Exurbia in South Carolina

[krazeeboi]

A new study released by the Brookings Institute entitled Finding Exurbia: America's Fast-Growing Communities at the Metropolitan Fringe details a new effort to locate and describe the exurbs of large metropolitan areas in the United States. It defines exurbs as communities located on the urban fringe that have at least 20 percent of their workers commuting to jobs in an urbanized area, exhibit low housing density, and have relatively high population growth.

Among the study's findings is that South Carolina has one of the largest proportions of their residents living in exurbs and that seven metropolitan areas have at least one in five residents living in an exurb, and the Greenville MSA is among them, ranking 4th overall at 22.1%; the study determined Laurens County to be the only exurban county in the Greenville MSA . In terms of the exurban share of our state's other metropolitan areas that were listed, Columbia ranked 12th at 17.0% (with 6 counties being described as exurban--which is the entire MSA except Richland County itself ) and Charleston ranked 20th at 15.6% (one exurban county, Berkeley). The Charlotte MSA, which includes York County (one of the MSA's three exurban counties), ranked 20th at 12.7%.

[erm1981]

This is really no surprise but it is interesting none the less!

[sonofaque86]

Interesting!

[Jerseyman4]

In a way, Berkeley County does not make any sense because part of Charleston's city limits run into Berkeley County (daniel island). But i do get it since some commuters are coming from Moncks Corner.

[Spartan]

That is interesting! I find it interesting that all of Columbia was listed as exurban except Richland, while Greenville only has Laurens. Granted its 3 counties inbetween 2 other MSA's vs Columbia's 6 counties with no neighboring MSAs (that would impact it the way Spartanburg and Anderson impact Greenville). I think that Pickens should fit in that category too. Also, It would be interesting to see a tract breakdown of exurbia. I think a lot of Richland and a lot of Greenville would fit their criteria.

[krazeeboi]

I was actually pretty surprised that we as a state ranked so far up there. I would have thought Virginia, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, Texas, etc. would have topped the list, but they didn't. Heck, Atlanta ranked 50th for its share of the MSA population deemed exurban; I was REALLY surprised by that finding.

This is all the more reason why our metros need to get on the ball with mass transit!

[erm1981]

Greenville always ranks high with the sprawl, and low with city population

[teshadoh]

Now I'm jealous - I've always found the exurban / suburban division fascinating & attempted my own criterias. I think I had last come up with a formula of less than 50% of residents living in the primary UA with of course a high commuting rate. But as the population nationally disperses away from urbanized areas, SC unfortunately is ripe - SC is surprisingly evenly dispersed state wide. So - with numerous towns of 5k & higher, that creates numerous nodes to gravitate around the primary metro center. So these towns assist the piggyback aspect of sprawl.

kb - good stuff, though I couldn't get the pdf to open just now (...ok, I'm getting back to the football game - Clemson 7 GT 0 )

[Charleston native]

I need better clarification of the term exurbia. What is it exactly? Developed areas beyond what is known as suburban?

[krazeeboi]

Click on the link to access the study itself; it gives a more detailed explanation.

[monsoon]

I need better clarification of the term exurbia. What is it exactly? Developed areas beyond what is known as suburban?

[digital_sandlapper]

Here's one good explaanation of "exurb", from Wikipedia:

"They begin as embryonic subdivisions of a few hundred homes at the far edge of beyond, surrounded by scrub. Then, they grow - first gradually, but soon with explosive force - attracting stores, creating jobs and struggling to keep pace with the need for more schools, more roads, more everything. And eventually, when no more land is available and home prices have skyrocketed, the whole cycle starts again, another 15 minutes down the turnpike."

-from Rybczynski, Witold (Nov. 7, 2005). "Suburban Despair". Slate

[Charleston native]

Thanks, dig and metro. Wow, I've got a much better idea of exurbs. You guys provided some great explanations. I guess then you could say that Elgin and Pontiac would be considered exurbs of Cola? Maybe Awendaw, Ravenel, and Hollywood are exurbs of Chas?

[btoy]

The current issue of Retail Traffic Magazine has an article on the form of retail being built along the I-85 Boombelt. THe article is titled Southern Sprawl Click here to read article.

Here are some interesting quotes.

I-85 is not just another rural highway. Researchers at Virginia Tech's Metropolitan Institute recently identified this corridor as

[pyper]

I kind of think counties are too big of an area to do this kind of study on. Here's a map that shows household density by tenure (owners are purple dots and renters are red). The way I read thier methodology, just plain rural areas are "exurbs" if they have population growth and commuters. So that means in some cases the difference between exurb and rural is some mobile homes have gone in. I think they could tighten that up some.