I’m writing this in response to a tweet by Brad Bartholomew, candidate for City Council District 1 in Salt Lake City.

I found out at a meeting today that people view #SLC in the same catagory as Alberquerque. No offense, but that hurts.

— Brad Bartholomew (@bbart76) July 18, 2013

(For purposes of consistency, all populations listed will be based on the July 1, 2012 estimates from the US Census Bureau.)

I’m actually surprised that Salt Lake City was regarded in a category as high as Albuquerque.  Often people use the wrong demographic methods when trying to formulate some kind of ranking.  As far as population within city limits goes, Salt Lake City is a mere 189,314 compared to Albuquerque’s 555,417.  On a list of US cities ranked by population, this places Albuquerque as number 32, while Salt Lake City is way down the list at number 124.  Unfortunately, many so-called experts inappropriately use this type of ranking when making comparisons.

I believe the correct way to make comparisons of this nature is to examine the larger metropolitan region.  On a list of US primary statistical areas ranked by population, the greater Salt Lake City metropolitan region ranks number 27 with a population of 2,350,274, while the greater Albuquerque metropolitan region only ranks number 53 with a population of 1,162,777.

One way to improve Salt Lake City‘s ranking among US cities would be to annex West Valley City, South Salt Lake, Millcreek township, and Emigration Canyon township.  This would give Salt Lake City a population of about 400,000 and would increase our rank from 124 to about 45, which would put us next to Oakland, California, and Tulsa, Oklahoma.  Whether or not that’s an improvement is a matter of opinion. 😉 LOL

Well, at any rate Albuquerque would be a great addition to the Western Regional Alliance (formerly the Western High-Speed Rail Alliance).  I’m also a fan of Breaking Bad, which is set in Albuquerque.  So here’s to Heisenberg!