# World's biggest cities merging into mega-regions



## Chrissib

Metro Manil may be a very big city, but it's isolated.


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## icracked

So this thread changed topics from World's biggest cities merging into mega-regions to Manila gallery:lol:


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## islander87

mexico's central region is home to some 70-75 million people.... on a approx ~320,000 km2 area land


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## Fallout

^^Thats almost same area as Germany (82 million people).


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## islander87

Fallout said:


> ^^Thats almost same area as Germany (82 million people).


well being more accurate its more like 250,000 km2 ... but yeah not exactly India or china mega regions


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## toddhubert

For pearl delta region, HK-SZ-GZ or GZ-SZ or HK-SZ interactions are still not that frequent due to the distance and political system reasons. But the most practical example now is the Guangzhou-Foshan, which is less than 30km in distance and subways linking two cities are underconstruciton and will be open this year.


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## the spliff fairy

Check it out on Google Earth, theyre all contiguous now (via the Eastern coastal strip of the delta):

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en....906538,113.786774&spn=0.931028,1.231842&z=10


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## toddhubert

the spliff fairy said:


> Check it out on Google Earth, theyre all contiguous now (via the Eastern coastal strip of the delta):
> 
> http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en....906538,113.786774&spn=0.931028,1.231842&z=10


of course i know, but SZ and HK has different political system which is a big barrier


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## the spliff fairy

no, dont mean HK, but north from Shenzhen on the coastal strip up to Guangzhou, via Dongguan

Here's a better centred pic, the very southern tip of the strip is Shenzhen, the northern end is Dongguan, while the monster past that, on the top left is Guangzhou

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&s...742,113.653564&spn=0.568465,1.003876&t=k&z=11



.


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## the spliff fairy

Here ya go, *Guangzhou, Dongguan, Shenzhen* - the brown areas are all the densest urbanity:










Close up of the coastal strip between Shenzhen in the south and Dongguan in the north, near point A above:










Close up of Gaungzhou (far left) and Dongguan (far right) connections:










In short if that was counted as one entity it would be something like 40 million at least (and not counting HK)


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## toddhubert

i see what you mean, but that does not mean they have much interactions or more integrated as between Guangzhou and Foshan which are the biggest and third biggest city in Guangdong. But in the future, there's no doubt that they will get more integrated.


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## India101

islander87 said:


> mexico's central region is home to some 70-75 million people.... on a approx ~320,000 km2 area land





Fallout said:


> ^^Thats almost same area as Germany (82 million people).


Thats about the same area as a part of northern India with a pop of ~310 million -


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## trainrover

Chrissib said:


> I had made a map, and post it again:
> 
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> In my opinions th biggest mega-regions will


never include Ontario's, so I corrected your map, thank you.....the predominant pollution of the area blobbed over by
bluishness is the stench of manure, which really ain't aboutta change:


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## 645577

well, if we include buenos aires (14 million aprox) also montevideo,etc with Sampa and rio you have a 70 million people


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## ACT7

trainrover said:


> never include Ontario's, so I corrected your map, thank you.....the predominant pollution of the area blobbed over by
> bluishness is the stench of manure, which really ain't aboutta change:


Why exclude Ontario-Quebec and keep Vancouver-Seattle on the map??? Some consistency would be nice. These forums are so opinion-based and interpretive they've become somewhat comical. Anytime you have to drive for 3 hours to reach another city and there is almost nothing inbetween, you can hardly call it a mega-region. Interconnected, yes...but what the hell isn't these days. Just my opinion.


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## Spookvlieger

645577 said:


> well, if we include buenos aires (14 million aprox) also montevideo,etc with Sampa and rio you have a 70 million people


Haha :lol:, this map you have changed made me laugh because I've checked it on google earth and between those cities are only some small twons and villages with hundred of miles...searching for the right words.....ohyeah: Endlessness of nothing! Better ckeck on other regions in blue coloured on this map first and see that they are much more densly devellopped.... I've measured gaps of 60Mi and gaps of 200Mi and some looked even wider...


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## Northsider

> Why exclude Ontario-Quebec and keep Vancouver-Seattle on the map??? Some consistency would be nice. These forums are so opinion-based and interpretive they've become somewhat comical. Anytime you have to drive for 3 hours to reach another city and there is almost nothing inbetween, you can hardly call it a mega-region. Interconnected, yes...but what the hell isn't these days. Just my opinion.


EXACTLY. Which is why this entire thread is ridiculous, if not amusing. Most of these "mega-regions" are laughable at best.


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## pesto

That region connecting Scotland to Granada, what do we call it, "the cross-the-water, freezing to roasting, mostly never spoke or heard of each other or strongly dislike each other, 5 days by train, with 100 different cultures, keep the French out" region?


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## Anderson Geimz

pesto said:


> That region connecting Scotland to Granada, what do we call it, "the cross-the-water, freezing to roasting, mostly never spoke or heard of each other or strongly dislike each other, 5 days by train, with 100 different cultures, keep the French out" region?


Or how about we just call you a fucking troll? (clueless as well)


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## pesto

Wow, I guess humor is in short supply in Europe. Did you invest in Greek bonds? 

I think most would say it is a rather odd region in that you have to swim the ocean, cross the Schwarzwald (where excluding summer you can hike all day and not meet many people) then pop through Switzerland, where again, you might have to hike around (or over) the Matterhorn to get into Italy and the rest of the region since, from the map, Geneve and Lac Leman seem to be excluded from the region. 

And you will end up with Spaniards, Catalans, Italians, Swiss (Italian, German, French and Romansch), Germans (north and south), various Low-landers, English, Yorkshiremen and Scots). All fine people, but hard to think of them as a region.


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## Anderson Geimz

Well, since you don't even acknowledge the difference between an urban area and a megalopolis, what's left to discuss? And I suspect you're terribly wrong about yourself being one of the few who actually traveled (surely you're kidding?)

Don't come into threads making bold claims and then leave all high and mighty when the heat gets too much. You're the one who sought this out.
And if you don't want to argue me, at least have the decency to answer Chrissib's question.


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## Skyline_FFM

Anderson Geimz said:


> Megalopoli are not continous urban areas you dumbass!
> 
> The Ruhr area would be a single urban area in US terms. You have nothing like the Blue Banana in the States. The Northeast corridor also qualifies as a megalopolis but is of a different nature. Less historical connections, more centaralised (on 4 or 5 cities most notably NYC), less connections other than road connections, the fabric is suburban instead of a web of highly connected (in every way possible) peppered high density nodes.
> Not even the Great Lakes region comes close to what the BB is, as distances are greater and there is less interconnection. Same goes for Southern California where cities are smaller and further apart and there are less of them.
> 
> Either the BB is a megalopolis or there are no megalopoli anywhere in the world...:|


:lol: I am living a 45 minutes car ride from the Ruhr area. Sorry to disappoint you. It isn't even a third as dense as most megacities around the Globe. It is not even close to a megacity or conurbation! No way. It's a huge amount of small towns with lots of empty space in between.


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## earthJoker

There is a vacuum in the Ruhrgebiet?:runaway:


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## Skyline_FFM

earthJoker said:


> There is a vacuum in the Ruhrgebiet?:runaway:


Several. I suggest you go up to the TV Tower Floriansturm in Dortmund and you will see wide open green areas. The same goes for the city of Hamm, where the Ruhrgebiet actually starts... Nothing but fields and farting cows.
The densest area is the smal area of Duisburg, Mülheim, Essen. The rest is pretty scattered settlements and cities with less importance, mostly poor, structurally overcome and shabby.


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## The Cebuano Exultor

*Standardize Definitions*

Everyone is bickering whether regions like the Blue Banana or the Rio de Janeiro-Sao Paulo-Montevideo-Buenos Aires region should be considered megalopolises or not. It's because everyone has a different measure of what constitutes a mega-region.

Can the thread starter or the mods, at least, come-up with a generally-acceptable standardized definition of what constitutes a mega-region, for the purposes of this thread. Please.

If I were to decide, I'd include all densely built-up farmlands into any given mega-region's total sprawl. I define "densely built-up farmlands" as having built-up housing settlements of 1 kilometer radial distances from each other in any direction, on average.

So, based on this definition, the areas in Northern India-Bangladesh and East China Central Triangle constitute the largest mega-regions on the planet.

Farming Community Densities in Bangladesh

Farming Community Densities in East China's "Central Triangle"


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## earthJoker

Skyline_FFM said:


> Nothing but fields and farting cows.


But how do they breath, without air?


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## Skyline_FFM

earthJoker said:


> But how do they breath, without air?


:lol:


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## Isek

Skyline_FFM said:


> Several. I suggest you go up to the TV Tower Floriansturm in Dortmund and you will see wide open green areas. The same goes for the city of Hamm, where the Ruhrgebiet actually starts... Nothing but fields and farting cows.
> The densest area is the smal area of Duisburg, Mülheim, Essen. The rest is pretty scattered settlements and cities with less importance, mostly poor, structurally overcome and shabby.


Dude, walk up to the TV-towers of Berlin or Munich and you think you are in the middle of a green park. Even more extrem are cities in England or the US. Lots of green everywhere. Just compare:

"Less dense" built up part of the Ruhr-valley

http://maps.google.de/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.500622,7.344704&spn=0.076726,0.17355&t=h&z=13



Part of London urban area near Heathrow

http://maps.google.de/?ie=UTF8&ll=51.393743,-0.431042&spn=0.076905,0.17355&t=h&z=13


In the middle of Washington "urban" area

http://maps.google.de/?ie=UTF8&ll=38.885822,-77.303066&spn=0.09594,0.17355&t=h&z=13


I really can not see big differences! It's green and there is no continuous dense built up area. That is also one characteristic of large cities in the western hemisphere. What do we discuss??


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## Skyline_FFM

Maybe, but when you look at Tokyo, Seoul, NYC or LA, Mexico City, Sao Paulo or Buenos Aires you really have the feeling of a megalopolis, where a huge number of cities just merged into an enormous urban area, economically and demographically and where you will see a merging of urban areas with urban areas in future. There is no way the Blue Banana will ever be such a closely integrated, merged and urban region as those others. The core of the Blue Banana, the Rhein-Ruhr Area is shrinking, Northern Italy may hold the status quo, but it is more likely to shrink demographically either. Not to forget the Channel and the Alps which are enormous obstacles as well as enormous deviders inside the Blue Banana.


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## Isek

Skyline_FFM said:


> Maybe, but when you look at Tokyo, Seoul, NYC or LA, Mexico City, Sao Paulo or Buenos Aires you really have the feeling of a megalopolis, where a huge number of cities just merged into an enormous urban area, economically and demographically and where you will see a merging of urban areas with urban areas in future.


We are not talking about feelings. We try to find objective methods to describe or define a mega-region. Also the thread is not about mono-centric mega-cities like NYC or SaoPaulo ect. A mega-region is more than a 30 km x 30 km extremely dense built up area. 





Skyline_FFM said:


> There is no way the Blue Banana will ever be such a closely integrated, merged and urban region as those others.


Of course, the Blue Banana spreads over more than 1000 km! How to compare this to Manhattan or SaoPaulo? Better compare it to the BosWash or Pearl River Delta ect. 




Skyline_FFM said:


> The core of the Blue Banana, the Rhein-Ruhr Area is shrinking, Northern Italy may hold the status quo, but it is more likely to shrink demographically either. Not to forget the Channel and the Alps which are enormous obstacles as well as enormous deviders inside the Blue Banana.


That there is probably 100 km of lower populated land is maybe no criteria for a mega region. And probably there are 3 mega-regions like South England, The Rhine and North Italy?

Of course the Blue Banana is the slowest growing of all mega-regions one may create on earth. But growing slow or even declining are also no criteria being no mega-region.


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## Chrissib

Skyline_FFM said:


> Maybe, but when you look at Tokyo, Seoul, NYC or LA, Mexico City, Sao Paulo or Buenos Aires you really have the feeling of a megalopolis, where a huge number of cities just merged into an enormous urban area, economically and demographically and where you will see a merging of urban areas with urban areas in future. There is no way the Blue Banana will ever be such a closely integrated, merged and urban region as those others. The core of the Blue Banana, the Rhein-Ruhr Area is shrinking, Northern Italy may hold the status quo, but it is more likely to shrink demographically either. Not to forget the Channel and the Alps which are enormous obstacles as well as enormous deviders inside the Blue Banana.


Those are metropolitan-areas, not megalopolises or mega-regions.


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## Skyline_FFM

^^ Neither the Blue Banana. Isek is right. The Blue Banana is actually 3 Mega-Regions. It is hard to declare it one single region if it is devided by the Alps and the Channel.
For me Rhein-Ruhe-Randstad would make more sense to call it a mega-region. :yes:


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## Anderson Geimz

Skyline_FFM said:


> :lol: I am living a 45 minutes car ride from the Ruhr area. Sorry to disappoint you. It isn't even a third as dense as most megacities around the Globe. It is not even close to a megacity or conurbation! No way. It's a huge amount of small towns with lots of empty space in between.


Not one word in this post has any relevance to the discussion. Not one...

Density, megacities, conurbation...maybe you're in the wrong topic?
We're discussing megalopoli or mega regions here, maybe you didn't notice?

(Plus the Ruhr is the world's prime example of what a conurbation is but that's another matter. Just shows you don't know what you're talking about on that subject either...:|)


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## Skyline_FFM

Anderson Geimz said:


> Not one word in this post has any relevance to the discussion. Not one...
> 
> Density, megacities, conurbation...maybe you're in the wrong topic?
> We're discussing megalopoli or mega regions here, maybe you didn't notice?
> 
> (Plus the Ruhr is the world's prime example of what a conurbation is but that's another matter. Just shows you don't know what you're talking about on that subject either...:|)


Wow, now I remember. You are the one who constantly gets nervous and aggressive in any discussion. And no Ruhr is NOT a conurbation. Almost no cities there really merged, which is the main factor for a conurbation.


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## Anderson Geimz

Skyline_FFM said:


> Wow, now I remember. You are the one who constantly gets nervous and aggressive in any discussion. And no Ruhr is NOT a conurbation. Almost no cities there really merged, which is the main factor for a conurbation.


I only get aggresive when confronted with stupidity of the highest order. You know, like claiming that the Ruhr area is not 
a conurbation when it is in fact the dictionary definition of one.

:bash::bash::bash:


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## Spookvlieger

@ Andersom Geimz: Dusseldorf and Wuppertal do not Belong to the Rurh metropolis?

If found this map and it shows that they're not but i always thought they made out a part of it...


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## Anderson Geimz

IMO Wuppertal/Dusseldorf/Cologne/Bonn/etc do belong to the Rhein-Ruhr metropolitan area, but not to the Ruhr conurbation.
But there could be made a case that it's all one big conurbation as well, certainly by international (/American) standards.


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## pesto

julesstoop: thanks; this was the best response to my question. Also, you seem less confrontational and less emotional; you must be Dutch.

It's true that there is a consistency in terms of wealth level and a growing cultural bond in this area (as opposed to the more eastern and southern parts of the EU). Geographically, an argument can be made that Brussels links to Amsterdam and (maybe) this links to the Ruhr and (maybe) this links to Southern Germany and (maybe) this links to Zurich; but Josham’s map deletes Munich, which makes this tougher. If the argument is that over time these links are likely to grow and this will become a somewhat homogeneous culture, then I would certainly hope so, assuming some local traditions are kept. 

But why include the UK and the trans-Alpine Mediterranean countries when there is such an obvious cultural and physical divide? London links fairly easily to Paris (which is well outside the banana peel) but the links to Amsterdam and the Ruhr are thinner. Josham’s map removes Barcelona/Costa Brava but still the Italian Riviera seems linked by German tourists but little else unless you are a serious mountain climber. Currencies change (the UK and Switzerland), politics change, intellectual traditions change, and of course, Switzerland is not an EU member at all. 

And as long as I’m annoying people, the California “emerging megalopolis” is confusing. There is a thin line of development along parts of highway 99 but this is in no way relevant to the economic and cultural bonds between greater LA and greater SJ-SF. Is someone arguing that this will be a megalopolis because of a thin line of continuity? Similarly Las Vegas (which seems a little out of place) is culturally tied to LA but thinly tied by physical continuity.


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## desertpunk

pesto said:


> And as long as I’m annoying people, the California “emerging megalopolis” is confusing. There is a thin line of development along parts of highway 99 but this is in no way relevant to the economic and cultural bonds between greater LA and greater SJ-SF. Is someone arguing that this will be a megalopolis because of a thin line of continuity? Similarly Las Vegas (which seems a little out of place) is culturally tied to LA but thinly tied by physical continuity.


There's little rationale for combining LA and San Francisco/San Jose. The distances and huge rural breaks between the two metros render any such talk of a megalopolis of them useless. LA and San Diego is much closer to reality which gets us to about 21,000,000 people. Bakersfield and Kern County will add another million in 20 years, but Las Vegas? That's some bad crack someone is smoking. :lol:


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## GENIUS LOCI

I think the problem is there are too much arbitrarian parameters to define what a megaloplis is, what is its shape and 'size'

If even to define a metro area there are many ways (and I saw SSC forumers debate on 'em so many times...) to define a megalopolis is pratically impossible

Anyway Blue Banana was the first attempt to define a new 'urban' concept. I think actually using the same basis to define the BB as a megalopolis we can find many different megalopolis in Europe in every direction, and even whole Europe could be considered as a megalopolis (same for China, India or other places)

Probably the concept of megalopolis is not that effective


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## Anderson Geimz

Sorry but all I read is that the Rhein-Ruhr is a *metropolitan area* as well as Germany's only *megacity* that lies at the heart of *The Blue Banana*. All true and all contrary to what you were claiming earlier. Then if you click on "Ruhr area", you can read it's a *(polycentric) urban area*, *agglomeration* and a *conurbation*. Again all contrary to what you claimed earlier...


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## George W. Bush

Just to save your face, I'm not gonna mention that you edited the article twice in the last 10 minutes. :lol:

In any case I was referring to the article's version before 14:41, which is this one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rhine-Ruhr&oldid=374796367


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## Anderson Geimz

George W. Bush said:


> Just to save your face, I'm not gonna mention that you edited the article twice in the last 10 minutes. :lol:
> 
> In any case I was referring to the article's version before 14:41, which is this one:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rhine-Ruhr&oldid=374796367


The point is that your proof is an article that can be editted by anyone? :lol: :|

I was showing you my point. I could have editted in a way that it said that Rhein Ruhr was a fairytale land but as it happens it was corrected to reality this time...

And by all means gloss over all the other bolded terms...pathetic...


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## George W. Bush

Oh well, it may all be a big big big coincidence that somebody else complete unrelated to you removed the word "megalopolis" from the article just a couple of minutes after I mentioned it. Couldn't it?


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## Anderson Geimz

George W. Bush said:


> Oh well, it may all be a big big big coincidence that somebody else complete unrelated to you removed the word "megalopolis" from the article a couple of minutes after I mentioned it. Couldn't it? ;-)


Stop annoying us and explain why the article mentions that Rhein-Ruhr is a metropolitan area at the heart of the Blue Banana and that the Ruhr area is a polycentric urban area and a conurbation.

All these things don't exists according to you, remember?

And if you keep acting like a child, please take a hike and leave this thread.


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## George W. Bush

I'm not as dogmatic as you. I've always stated that it's all up to your favourite definition of what "urban area" means. As the term conurbation to me denotes an almost completely closed urban area and I don't consider woods and farmland to be "urban area", the Ruhrstadt as a whole clearly doesn't fit in this mold. That's because I look at your map and I also trust my own eyes and memory, as I know the train route from Dortmund to Duisburg almost by heart. There is no such thing as a closed urban area along this route. I also told you that there is a dense subregion including Essen, Bottrop and Mühlheim (and Oberhausen, for that matter), which fits the definition of a conurbation. That's about it.


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## caduroxbr

[/QUOTE]

Sao Paulo Megalopolis (Sao Paulo metro area + Campinas metro area + Santos metro area + Sao Jose dos Campos metro area)
More than 24.000.000 peoples live today.
In the future this region conect to Rio Megalopolis.

More photos!


Lukinhaaaz said:


> Mais algumas imagens que mostram a conurbação da RM de SP e RM do RJ, em relação a suas regiões vizinhas (Interior e Litoral)
> 
> Região Metropolitana de Rio de Janeiro
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> Vista parcial da seguintes regiões: Região Metropolitana de São Paulo, Região Metropolitana de Campinas, Baixada Santista, Jundiaí e região; Jacareí, São José dos Campos e região.
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> São Bernardo do Campo na RM de SP e Cubatão na Baixada Santista.
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> Leste da RM de São Paulo em relação a Jacareí e São José dos Campos no Vale do Paraíba Paulista.
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> Conurbação entre Jundiaí e Campinas.
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> Conurbação entre a Grande São Paulo e Jundiaí.
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> Vista parcial da Grande São Paulo e da Baixada Santista.


Rio-Sao Paulo


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## spotila

I found this map pretty neat:


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## Anderson Geimz

Here's a (selfmade) map at a similar scale to the US Megaregions one. 

As you can see The Blue Banana is basically a Great Lakes megaregion with a Northeast megaregion inside it at its core. Then you have a Southern and Northern California megaregion directely to the south, as well as a Gulf coast one. A Cascadia megaregion to the north of the BB and "Florida" to the southeast. Lastly, there are about five "Piedmont Atlantics" to the east and that's only if we stop counting...

In other words, you take all US megaregions and throw them on one heap and that's how the clustering of cities in Europe looks like. Suffice to say it's of a totally different scale, with most importantely, the Blue Banana at its core...


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## Spookvlieger

Nice job Anderson!!! That map came out really good!


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## The Cebuano Exultor

*An Opinion on the What the Loosest Parameter for Mega-Region Should Be*

If we're taking the "mega-region" term to its loosest possible parameters, then the map above roughly illustrates the European Megalopolis at its most extreme breadth and width.

This "mega-region" would encompass all of mainland Europe along with parts of the British Isles and Asian Turkey. This would form the most sprawling mega-region on Earth and third most populous (after the Northern India - Bangladesh Megalopolis and the Eastern China Megalopolis).

I know this sounds absurd to many forumers (to urban area purists, most especially), but if we take the term "mega-regions" to mean any contiguous area (of urban or rural setting) with built-up density of at least one built-up structure per kilometer radii, then we'd have a "mega-region" just like the one described and illustrated in the map above.


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## George W. Bush

We can define anything, as long as it is logically consistent. But is it useful? What's the driving motivation behind defining such a concept? I fail to see any deeper use, other maybe than personal entertainment ("let's play the megaregion game and see who's able to define the biggest, largest and awesomest mega-uber-super-duper-region?"). No problem with that, I can understand it's fun.


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## The Cebuano Exultor

*@ George W. Bush*

^^ Yep. :yes: That's exactly the point, isn't it. 

The loosest parameters does seem to be only about "my-dick-is-bigger-than-yours."

But, I guess, more defined mega-regions such as the: Northeastern Corridor, Blue Banana, Tokaido Rail Corridor, Pearl River Delta, Yangtze River Delta, Rio-Paulo, Central Mexico, So-Cal, Chi-Pitts, Beijing-Tianjin, Nile River Delta, Lagos Conurbation, Java Island, New Delhi-Kolkata, and Tel-Aviv-Beirut illustrate the growing reality that economic entities are actually clumping together, not as countries, but as dense and fairly connected urban regions.


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## George W. Bush

In 250 million years we may even have a pancontinental conurbation.


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## mhays

Seems like there's a lot of arguing over terms that themselves have no unarguable definitions. 

Most words are like that. You can say that X source defines a word in a certain way, and there will always be authorities who define certain words in certain ways (starting with the people who first used the words), but there's no "official" arbiter of such things.


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## AnOldBlackMarble

Northsider said:


> There are no places in the States that can be truly a Megalopolis



Well I live in Los Angeles and I can tell you that if you drive from San Diego to Santa Barbara (200 miles or so) you are pretty much driving through one unbroken continuous city. There are either business, shopping centers, or housing developments on either side of the freeway. I would consider that a megalopolis. Maybe a sprawled one but driving over 200 miles without leaving town is a weird sensation.


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## daikin

the world largest megalopolises is Indo-Gangetic Plain: Karachi, Delhi, Islamabad, Lahore, Kanpur, Kolkata, Varanasi, Dhaka — 200 million










in big picture










and is one of the oldest and biggest 

megalopolises from the ancient time


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## the spliff fairy

wow look at Java, population 125 million (in an area the size of Louisiana). Over 30 million in the Jakarta CSA, second biggest metro after Tokyo (39 million).

Also Nile Delta 70 million in an area just bigger than Maryland.


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## tk780

Anderson Geimz said:


>


Neat. I suppose those are Urban Areas, not Metropolitan Areas?


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## Anderson Geimz

No, metropolitan areas. I tried to follow the same criteria as the US map.


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## tk780

Why are cities that clearly form a single metropolitan area indicated as separate dots though?


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## Anderson Geimz

Examples?

These are MSA equivalents. Some US CSA's also consist of seperate MSA's. For example LA and Riverside-San Bernardino, Washington and Baltimore or San Fransisco and San Jose.


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## tk780

The cities in North Rhine Westphalia, Frankfurt-Wiesbaden-Mainz, Marseille-Aix-en-Provence, Rotterdam-The Hague (if I'm seeing it right) and probably a few others. Those would not be separate MSAs by US standards.


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## Anderson Geimz

Aren't you being a bit too nitpicky?

Afterall San Fransisco and San Jose are not one MSA either...

Basically your argument is that there are 3 too many little dots on the map? :dunno:

Personally I'm comfortable with Rotterdam and The Hague or Koln and Dusseldorf having their own metropolitan area. These are important enough cities with their own pull.
And I don't see how Aix-en-Provence absolutely positively belongs to the same metropolitan area as Marseille either.


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## tk780

I was just using those as examples. It seems like you have marked every city of a certain size as having its own metro area. 

As per the U.S. Census Bureau definition, two cities that are part of the same urban area are automatically part of the same MSA, and the U.S. Census Bureau's standards for urban areas are more generous than those usually used in Europe to begin with.

The San Jose area is not its own MSA because it is large or important but because, due to statistical quirks, the southern Silicon Valley is classified as a separate urban area from the San Francisco-Oakland area. The Bay Area is actually one of the few cases where applying the French 200-meter rule instead of the American definition would result in a larger urban area (and thus, MSA).

Anyway, sorry for the off-topic post.


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## Anderson Geimz

But Aix-en-Provence and Marseille don't share an urban area. Neither do Rotterdam and The Hague (strickly speaking) and neither do Dusseldorf and Koln, not with eachother and not with The Ruhr conurbation.

But please let me know if you think there is a grave mistake on that map that changes what it intents to show. It's good to have feedback and at least you're not being a dick and you know the definitions and don't go by the childish fantasies of some in this thread.


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## 909

Anderson Geimz: That's a great map you made! I assume the medium sized circles are for cities in the 1-5 million league. Although I do not want criticize your work and don't get me wrong, but perhaps you may consider this: perhaps it would be interesting to distinguish the bigger cities in this league from the smaller ones. For example, Kiev and Zaporizhia are in same category, just like Warsaw and Wroclaw, Hamburg and Dresden, Birmingham and Newcastle. I know you have to draw the line somewhere, but isn't it better to create another category for (let's say) 2-5 million?


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## Anderson Geimz

909 said:


> Anderson Geimz: That's a great map you made! I assume the medium sized circles are for cities in the 1-5 million league. Although I do not want criticize your work and don't get me wrong, but perhaps you may consider this: perhaps it would be interesting to distinguish the bigger cities in this league from the smaller ones. For example, Kiev and Zaporizhia are in same category, just like Warsaw and Wroclaw, Hamburg and Dresden, Birmingham and Newcastle. I know you have to draw the line somewhere, but isn't it better to create another category for (let's say) 2-5 million?


I used the same criteria as the US map. Metro areas between 1 and 3 million. All those cities are that. It just so happens that the first city of each country you mention is on the 3 million side of things, and the second ones are on the 1 million side.


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## 909

Ok, thanks for the explanation. kay:


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## pesto

I'm a little lost. What are we trying to show by the new US and Europe maps?

As a side note, using the US MSA and CSA defintions is not always wise. Their own website indicates that these are statistical studies and not valid for budgeting, planning, project and similar purposes without an independent analysis. As has been noted, the LA, SF, NY and many other regions are not usefully described in the MSA's.


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## Substructure

George W. Bush said:


> In 250 million years we may even have a pancontinental conurbation.


Istanbul already is, spanning across both Europe (left) and Asia (right).


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## Azia

*Seoul*

It is possible that the Seoul area in South Corea will hit the 30 million inhabitans barrer ??


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## diablo234

Promotional video on the emerging urban corridor known as the Texas Triangle or Texaplex.


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## Skyrazer

It's good to see that Texas is not suffering many of the woes much of the rest of the US is going through, but "Texaplex"? I dunno, sorta sounds lame to me.

But there is a thing or two to learn from Texas you must admit.


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## diablo234

Skyrazer said:


> It's good to see that Texas is not suffering many of the woes much of the rest of the US is going through, but "Texaplex"? I dunno, sorta sounds lame to me.


Well it is a promotional/marketing video afterall.


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## Bricken Ridge

Chrissib said:


> Metro Manil may be a very big city, but it's isolated.



Actually, the fast developing urban corridor of Central Luzon- Metro Manila- Southern Luzon is considered a major agglomeration that includes close to 40 million people within its cluster of town and cities and is comparable to Jakarta's Jabotek and Japan's Tokyo-Osaka-Kyoto corridor (for your "isolated" island comparisons). This linear development is notable since economically and singularly, it parallels with other advanced regions in newly industrialized countries. This region is increasingly unified and efficient as more expressways and rail systems are built on top of a more developed infractructure compared to the rest of the Philippines.


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## Skyrazer

diablo234 said:


> Well it is a promotional/marketing video afterall.


I realise that, but it is true that economically, Texas is expanding at a considerable rate while most of the rest of the country is going backwards.


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## Yuri S Andrade

There are so much confusion on this thread around concepts like conurbation, metro area, megalopolis, mega-region and even city.

Back to the topic, many people talk about the *Rio-São Paulo corridor*, but actually the strongest link is between São Paulo and its wealth hinterland. Plus, the distance between São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro (400 km) are pretty much the same between São Paulo-Belo Horizonte (5.2 million people in metro area) and São Paulo-Curitiba (3.3 million people metro area), as you can see on the map:



São Paulo's region would comprise cities like Campinas, Piracicaba, Sorocaba and São José do Campos, etc. Population:

*----------------- 2009 --------- 2000 -------- 1991 -------- 1980
São Paulo --- 32.180.748 --- 28.728.475 --- 24.305.301 --- 19.130.351*


Rio de Janeiro's would comprise Volta Redonda, Juiz de Fora, Nova Friburgo, Macaé, etc.:

*------------------- 2009 --------- 2000 -------- 1991 -------- 1980
Rio de Janeiro --- 16.087.416 --- 14.440.057 --- 12.828.096 --- 11.295.743*

^^
On this two contiguous areas live around *48 million people*. But, like I said, we could expand São Paulo's in other directions, specially to the hinterland, including Araraquara-São Carlos (600k people), São José do Rio Preto (700k people in metro area) and Ribeirão Preto (1 million people metro area) and eventually including the whole *São Paulo state*, which has *41 million inhabitants[/i].

For further details:
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1026255





----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------







joshsam said:



These two maps come from google earth and only show real Highways. Not roads that only have 2 lanes and also are called highway in Brazil and some other parts in the world.

(...)










SO I gues where really bad connected then...

Click to expand...

^^
This map is not correct. Missing several highways and all the interrupted lines, are actually continuous.

Some facts about the Southern Brazil (Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul states). Roughly the same size of France, 27 million people (not much less than Canada), 265 billion US dollars GDP (bigger than Thailand). There's no such thing like Rio-São Paulo-Buenos Aires area, but South is not a empty place at all:



^^
Between the two biggest cities, Porto Alegre (4.2 million metro area) and Curitiba (3.3 million people metro area) are 700 kms and we have many smaller metro areas in the way. Ponta Grossa metro area (400 k people); Paraná coast (270 k); Joinville metro (850 k); Blumenau metro (650 k); Itajaí metro (560 k); Florianópolis metro (900 k); Tubarão metro (260 k); Criciúma metro (490 k); Rio Grande do Sul coast (250 k); Caxias do Sul metro (780 k); Santa Cruz do Sul-Lajeado area (550 k). Aside this, the whole hinterland are quite dense. For example, in the Londrina-Maringá 100 km axis (top of the map) lives 2 million people.*


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## Sniper

*A megalopolis is a conurbation of metropolitan areas.*

Bos-Wash and Tokyo-Osaka-Nagoya are the best definitions. Guangzhou-Shenzhen-HK is also a new megalopolis. If we're too strict, by the original definition there aren't any other megalopoles.

but who cares?


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## Anderson Geimz

A conurbation of metropolitan areas?! :nuts:

What a silly thing to say. "A heap of spiderwebs".

Sorry you have no idea...

If you meant to say "a chain of metro areas" or "a collection of metro areas", than that would be right, but either your English is bad or you don't understand the terminology. A conurbation is multiple urban areas that are physically connected.


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