| Texas Triangle Megaregion | |
|---|---|
| — Megaregion of the U.S. — | |
| Houston | |
| Dallas | |
| San Antonio | |
| Country | United States
|
| State(s) | Texas |
| Population | 13,800,000 |
The Texas Triangle is one of eleven so-called megaregions in the United States. These are urban areas that are much greater in scale than just a metropolitan statistical area (MSA), defined by the US Census Bureau. These regions also are known as megapolitan areas. The term comes from the fact that the three main cities in the Texas Triangle are connected by a highway system Interstate 45, Interstate 10, and Interstate 35 that forms up a triangle when connected.
The Texas Triangle in Texas contains 5 of the 20 biggest cities in the US, and is home to more than 70% of all Texans (pop 13.8 million)[1]. In the next 40 years, the population of the Texas Triangle will grow more than 65%, or an additional 10 million people, leading to 78% of Texans living and working within the Texas Triangle. From a people point of view, the Triangle increasingly is Texas.[2]
The major cities in the Triangle are Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin, and Fort Worth. Additional MSAs in the region include College Station-Bryan, Killeen-Temple-Fort Hood and Waco. There are a further so-called 12 micropolitan statistical areas. There are 66 counties altogether in the Triangle.[3] Sometimes, however, Beaumont, located east of Houston, has been considered part of the Texas Triangle.
Other sizable cities in Texas not included in the Triangle are Corpus Christi, El Paso, Lubbock, Midland-Odessa, Abilene, San Angelo, Amarillo, McAllen and Laredo.
The megaregion is defined in work by America 2050 and others. The area has also been called the Texas Crescent and the Texaplex. Dr. Robert Lang of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech identified Dallas-Fort Worth as one of the earliest recognized megapolitans. Each city being very different and distinct from the other, Dallas and Fort Worth nonetheless grew together to form the urban area widely known as "The Metroplex."
A conference about the future of the Texas Triangle was held by Houston Tomorrow and America 2050 on September 24-25, 2009 in Houston.
The 60,000-square-mile (160,000 km2) region contains most of the state's largest cities and metropolitan areas as well as 17 million people, nearly 75 percent of Texas' total population.[4] The region is comparable to Florida in population size and comparable to Georgia by area.
According to The University of Texas Center for Sustainable Development, "the Texas Triangle has three sides measuring 271, 198 and 241 miles in ground distance."[5]
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