What is urban?

So, continuing from my previous post, what is it that makes an area "Urban"? "Rural"? "Suburban"? Comparing Anchorage, AK and Newark, NJ there isn't a major difference in population. Racially Anchorage is a lot "whiter" than Newark (~70% overall vs. ~25% overall). Is race a way to judge "urbanicity"? Is income or poverty a way to judge "urbanicity"?

According to wikipedia for Anchorage:
"The median income for a household in the city is $55,546, and the median income for a family is $63,682. The per capita income for the city is $25,287. 5.1% of families and 7.3% of the population are below the poverty line. Out of the total population, 8.8% of those under the age of 18 and 6.4% of those 65 and older are living below the poverty line."

While Newark:
"The median income for a household in the city was $26,913, and the median income for a family was $30,781. The per capita income for the city was $13,009. 28.4% of the population and 25.5% of families were below the poverty line. 36.6% of those under the age of 18 and 24.1% of those 65 and older were living below the poverty line. In 2003, the city's unemployment rate was 12%."

So Anchorage has significantly less poverty and higher overall incomes (though I'm willing to bet Anchorage has a higher overall cost of living as well). Is this a way to judge whether an area is "urban"? I don't think so. While I do believe race and income play a significant role in the general perception of urban areas, there are certainly suburban and rural areas with high minority rates and low income, but they would certainly not be considered "urban" simply because of this fact.


But there are a couple major differences between these two cities I keep coming back to. Namely, population density and surrounding areas. There are major, colossal differences between Anchorage and Newark in these categories, and, to me at least, these are two attributes that shape how I discern between urban, suburban and rural areas.

On surrounding area: Anchorage is surrounded by a whole lot of nothing. Wilderness. I mean we're talking Call of the Wild around there. There are some rural suburbs, some farmland to the north and the tourist destinations on the Kenai Pennisula to the south (which are multiple hours away and not considered part of Anchorage) but mostly you have a city surrounded by undeveloped (or undevelopable) wilderness.

Newark's surrounding area? Hmmm, New York City? The Oranges? Hoboken? Are you seeing a trend here? Newark is surrounded by more cities, suburbs of cities and suburbs of the suburbs. It is just people, people everywhere as far as the eye can see.

If you consider Newark part of the Greater New York Metropolitan Area (which the US census does) then it is part of a metropolis of over 18 million people. Anchorage? Even counting the rural suburbs the Anchorage Metropolitan Area tops out at under 400,000 people. That is a huge difference there.

That ties into population density. As I said, Anchorage and Newark have similar populations. The difference? Newark comprises some 26 square miles. That includes waterways, airports and rail lines. Anchorage comprises just over 1800 square miles. Admittedly a lot of that land does not support people, being mountains (most of Chugach State Park is within the Anchorage city limits), tundra, wetlands, waterways etc. But it is still a huge difference. To put it in perspective, the city of Anchorage is larger than the *state* or Rhode Island. If you took all of New Jersey from New Brunswick north, that'd be around the size of Anchorage.

Net result? Anchorage has a population density of ~164/square mile. Newark? 11,400 people per square mile. Just a bit of a difference there. And I really believe these are two aspects that really help define why one is urban and the other is not. I'll expand more on this later hopefully, but this is too long as it is and I have to get back to work. :-)