New York has garnered thenicknameMetropolis to describe the city in the daytime in popular culture, contrasting withGotham, sometimes used to describe New York at night.[1]Skyline ofTokyo, the world's most populous metropolis, withMount Fuji in the backgroundSkyline ofLondon, which was once themetropole of theBritish Empire
Ametropolis (/mɪˈtrɒpəlɪs/ⓘ)[2] is a largecity orconurbation which is a significant economic, political, and cultural area for a country or region, and an important hub for regional or international connections, commerce, and communications.
A big city belonging to a largerurban agglomeration, but which is not the core of that agglomeration, is not generally considered a metropolis but a part of it. The plural of the word ismetropolises,[3] although the Latin plural ismetropoles, from the Greekmetropoleis (μητρoπόλεις).
For urban areas outside metropolitan areas that generate a similar attraction on a smaller scale for their region, the concept of theregiopolis ("regio" for short) was introduced by urban and regional planning researchers in Germany in 2006.[4]
Metropolis (μητρόπολις) is aGreek word, (plural:metropoleis) coming fromμήτηρ,mḗtēr meaning "mother" andπόλις,pólis meaning "city" or "town", which is how theGreek colonies of antiquity referred to their original cities, with whom they retained cultic and political-cultural connections. The word was used in post-classical Latin for the chief city of a province, the seat of the government and, in particular,ecclesiastically for the seat or see of ametropolitan bishop to whomsuffragan bishops were responsible.[5] This usage equates the province with thediocese orepiscopal see.[6]
In a colonial context, it is the "mother city" of acolony, that is, the city which sent out settlers. The word has distant roots in thecolonial past of Ancient Greece with first usage inMiddle English around the 14th century.[7] This was later generalized to a city regarded as a center of a specified activity, or any large, important city in a nation.[citation needed]
The concept of a "metropolis" as a "mother city" dates back to at least sixth-century Canterbury, where the term was used in a religious context, but the term began to be used to describe a large secular city starting with 16th-century London.[8] London's cultural influence meant that until the 19th century, concepts of the "metropolis" were rarely used to describe other cities, though Edinburgh was also described as a "metropolis."[9] While metropolis can often mean any large city, the metropolis is generally understood as a city which serves as a particular function as opposed to simply being large.[10]
Modern ideas of a metropolis have changed as modern city growth has created "polycentric" urban regions, where one city does not necessarily dominate its surroundings but instead is central to an economic region. Instead of a single "metropolis" fulfilling an economic role, large urban areas such as the Tokyo–Osaka corridor or the southern California built up area have been considered as a modern "metropolis" even though the region encompasses multiple cities.[11]
In France, Portugal, Spain, and the Netherlands, the wordmetropolis (métropole (Fr.) /metrópole (Port.) /metrópoli (Spa.) /metropool (Dutch)) designates the mainland part of a country situated on or close to the European mainland; in the case of France, this means France without itsoverseas departments. For Portugal and Spain during theSpanish Empire andPortuguese Empire period, the term was used to designate Portugal or Spain minus its colonies (theUltramar). In Francemétropole can also be used to refer to a largeurban agglomeration; for example, "La Métropole de Lyon" (theLyon Metropolis).
The Japanese legal termto (都) is by designation to be translated as "metropolis".[13] However, existing translations predate the designation[clarification needed]. Structured like aprefecture instead of a normal city, there is only oneto in Japan, namely Tokyo. As of 2020[update], Japan has12 other cities with populations greater than one million. The sameKanji character in Chinese, or in generic Japanese (traditional or non-specific), translates variously—city, municipality, special municipality—all qualify.
Greater Manila Area is the contiguous urbanization region or Extended Metropolitan Manila surrounding Metro Manila. This built-up zone includesMetro Manila and the neighboring provinces ofBulacan to the north,Cavite andLaguna to the south, andRizal to the east. Though sprawl continues to absorb new zones, some urban zones are independent clusters of settlements surrounded by non-urban areas.
In the South Korea, there are seven special and metropolitan cities at autonomous administrative levels. These are the most populous metropolitan areas in the country. In decreasing order of the population of 2015 census, they areSeoul,Busan,Incheon,Daegu,Daejeon,Gwangju andUlsan.
According to the census of 2015, cities ofChangwon andSuwon also qualify for being elevated to the level of metropolitan cities (having population over 1 million), but any future plans to promote them into metropolitan city are unlikely to be accepted because of political concerns about thestructure of administrative divisions. There are also some county-level cities with increasing population near 1 million, namelyGoyang,Yongin, andSeongnam, but they are also unlikely to be promoted into metropolitan city because they are allsatellite cities ofSeoul.
A 2014 law allowed any group ofcommunes to cooperate in a larger administrative division called amétropole. One métropole,Lyon, also has status as adepartment.
The largest German city by administrative borders isBerlin, whileRhine-Ruhr is the largest metropolitan area (with more than 10 million people). The importance of a city is measured with three groups of indicators, also called metropolitan functions: The decision making and control function, the innovation and competition function, and the gateway function. These functions are seen as key domains for metropolitan regions in developing their performance.
As of January 1, 2015, there are 14 "metropolitan cities" in Italy.Rome,Milan,Naples and other big cores have taken in urban zones from their surrounding areas and merged them into the new entities, which have been home for one out of three Italians. Theprovinces remained in the parts of the country not belonging to anyCittà Metropolitana.[17]
TheUnion of Polish metropolises (Polish:Unia Metropolii Polskich), established in 1990, is an organization of the largest cities in the country. Currently twelve cities are members of the organization, of which 11 have more than a quarter-million inhabitants. The largest metropolitan area in Poland, if ranked solely by the number of inhabitants, is theKatowice metropolitan area with around 3 million inhabitants (5 million inhabitants in theKatowice-Ostrava metropolitan area). TheMetropolis GZM is an initiative of recent years attempting to unitethe conurbation into one official urban unit. It is followed byWarsaw, with around 1.7 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.1 million in theWarsaw metropolitan area. Other Polish metropolises areKraków,Łódź,Wrocław,Poznań,Tricity,Szczecin andBydgoszcz–Toruń.
In Turkey the metropolitan cities are described as "büyükşehir". There are 30 metropolitan municipalities in Turkey now. The largest by far isIstanbul, followed byAnkara,İzmir andBursa.Istanbul, the largest city in Europe in terms of population, has a population of over 15 million. The city has surpassedLondon andDubai to become themost visited city in the world, with more than20 million foreign visitors in 2023. This city, which played an important role in the spread of Christianity, is an important heritage for European culture.
In the United States, anincorporated area or group of areas having a population more than 50,000 is required to have ametropolitan planning organization in order to facilitate major infrastructure projects and to ensure financial solvency. Thus, a population of 50,000 or greater has been used as a de facto standard to define ametropolis in the United States. A similar definition is used by theUnited States Census Bureau. The bureau defines aMetropolitan Statistical Area as "at least one urbanized area of 50,000 or more inhabitants." The six largest metropolitan areas in the USA areNew York,Los Angeles,Chicago,Dallas,Houston, andWashington, D.C., with New York being the largest.
TheAustralian Bureau of Statistics defines a metropolitan area as any statistical division or district with a population of more than 100,000.[19] According to this definition, there are currently 19 metropolitan areas in Australia, including every state capital. By population, the largest metropolitan area isSydney (urban area population at 2020 Census of 5,367,206) and the smallest isBendigo (urban area population at 2020 Census of 100,632). Rapid urban growth in Victoria has seen the 'Manhattanization' of Melbourne, with high-rise clusters in South Yarra, Box Hill, Moonee Ponds and Footscray. The regional city of Geelong which is approximately 40 miles south west of Melbourne, has seen the emergence of high-rise office and apartment buildings in recent years. Geelong is the fastest growing regional city in Australia, and its growth will transform the Port Phillip region in a similar manner to San Francisco's Bay Area. (urban area population at 2020 Census of 160,991).[20]
^"metropolis, n."OED Online, Oxford University Press, June 2017, www.oed.com/view/Entry/117704. Retrieved December 19, 2017; "polis, n.2."OED Online, Oxford University Press, June 2017, www.oed.com/view/Entry/146859. Retrieved December 19, 2017.
^"Local Government in Japan"(PDF). Council of Local Authorities for International Relations. p. 41. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on October 25, 2007. RetrievedOctober 16, 2007.
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