Talk:Metro-East

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I live in the area and I know what is considered part of Metro East and what isn't. I'm breaking up this page. This will take a lot of edits, so be patient. Kimmy78 02:43, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Citations

OK, this article originally listed 11 counties as Metro-east, now it lists 6 and St. Louis MSA includes 5 counties. Does anyone have a source for what exactly is Metro-east, not I live there so trust me, but an actual, verifiable source? Someone created Image:Metro-East location.gif, I was about to make an svg version, but I see that the definition has changed. Can someone tell me what counties to include so I can make the map? --Dual Freq 18:59, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

• "The Illinois Section of the St. Louis Metropolitan Statistical Area, better known as the Metro East, is comprised of five counties: Clinton, Jersey, Madison, Monroe and St. Clair".[1] --Dual Freq 19:18, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

The MSA should be the deciding factor. The western parts of the five counties (Clinton, Jersey, Madison, Monroe and St. Clair) extending into Illinois are quite rural-- any other counties that may have been previously listed are certainly not part of a "metropolitain" area. I think it is great you are going to make an image map-- however, Image:Metro-East location.gif clearly is overstating thigs a bit, so if you make an .svg, the the aforementioned 5 counties are appropriate, in my opinion. --Lmbstl 10:04, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

PS- see Image:St Louis MSA.png. Although not beautiful, it is correct. --Lmbstl 10:08, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

There is also this image Image:Untitled-8.png used on the {{St. Louis MSA}} template . . .

OK, I'm changing the list to the 5 Illinois counties in the St. Louis MSA. According to the above link, Jersey county wasn't always part of the MSA, maybe in the future Washington county will be added, but right now it is not part of the MSA and also not part of Metro-East. --Dual Freq 19:59, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

As for the image, Image:St Louis MSA.png seems OK, Image:Untitled-8.png doesn't include Clinton County for some reason. The SVG one I planned would be exactly like Image:Map of Illinois highlighting Northwestern Illinois.svg except with the appropriate counties highlighted. It would take a bout 5 minutes to do, but Image:St Louis MSA.png seems OK and it includes names. If anyone wants the SVG version, I'll add it on request. --Dual Freq 21:32, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

If your version is an improvemnt, then by all means, please feel free to add it! --Lmbstl 02:17, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

In a related note, offically there are now 9 IL counties in the IL portion of the St Louis MSA. I doubt that locals consider the newly added counties as part of the Metro East though so I have made a subtle change to the summary to reflect it by removing "the" instead of adding them. ("Metro East" is very much a local term not on a federal one like MSAs.) Jon 18:25, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Who decides which counties are included or not? Is this the state of Illinois? I find it interesting because Bond County is not mentioned, despite being closer in location to St. Louis than many of the areas (particularly in Clinton County) listed. Bond County does consider itself to be part of the Metro East and I have heard it described as such informally (covered in the Metro East section of the Post-Dispatch, for instance) and so it is odd that it is not included, yet areas 30 miles farther away from St. Louis are included. That's weird. Why can't the article include those counties which are often assumed to be part of it, while mentioning that they are not included in it by the statistical authority? That seems to be a more appropriate way to do it.--Gloriamarie 19:24, 14 August 2007 (UTC)