A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z Misc
BosWash The
BosWash or
Bosnywash or
Boshington megalopolis is the name for a group of
metropolitan areas in the
northeastern United States , extending from
Boston, MA to
Washington, D.C. , including
Providence, RI ,
Hartford, CT ,
New York City, NY ,
Philadelphia, PA , and
Baltimore, MD . The geographic trend was first identified in the
1961 book
Megalopolis: The Urbanized Northeastern Seaboard of the United States by
French geographer Jean Gottmann . The cities are also linked economically, and by transportation and communications.
According to Gottman, BosWash "provides the whole of America with so many essential services, of the sort a community used to obtain in its 'downtown' section, that it may well deserve the nickname of Main Street of the nation." He also envisioned the development of two similar megalopolises in the US:
ChiPitts from
Chicago to
Pittsburgh and
SanSan from
San Francisco to
San Diego . However, a more accepted definition in California is
Bajalta California comprising of just the southern end of SanSan.
BosWash theoretically extends from extreme southern
Maine and
New Hampshire all the way south to
Virginia , where recently, with the explosion of population in the
Hampton Roads area, the megalopolis now includes the three largest cities in southeastern Virginia:
Virginia Beach ,
Norfolk , and
Chesapeake . The megalopolis contains a reported population of 44 million, or 16% of the population of the United States (0.7% of the world population), three
world cities , and four of the
world's fifty largest metropolitan areas â€"
Boston ,
New York ,
Philadelphia , and
Baltimore-Washington â€" as well as the
New York Stock Exchange and
NASDAQ , the
White House and
US Capitol , the
UN Headquarters , the headquarters of
ABC ,
NBC ,
CBS , and the
New York Times Company as well as the
Washington Post , and six of the eight
Ivy League schools. The high-speed
Amtrak train, the
Acela Express , runs on the
Northeast Corridor , an
electrified rail line extending the length of the BosWash area.
Interstate 95 , arguably one of the most vital highways in the country, is also a major transportation route for the BosWash area. As large as Boswash is, internationally there are other larger megalopolises, such as
Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka-Hiroshima-Fukuoka containing 75 million people, the very reason for the success of the bullet train (
Shinkansen ). The
Pearl River Delta in China could also be considered a developing megalopolis as it is home to several cities upwards of 1 million people in a small area.
Population-density map of BosWash
The major cities in the BosWash megalopolis include the following (North-to-South):
Portland, Maine Manchester, New Hampshire Boston, Massachusetts Providence, Rhode Island Warwick, Rhode Island Worcester, Massachusetts Springfield, Massachusetts New Bedford, Massachusetts Fall River, Massachusetts Hartford, Connecticut New Haven, Connecticut Bridgeport, Connecticut Stamford, Connecticut Yonkers, New York New York City, New York (Manhattan , Brooklyn , Queens , Staten Island , The Bronx )Long Island, New York (Nassau and Suffolk Counties)Jersey City, New Jersey Newark, New Jersey Paterson, New Jersey Edison, New Jersey New Brunswick, New Jersey Allentown, Pennsylvania Princeton, New Jersey Reading, Pennsylvania Trenton, New Jersey Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Camden, New Jersey Atlantic City, New Jersey Wilmington, Delaware Baltimore, Maryland Columbia, Maryland Annapolis, Maryland Washington, D.C. Arlington, Virginia Alexandria, Virginia Richmond, Virginia Norfolk, Virginia Virginia Beach, Virginia Chesapeake, Virginia
Rank Combined Statistical Area State(s) 2004 Estimate 2000 Population 1990 Population (1990-2000)>- 1 New York-Newark-Bridgeport NY-NJ-CT-PA 21,858,830 21,361,797 19,710,239 8.4|- 4 Washington-Baltimore-Northern Virginia DC-MD-VA-WV 8,026,807 7,538,385 6,665,228 13.1|- 6 Philadelphia-Camden-Vineland PA-NJ-DE-MD 5,951,797 5,833,585 5,573,521 4.7|- 8 Boston-Worcester-Manchester MA-NH 5,809,111 5,715,698 5,348,894 6.9|- Combined 41,646,545 40,449,465 37,297,882 8.4|}Included or neighboring MSAs not in a CSA Rank Metropolitan Statistical Area State(s) and/or Territory 1 July 2004 33 Virginia Beach -Norfolk -Newport News VA -NC 1,644,250 34 Providence -New Bedford -Fall River RI -MA 1,628,808 44 Hartford -West Hartford -East Hartford CT 1,184,564 46 Richmond VA 1,154,317 59 Albany -Schenectady -Troy NY 845,269 63 Allentown -Bethlehem -Easton PA -NJ 779,816 70 Springfield MA 687,973 86 Scranton --Wilkes-Barre PA 551,531 91 Harrisburg -Carlisle PA 519,331 96 Portland -South Portland -Biddeford ME 510,791 99 Lancaster PA 487,332 117 York -Hanover PA 401,613 121 Reading PA 391,640 164 Atlantic City NJ 268,693 183 Barnstable Town MA 228,683 216 Charlottesville VA 180,901 254 Bangor ME 148,196 268 Dover DE 138,752 275 Pittsfield MA 132,486 288 Lebanon PA 124,489 311 Harrisonburg VA 111,284 327 Lewiston -Auburn ME 107,022 Combined non-CSA MSAs 12,224,733 Combined CSAs and MSAs 53,871,278|}* List of U.S. multistate regions Highways along the BosWash corridor Overpopulation The Sprawl , a science fiction extension of BosWash which extends from Boston to Atlanta from the books of William Gibson Mega-City One , another science fiction megalopolis based on BosWash from the Judge Dredd seriesNortheast Corridor , the railroad line that runs through the region.Quebec City-Windsor Corridor , the Canadian equivalent of the Northeast Corridor/BosWashUrban sprawl *About.com article on BosWash
