Is this what Erie looks like? (Philadelphia, Pittsburgh: how much, home, live in)

[PacoMartin]

Does it still look basically the same. A busy city perched on a Lake with hardly anything around it?

[Ohiogirl81]

Uh ... no.

Well, the lake hasn't gone anywhere.



Nice historical drawing, though. I think the date says 1870. Interesting to see how development went further west than it did on the east side; the east side development barely goes past Parade Street.

It would be cool to get a print and have it framed.

[Hopes]

In the basic description of it being a city on a lake with rural areas nearby, yes, Erie is still like that.

The sprawl is bigger today, but it still gets rural pretty fast.

[trackstar13]

Originally Posted by Hopes

In the basic description of it being a city on a lake with rural areas nearby, yes, Erie is still like that.

The sprawl is bigger today, but it still gets rural pretty fast.

This is true of most places in western and central PA and I have even recently hunted in Allegheny county so you could definitely say it gets rural very quickly once you leave the city of Pittsburgh. For a city its size, Erie has a significant amount of sprawl, especially to the west. Millcreek Township has over 50,000 residents and is actually bigger in terms of population than Harrisburg. Yes there are still many rural areas in Erie county, but the map posted doesn't really show anything south of 26th street and there definitely was not as much sprawl to the west or east when this map was developed. I would say the big differences between that map and today are the sprawl in all directions but north (obviously) and the addition of big buildings away from the center of the city, i.e. Hamot, and whatever that tall building across the street from it is called. Erie will always be somewhat isolated, unless it expands rapidly all the way to both the Ohio and New York borders, which I am not sure I see happening anytime soon. Although some would say that this has happened to some extent already, here is some interesting information from Wikipedia:

Erie's Metropolitan Area consists of approximately 280,000 residents and an Urbanized Area population of approximately 195,000. The Erie-Meadville CSA is home to nearly 370,000 residents, and with the bordering Chautauqua County, New York and Ashtabula County, Ohio, Erie is the central city for a region of over 700,000 people.

[PacoMartin]

Originally Posted by track2514

This is true of most places in western and central PA and I have even recently hunted in Allegheny county so you could definitely say it gets rural very quickly once you leave the city of Pittsburgh.

The State of Pennsylvania seems unsure of how to classify Erie. The above map is from the:The Center for Rural Pennsylvania which is a bipartisan, bicameral legislative agency that serves as a resource for rural policy within the Pennsylvania General Assembly. The Center works with the legislature, educators, state and federal executive branch agencies, and national, statewide, regional and local organizations to maximize resources and strategies that can better serve Pennsylvania's 3.4 million rural residents.

The Center for Rural Pennsylvania as you can see from the above map classifies Erie County as urban.

But the Department of Public Welfare has reclassified Erie as rural.

IMHO the "urban level" of a county should be determined by the percentage of it's population that lives in an urban environment (as determined by the federal census bureau), and not by how much empty land is in the county.

By this criteria, Erie County and Blair County are more urban than Lebanon County. Also Erie is high up on the list (on par with Scranton Wilkes-Barre) which also has a lot of land. By no means should Erie County be considered rural.

100.00% Philadelphia County
99.54% Delaware County
97.51% Allegheny County
97.07% Montgomery County
92.07% Lehigh County
91.17% Bucks County
87.23% Northampton County
86.72% Chester County
86.68% Dauphin County
83.69% Lackawanna County
80.02% Luzerne County
79.98% Erie County <==============
78.74% Lancaster County
77.82% Cumberland County
76.57% Blair County <==============
76.26% Berks County
75.28% York County
74.64% Westmoreland County
74.17% Beaver County

73.44% Lebanon County <==============


If you look at the bottom of the list you can see why Erie residents are upset at a system that classifies Perry county as "urban" and Erie county as "rural".

11.50% Perry County
9.89% Tioga County
0.00% Fulton County
0.00% Forest County
0.00% Potter County
0.00% Sullivan County

[trackstar13]

Paco

You have posted some good information and I think the main issue with the Erie county rural/urban debate is what you have mentioned in your last post. There are some rural areas in southeastern and southwestern Erie county, but the majority of Erie county residents live in the city or the suburbs immediately surrounding the city. The other issue that I have with change in designation for Erie is related to the size of the city itself. The city of Erie still has over 100,000 residents and I am not sure how a "rural" county could contain such a large city that is the business and population center of Northwestern PA.

[Key West]

I believe Erie looks a little bit more like this

Spoiler

[trackstar13]

[trackstar13]

The map I posted above is helpful when discussing this issue and I believe the main growth has been or is occurring currently in Millcreek, Harborcreek, Fairview, Summit, and maybe North East in the near future with the recent gas drilling. In other words, as Paco mentioned much of Erie county is rural, but townships right around the city have become much more populated in recent years.

[Ohiogirl81]

That's a cool map, too; it's pre-1910, there's no Lawrence Park Township.