.9% in Seattle are gay or bisexual, second only to SF, study says . In: The Seattle Times , The Seattle Times Company. Retrieved May 1, 2009.
literature
- Susan Wilson: The Literary Trail of Greater Boston: A Tour of Sites in Boston, Cambridge, and Concord, Revised Edition . Commonwealth Editions, 2005, ISBN 1-889833-67-3 .
- Sam, Jr. Warner: Greater Boston: Adapting Regional Traditions to the Present . University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8122-1769-1 .