Cincinnati MSA to surpass Cleveland MSA in population this year (Columbus: pierogies, housing)

[QueenCty]

The metro numbers are now official from the census bureau - these are paragraphs specific to this thread:

Metro area now Ohio's biggest
BY TONY LANG | [email protected]
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The 15-county Cincinnati metropolitan area, which includes seven counties in Northern Kentucky and three in Southeast Indiana, now ranks as Ohio's largest metropolitan area. Census estimates released today show the area has overtaken metro Cleveland in total population the last two years.

But Greater Cincinnati added 12,550 people to rank 24th in population. Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor slipped to 25th, with a loss of 8,808.

The Census Bureau pegged the Cincinnati region's total population at 2,133,678 as of July 1, 2007. Metro Cleveland's total declined to 2,096,471.

[costello_musicman]

15 counties?!?

What does Cleveland count... 5??

[QueenCty]

For Cincinnati, 2,003,888 of the population is within 8 counties. Considering the 3 Kentucky counties (of these 8) are about the size of one Ohio county, this would probably be more comparable to the land area of metro Cleveland.

The definition is based on economic patterns of the metro, and places like Dallas, Denver, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Kansas City etc., for example, currently have boundaries much larger than Cincinnati's 15 county metro so I understand the point.

[costello_musicman]

Originally Posted by QueenCty

For Cincinnati, 2,003,888 of the population is within 8 counties. Considering the 3 Kentucky counties (of these 8) are about the size of one Ohio county, this would probably be more comparable to the land area of metro Cleveland.

The definition is based on economic patterns of the metro, and places like Dallas, Denver, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Kansas City etc., for example, currently have boundaries much larger than Cincinnati's 15 county metro so I understand the point.

OK, thanks for the clear up! That did fix my perception.


For Cleveland's sake, there seem to be three big things that limit our MSA (besides all ecomonic issues):

1) Our bordering county to the south contains the city of Akron, which only allows us to count it in our CSA...even though the suburbs are merged...
2) The Lake! but in a way it does somewhat limit sprawl.
3) We stopped counting Ashtabula County in, I believe, 2004 for our MSA. I still really can't figure it out, but it gave us a "looking bad for the region" hit of -100,000 people.

Oh well, I still like both cities though...No hard feelings!

[1watertiger]

i agree with musicman. why would cinci count 15 counties which includes dayton ? (dayton is further and much less connected to cinci than akron to cleveland) akron is merged with cleveland and is an adjoining county and isnt counted ? doesnt seem right.?. oh well,, anyone who is familiar with driving around both metros knows greater cleveland is larger anyway. but they are both good sized metros , csa or msa.... by the way,, any cities that have major league baseball are usually the largest metro markets.

[QueenCty]

Cincinnati's metro does not currently include the Dayton metro. There is some speculation that Cincinnati will pick up Dayton and Cleveland will pick up Akron in the 2010 numbers.

[Cincy-Rise]

Cincinnati's metro is cut off as well because of Dayton.

If/when (more than likely in the 2010 census count) Cincy's and Dayton's metros merge, this will put us at 3.2 million.

The Cincinnati metro gained over 15K residents, while Cleveland lost about 8K, this is the main reason behind the takeover.

[BelieveInCleve]

The Cleveland metro areas numbers differ a lot depending on where you get the information from. The 5-county area is 2,250,000, Cincinnati metro is 15-county and 2,130,000. So the Cleveland metro is larger. The Cincinnati metro is a lot larger in land area though. The Dayton metro is 800,000. However the Dayton CSA (Dayton-Springfield) has 1,050,000

Heres some more info: The Cleveland-Akron CSA has 2,950,000. The Cincinnati-Wilmington CSA has 2,150,000. If there was a Cincinnati-Dayton CSA it would have 3.2 million. HOWEVER, Canton in not even included in the Akron metro or the Cleveland/Akron CSA, and its connected to Akron. SO, the Cleveland/Akron-Canton CSA would actually have 3,350,000, ahead of the Cincinnati/Dayton-Springfield CSA. Also, the new Cleveland CSA would still be a lot smaller in land area than the new Cincinnati CSA. For the Cleveland CSA to be the same size as the Cincinnati one, it would have to be as big as the whole NE Ohio area, which has 4.5 million people, well ahead of the Cincinnati area.

So, to make a long story short, Cleveland is more populated than Cincinnati whichever way you look at it. Also the Cleveland area is a lot denser than the Cincinnati area. However both of them are more dense than the Columbus area. The Columbus CSA is very large in area and only has 1,950,000. The Columbus metro has 1,750,000.

[Cincy-Rise]

Everything is right here: Annual Estimates of the Population for Counties: April 1, 2000 to July 1, 2007 (http://www.census.gov/popest/counties/CO-EST2007-01.html - broken link)


I was going on the new census counts which put Cleveland at 2,096,471.

The Cincinnati MSA includes 15 counties, but to be fair they are smaller (map below). The number of counties do not matter ... it's the size of the county. Also, the MSA is given to an area based on driving patterns (regional significance). The 15 counties are designated to Cincinnati because those counties are in and out of Cincinnati's region of influence.

Let's say that Cleveland was lumped in with Akron as well ... that still isn't something that Cleveland might want/need, because Akron was also a victim of population decline.

You have to factor in, Cleveland losing almost 10K people a year and Cincinnati gaining over 12K (assuming this happens) ... is only going to widen that difference.

Here's a map of showing the MSA's. Notice, how on the OH side, we are at a disadvantage because of Dayton and our boundaries seem to be smaller in comparison to Cleveland's. Picking up the counties in KY and IN are not going to significantly "boost" our numbers because these are rural counties (all except for immediate Northern Kentucky).

NOKY and SE IN should be lumped into our MSA, that's why we're called a Tri-State area. SE IN and NOKY wouldn't be what they are if it weren't for Cincinnati.




Btw, Dayton's MSA is 835,537 with a CSA of 1,067,741 and Cleveland's CSA is 2,896,968 with an MSA of 2,096,471.


Here's the total:


1. Cincinnati-Middletown MSA – 2,133,678
in Ohio – 1,642,093
in Kentucky – 412,820
in Indiana – 78,765

2. Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor MSA - 2,096,471

3. Columbus MSA - 1,754,337

4. Dayton MSA – 835,537

5. Akron MSA - 699,356

6. Toledo MSA – 650,955

7. Youngstown-Warren-Boardman MSA – 570,704
in Ohio – 453,895
in Pennsylvania – 116,809

8. Canton-Massillon MSA – 407,180

9. Huntington-Ashland-Ironton MSA – 284,026
in West Virginia – 135,666
in Kentucky – 85,751
in Ohio - 62,609

10. Parkersburg-Marietta-Vienna MSA – 160,656
in West Virginia – 99,080
in Ohio - 61,576

11. Wheeling-St. Clairsville MSA – 145,454
in West Virginia – 77,546
in Ohio - 67,908

12. Mansfield MSA - 125,679

13. Weirton-Steubenville MSA – 122,580
in Ohio - 68,730
in West Virginia – 53,850

14. Lima MSA - 105,233

15. Sandusky MSA - 77,323

[1watertiger]

for the cleveland msa to have 5 counties and still be almost equal in population to cincys 15 county "msa", speaks volumes. akron/summit county boarders cleveland/cuyahoga, with downtown akron only 29 miles away.(hell, our far eastern suburbs of cleve. are farther away !) but summit county isnt counted ? i bet if you put 15 N.E. ohio counties together and called it a "msa" we would not have this discussion...like i have always said (in my opinion) metro cleveland/N.E. ohio is a rare, but true, "CSA".... anybody have thoughts about that ?