Metropolitan Areas of Colombia

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Metropolitan Area is the name of the regions conformed legally by an urban center and some metropolitan municipalities.

The conditions that must fulfill a group of populations to be able to obtain estatus of Metropolitan Area in Colombia, are the following ones:

Each one of the municipalities, as much the central nucleus as the borders must have a population of at least 50,000 inhabitants.

The bordering populations must be integrated city-planning to the central city.

At least two third parts of the active populace economically of the Metropolitan Area, must work in urban and nonrural activities.

Each one of the bordering municipalities must have at least 10% of their workers in the central urban nucleus.

One of the characteristics of the metropolitan areas is that a great part of their inhabitants moves daily to work in the central urban nucleus, thus to these bordering populations are called "dormitory cities", which mean that their inhabitants single are going to sleep and to spend the weekend.

An important aspect of the Metropolitan Areas, is that it allows to make programs of joint planning between the municipalities, and thus to allow an ordered and proportional growth to the strengths of each population. For example, to impel in a population the industry, another one the house and another one the tourism, according to the necessities of the Area and the characteristics of each municipality.

These are the Metropolitan Areas recognized by the Colombian government:

Metropolitan Area of Cúcuta. Created by Decree 000508 of 1991. Conformed by Cúcuta, Villa del Rosario, Los Patios and El Zulia.

Metropolitan Area of the Valle de Aburrá. Created by the Decree 34 of 20 November of 1980. Conformed by the populations of Medellín, Bello, Barbosa, Copacabana, La Estrella, Girardota, Itagüí, Envigado, Caldas and Sabaneta.

Metropolitan Area of Bucaramanga. Created by the Decree 20 of 1981. Conformed by the municipalities of Bucaramanga, Floridablanca y Girón. At 1986 Piedecuesta was incorpored.

Metropolitan Area of the West Center. Created by Decree 014 of 1991. Conformed by the municipalities of Pereira and Dosquebradas. At 1981 Virginia was incorpored, and Santa Rosa de Cabal is waiting for approval.

Metropolitan Area of Barranquilla. Created by Decree 28 of 1981. Conformed by the municipalities of Barranquilla, Puerto Colombia, Soledad and Malambo.

Metropolitan Area of the Sabana of Bogotá. To be defined officially. Conformed by the city of Bogotá and its 20 localities, plus Soacha, Mosquera, Funza, Madrid, Chía, Cajicá, La Calera, Sopó, Tenjo, Tabio, Sibaté, Zipaquirá, Facatativá. These last ones also conform regional urban centers of smaller scale.