Detroit smaller than Jacksonville, Fl?

[iheartthed]

I was researching the inconsistencies of the population counts on wikipedia when I came across this site that claims Jacksonville, Fl has surpassed Detroit in population as of 2009. That should be a bit startling, if true...

http://www.world-gazetteer.com/wg.ph...c&va=&srt=pnan

[Novine]

Jacksonville is a consolidated city-county government so a more accurate comparison would be Detroit and Wayne County's population, not city to city.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacksonville,_Florida

[BShea]

I graduated high school many moons ago in Jacksonville.

No comparison of the two cities and counties. I'm not a native of either place, but I'll take Detroit.

[rid0617]

Jacksonville originally was much smaller than Detroit. But they decided to join the governments together and now all of Duval county is City of Jacksonville

[ghettopalmetto]

In terms of area, Jacksonville is the second-largest city in the U.S. [[after Anchorage), at 600+ square miles. Driving in from the north on I-95, one reaches the Jacksonville City Limits in a rural area 30 miles or so from downtown.

Population is just numbers. It doesn't mean a whole lot without any context. No need to panic.

[jjw]

Jacksonville is a consolidated city-county government so a more accurate comparison would be Detroit and Wayne County's population, not city to city.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacksonville,_Florida

It would be more accurate if Wayne County was one municipality. As it stands now, it isn't so it wouldn't be an accurate comparison. Many cities have been gobbling up land and incorporating existing areas.

[iheartthed]

In terms of area, Jacksonville is the second-largest city in the U.S. [[after Anchorage), at 600+ square miles. Driving in from the north on I-95, one reaches the Jacksonville City Limits in a rural area 30 miles or so from downtown.

Population is just numbers. It doesn't mean a whole lot without any context. No need to panic.

Here is context: Next year when census numbers are released national headlines will read "Detroit, once fourth largest city in the nation, now smaller than Jacksonville, Florida".

[ghettopalmetto]

Charleston, SC was once the 4th-largest city in the U.S. too. Now it's smaller than Ann Arbor. Therefore, it must be terrible, right?

Detroit has far bigger problems than whether or not some other city annexes its entire county.

[Detroitnerd]

Up until Anchorage expanded [[by an astonishing amount, something in the thousands of percents), Jacksonville was the largest, by area, city in the United States. And so it's hardly surprising that it would have a large population. [[It can rack up population all it likes but it's still a relatively low-density area. Not really my idea of a "city.")

[iheartthed]

Charleston, SC was once the 4th-largest city in the U.S. too. Now it's smaller than Ann Arbor. Therefore, it must be terrible, right?

Detroit has far bigger problems than whether or not some other city annexes its entire county.

Charleston was the fourth largest city over 200 years ago.

Detroit was the fourth largest city the year my farther was born [[1946). Detroit was the sixth largest city the year I was born [[1982). Detroit was the tenth largest city the year that my nephew was born [[2001). By the time that I graduated from college [[2006) it was the eleventh largest city. Now at the time of my writing this post [[2009) it is expected to be the twelfth largest city. There is a lot of political capital lost when you aren't able to say that you are the fourth or fifth [[or hell, even in the top ten) largest city in the nation [[or the 21st largest city in the world, as Detroit was in 1950: http://www.ncge.org/files/public/Dat...950and2000.pdf).

What could be more important for Detroit right now than keeping residents [[and Michigan too for that matter)?

By constrast, Jacksonville, was the nation's 47th largest city the year my father was born [[1946). Jacksonville was the nation's 22nd largest city the year that I was born [[1982), which was two decades after Jacksonville consolidated into a city-county government. Jacksonville was the nation's 13th largest city the year that my nephew was born [[2001). And now, as I write this it is projected to be the nation's eleventh largest city, while Detroit is now to be the nation's 12th largest city.

Jacksonville isn't the only consolidated government region to surpass Detroit. Houston, Dallas, and Phoenix all have similar governments but all are counted as being larger than Detroit, without any qualifiers. Houston is regarded as the fourth largest city in the country now, even though the population density in that city is 2/3rds that of Detroit's. Phoenix is recognized as the fifth largest city even though its population density is less than half that of Detroit's.

To be clear, Detroit isn't being pushed down the list because Jacksonville, or other places, are going through explosive growth. Unlike the case of Charleston, where other cities just out grew it over the course of the past 200 years, Detroit is losing population even more rapidly than other northern industrial cities of comparable age and maturity [[Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, etc.). If Detroit were still the same size that it was in the 2000 census, then it would be the 11th largest city in the U.S. If Detroit was the same size that it was the year that I was born [[1982), it would be the 10th largest city in the U.S.

[Novine]

"To be clear, Detroit isn't being pushed down the list because Jacksonville, or other places, are going through explosive growth."

What are you talking about? Most of those cities are growing because they are capturing growth that in Detroit takes place in the suburbs. Jacksonville doesn't have suburbs like Detroit does. Even as the population exits the original city area, it still remains within the city limits. That's true of many of the other cities you listed as well.

[jiminnm]

What are you talking about? Most of those cities are growing because they are capturing growth that in Detroit takes place in the suburbs. Jacksonville doesn't have suburbs like Detroit does. Even as the population exits the original city area, it still remains within the city limits. That's true of many of the other cities you listed as well.

That may be technically correct Novine, but it masks a huge problem for Michgan - declining political representation and loss of political power. Michigan will lose another seat in the US House in 2010, and lose at least one more in 2020 [[depending on whether or not illegal immigrants are granted an easy path to citizenship).

[rooms222]

The Original Poster's site was interesting in that if you clicked on the tab, it also showed Metro Areas. Their metro area included Windsor in the population figures, making Detroit the 9th largest.......

As to consolidating government, Indianapolis did this in the early 70's [[where I grew up). There was one way busing out to the "suburbs." Everyone voted for the mayor, but schools, police, and fire remained under the control of the local area. Due to budget constraints, some fire and police are now getting integrated with the main city [[after 35 years!!) Such integration is only happening voluntarily........ It also had some other weird effects. Growth stopped in the "new" parts of the city and started even further out [[beyond the new city limits). This mainly was because many [[predominantly white) people were willing to live way out to not have their kids go to school with the kids bused from the city. After about 25 years, growth restarted in the then not so "new" part of the city.......The biggest stumbling block to this plan for Metro Detroit is that it would mean that Detroit would give up electing its mayor and council for itself, but would do it in combination with the rest of Metro Detroit. Even if many of the concessions to the suburbs were made [[as in Indianapolis), for this to happen, people would have to be really ready for a change, or it could be imposed by a vote of the legislature and signed by the Governor [[unless something in the Michigan constitution also required a ballot intitiative)......

[Crumbled_pavement]

[[Metro Detroit Regionalization) could be imposed by a vote of the legislature and signed by the Governor [[unless something in the Michigan constitution also required a ballot intitiative)......

I literally think there would be riots [[on both sides of 8 Mile) if Granholm even jokingly let the thought of something like this slip off her lips. . .

[ghettopalmetto]

Charleston was the fourth largest city over 200 years ago.

And Detroit was the fourth largest city over 50 years ago. What's your point?

There is a lot of political capital lost when you aren't able to say that you are the fourth or fifth [[or hell, even in the top ten) largest city in the nation [[or the 21st largest city in the world, as Detroit was in 1950.

To what political capital are you referring, exactly? Seattle, San Francisco, Portland, Minneapolis, Boston, Denver, and Washington, DC are all smaller than Detroit. Should someone tell them to start crying as well? The bigger problem is what Detroit does, or does not do, with the capital and resources it already has.

There are plenty of "large" cities that I'd consider terrible places to live. You couldn't pay me enough to live in San Jose, Houston, or Columbus. On the other hand, many smaller cities aren't sitting there bitching about Census numbers, but focusing on creating a liveable and attractive environment for the people who do live there.

In my opinion, it's a choice between optimism or pessimism. This is all crying about spilled milk. It's not unlike women who marry a man just because he has a six-figure salary. Numbers don't create status, kids.