Projection: Metropolitan areas in 2050

[Chrissib]

I made a projection that projects the size of all metropolitan areas that are larger than 1 million now and will be larger than 2 million in 2050.

My idea was that I took the present population figures from citypopulation.de (with a few adjustments made by me). Then I looked up what the UN projects how the urban population of all countries will grow. I took the growth rate and applied it to the city sizes, so in the end I assumed that from 2012 to 2050 all cities in the country will grow by the same speed.

Basically this is the situation today, with the size of the dot representing the size and it's color it's growth rate over the last few years:





And this is what I got in 2050 (the color indicates the predicted growth rate between 2045 and 2050) Thre will be a lot more metro areas over 2 million people in 2050 but since they don't have over 1 million people now, they are not included here:




I assumed that Guangzhou and Shenzhen will grow into one metropolitan area as Shanghai will with Wuxi and Changzhou.

The biggest three metro areas in 2050 (and the three who will cross the magic 50 million barrier) will be the Pearl River Delta (excl. HK and Macao) with 57.64 million people, Karachi with 54.1 million and Delhi with 50.2 million people. There will be 25 metro areas in total with over 20 million people and 70 Megacities (over 10 million).


Later on I will post the exact figures for all (not 69, but) 70 Megacities in 2050.

[null]

Shanghai-Suzhou-Wuxi, not Changzhou.

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by null

Shanghai-Suzhou-Wuxi, not Changzhou.

Changzhou is not far away from Wuxi and you have a developing link consisting of built up areas between Wuxi and Changzhou, so I included it in the figure for 2050. Suzhou is included in both now and 2050.

[tita01]

omg!!! 69 Megacities in 2050

[VECTROTALENZIS]

Suzhou, Wuxi, and Changzhou will never be part of Shanghai, they are too far away and disconnected with Shanghai to be considered part of the same metropolitan area.
People living in those cities work in those cities and go to Shanghai rarely.

Guangzhou and Shenzhen are not a single metropolitan area, they are 100 km a part.
They are instead megacities of their own. Guangzhou and Foshan and half of Dongguan is a seperate metropolitan area of 15 million while Shenzhen and the other half of Dongguan is also a seperate metropolitan area of 12 million.

[the spliff fairy]

go on Google Earth, Guangzhou - Dongguan-Shenzhen have now morphed into one another via the coastal strip. Its one contiguous urban area now (not a metro) with a population of 25 million.

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by VECTROTALENZIS

Suzhou, Wuxi, and Changzhou will never be part of Shanghai, they are too far away and disconnected with Shanghai to be considered part of the same metropolitan area.
People living in those cities work in those cities and go to Shanghai rarely.

Guangzhou and Shenzhen are not a single metropolitan area, they are 100 km a part.
They are instead megacities of their own. Guangzhou and Foshan and half of Dongguan is a seperate metropolitan area of 15 million while Shenzhen and the other half of Dongguan is also a seperate metropolitan area of 12 million.

We're talking about 2050 here. These cities will continue to grow and finally merge into a single metropolitan area. I have already read plans that will ease development of the Pearl River Delta as a single metropolitan area and I think the same will happen for the ribbon between Shanghai and Changzhou. It's in a way like the Rhein-Ruhr area. People from Dortmund would rarely or never go to Cologne but it is still a single metropolitan area.

And there are several examples of metropolitan areas spanning over 100km. That includes areas like Los Angeles, Miami and even Seattle.

[Chrissib]

As promised, here the list of the 70 megacities in 2050 (not 69 as I previously counted, sorry about that):

[the spliff fairy]

Shanghai and Suzhou are also contiguous now. Suzhou is the splodge in the centre, nearing the lake, Wuxi on the top left of that.

Changzhou meanwhile is the burgundy splodge on the far left, but is not contiguous enough (yet) to be counted together.



The countryside meanwhile, for hundreds of miles, looks like this, all the way south to Hangzhou. Theyre the richest
farmers in China, with free apartment blocks built by their collectives and the local councils - but it isn't urban (check
out the fields and lack of roads between the midrises).

[the spliff fairy]

Pearl River Delta (60-120 million). Hong Kong is not counted as its not contiguous.

- sorry about the size of the pic

[chornedsnorkack]

Should the expiration of Hong Kong´s privileges on 1st of July, 2047, count as a large population increase of Pearl River Delta between 2045 and 2050?

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by chornedsnorkack

Should the expiration of Hong Kong´s privileges on 1st of July, 2047, count as a large population increase of Pearl River Delta?

Yes, but I didn't take border and status changes into account. Including HK, the Pearl River Delta will have not 58 million, but 66 million inhabitants in 2050.

[the spliff fairy]

Dyou think by then Beijing- Tianjin will have connected up? Langfang has just announced plans for a supertall so Im sure it'll grow - but Ive heard Tianjin is spreading in the opposite direction, toward the coast.

[megacity30]

Originally Posted by the spliff fairy

Pearl River Delta (120 million). Hong Kong is not counted as its not contiguous.

The entire population of Guangdong Province is 104,303,132 (104.3 million) as of China's 2010 Census.
reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._by_population

Pearl River Delta would contain about 45 million urban residents today, and not 120 million.


http://www.travelchinaguide.com/imag.../guangdong.gif

[the spliff fairy]

sorry got that of wiki

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by the spliff fairy

Dyou think by then Beijing- Tianjin will have connected up? Langfang has just announced plans for a supertall so Im sure it'll grow - but Ive heard Tianjin is spreading in the opposite direction, toward the coast.

I thought about it but then said no. The difference is that Beijing and Tianjin have much more room and much more directions to grow than the PRD and the YRD cities. Tianjin can grow in almost every direction and Beijing at the moment is only limited by mountains in the west. So even if the built up area of both cities doubles until 2050, they would still be not connected.

The Pearl River Delta cities are surrounded by mountains, so they have no other "choice" than growing together by filling the last flat and good spots of easy to develop land. A doubling of the built up area there would consume all of the remaining flat lands and lead to a continuous built up area on both sides of the Pearl River.

Changzhou, Wuxi and Suzhou are somewhat limited in their growth directions by the Yangtze river to the north and lake Taihu to the south. A doubling of the built up area there would lead to a clearly continuous built up area between Changzhou and Shanghai.

The UN predicts that the urban population of China will grow by 52% until 2050, which makes a doubling of the built up areas highly possible. It's not only the 52% additional urban population which will lead to more land consumption but also smaller households and a higher demand for space because of the increase in wealth. And that doesn't even take a possible suburbanisation process into account! (I know that China will never experience American style suburbia, but there are other less land consuming suburban styles, e.g. terraced homes which may become attractive to some people in China).

[megacity30]

Great list, Chrissib.
Kudos to your effort!

A question about Rhein Ruhr, though. Its population is already 11.4 million.
Does it mean there will be zero population growth in nearly 40 years?!

Also, does the 16 million population for London refer to its urban area or metropolitan area? 'Coz London's metropolitan area population may already, arguably, be 21 million.

[megacity30]

Originally Posted by the spliff fairy

sorry got that of wiki

No problem, the spliff fairy.

What do you think of the other population figures in Chrissib's list?

[Chrissib]

Originally Posted by megacity30

Great list, Chrissib.
Kudos to your effort!

A question about Rhein Ruhr, though. Its population is already 11.4 million.
Does it mean there will be zero population growth in nearly 40 years?!

Also, does the 16 million population for London refer to its urban area or metropolitan area? 'Coz London's metropolitan area population may already, arguably, be 21 million.

Thanks!

Yes, Rhein-Ruhr is projected not to grow over the next 40 years. But better yet than Tokyo and Osaka, which are projected to shrink.

For London I used the figure of 12.8 million inhabitants from citypopulation.de. I remember that Brisavoine once tried to define the London metropolitan area and he came to a similar result. The problem is that the countryside of southern England is very densely populated, so different definitions lead to vastly different figures. The 12.8 million figure includes most suburbs, but not exurbs far away from the city center which are included in the definitions that lead to figures of around 20 million people.

[megacity30]

Originally Posted by Chrissib

Thanks!

Yes, Rhein-Ruhr is projected not to grow over the next 40 years. But better yet than Tokyo and Osaka, which are projected to shrink.

For London I used the figure of 12.8 million inhabitants from citypopulation.de. I remember that Brisavoine once tried to define the London metropolitan area and he came to a similar result. The problem is that the countryside of southern England is very densely populated, so different definitions lead to vastly different figures. The 12.8 million figure includes most suburbs, but not exurbs far away from the city center which are included in the definitions that lead to figures of around 20 million people.

Interesting!
In that case, the ten most populous urban areas in the world will be in the economically-developing world. Of course, China may have become an economically-developed country before 2050.

As you and spliff fairy pointed out, Shanghai - Changzhou are already becoming one contiguous urban area. If its present rate of urbanization is sustained, Shanghai may become contiguous with Nanjing, Hangzhou and Ningbo by 2050.
But of course, it's just speculation.