Quote:
Originally Posted by Rathji
Obviously when you factor in metro area it really messes with the numbers, however unless you are somehow claiming that this inaccuracy would move Calgary from a middle of the pack at 62, to top of the pack in the top 5, the basic idea is still fairly reasonable.
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Where Calgary would fall on any list relies heavily on what the criteria are and which cities are included. If someone was talking about population density in North American cities that have 500,000+ in population, I could see Calgary being one of the lowest density if you're talking about cities and not metro areas.
Just glancing at some densities for city populations around North America I can only find a few of any size (Nashville, Jacksonville, and Oklahoma) that have a lower population density within their city limits than Calgary. And I believe at least some of those cities (Nashville for sure) have consolidated city and county governments so there are large rural areas included within their city limits; the vast majority of the population there lives in a much higher density than the average. So it's possible if one made a list with that criteria that Calgary would finish on the top 5 of lowest population density.
But again, that's not really an apples to apples comparison because Calgary is much more self contained than a lot of those cities. A lot more sprawl (and the lower density that comes with it) will show up in Calgary's city figures than other cities who have just as much sprawl in their metro area that's not within their city limits.
What I'd like to see is data which shows what percentage of a city's population lives in various levels of density. Total numbers aren't all that helpful when you consider that large parks, mountain ranges within city limits, and other unlivable areas can greatly affect overall density numbers without changing actual housing density.
For instance, a city of 1 million people that's 1000 km2 in size could be very different depending on its makeup. On the one hand it could be constant sprawl with everyone living in fairly low densities of about 1000/km2. On the other hand, there could be a dense inner core with 500,000 people living in a density of 5000/km2, an area outside that with 400,000 people living in a 2000/km2 density, a couple hundred km2 with mountains and parks, and then a low density outlying area with the remainder living at about 200/km2. Both cities would have the same number of people in the same amount of land, but the population centers would be greatly different in terms of density.