Metrolina: A Southern Dispersed Urban Region

METROLINA: A SOUTHERN DISPERSED URBAN REGION Alfred W . Stuart* One of the most apparent features of the South is its paucity of large cities. On the other hand, certain other characteristics suggest a relatively urban region. In North Carolina, for example, almost 14 per­ cent of the state’s population in 1970 was employed in manufacturing plants— a level of participation comparable to that of Illinois, Michigan, and other more industralized states. (1) Yet, unlike those industrialized states, the majority of the population in North Carolina (55 percent) was classified as rural in 1970. (2) The explanation for this seeming paradox lies in the unique history of industrialization that has characterized North Carolina and a few other areas in the South. Textiles are the dominant form of manufac­ turing and over the years mills have been established in rural and small town locations in search of pockets of surplus rural labor. This pattern of rural industrialization began in the late 19th century and persists to this day. It has produced other unusual features of the landscape. One was the company town— a community of housing and basic services pro­ vided for workers by a textile firm. This arrangement has largely dis­ appeared although Kannapolis, N. C., home of the giant Cannon Mills Co., is still unincorporated and a partial company town (1970 popu­ lation 36,293). More significant but less apparent than the company town has been the creation of dispersed urban regions that do not fall within the usual definitions of urban places, such as Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas (SMSA). The lack of recognition of this perhaps unique type of urban region may also help explain the paradoxical relationship between degree of reported urbanization and industrialization. In this study, a dispersed urban region is operationally defined as an extensive area, the bulk of which does not qualify for SMSA status. In the aggregate it possesses characteristics similar to existing SMSAs with the same population. The main difference is that the dispersed urban region has more area and, therefore, a lower population density. It also has a smaller proportion of its population classified as urban. The core of the dispersed urban region is an SMSA but it is disproportionately small for the magnitude of some of its functions. The area surrounding the SMSA is frequently heavily specialized in certain, usually urbanoriented , activities but notably lacking in others. Only when the core •Dr. Stuart is associate professor of geography at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. The paper was accepted for publication in June 1972. 102 So u t h e a s t e r n G e o g r a p h e r (the SMSA) and the surrounding peripheral counties are formed into a single region does a balanced picture emerge. (3) “Metrolina,” the dispersed urban region centering on Charlotte, North Carolina, is a clear example of a dispersed urban region (Figure 1). In this area participation in manufacturing reaches an incredible 20 percent. Local leaders have long felt that Census definitions tended to understate Charlotte’s urban status. A twelve county definition of the broader urban region has been delimited on the basis of the city retail trade area and the term Metrolina is applied. (4) The local definition of the Metrolina region is accepted as a working hypothesis. HIGH CENTRALITY OF THE CORE COUNTY. The first character­ istic listed above for a dispersed urban region was that the core has Vol. XII, No. 2 103 functions that were disproportionately high. In Charlotte, per capita retail sales in 1967 ($2,268) were 49 percent higher than the national average and 41 percent higher than for all SMSAs with populations of at least 200,000. This level of retail sales existed despite the fact that per capita income in the Charlotte SMSA was several hundred dollars below that for all SMSAs with over 200,000 inhabitants. (5) Even more dramatic was Charlotte’s status as a wholesale center. Among the sixty largest wholesale centers in the U. S. in 1969 Charlotte ranked first in wholesale sales per capita, first in wholesale sales per employee, and during 1958-1967 ranked first in the South and third in...