I hear some cities call the larger area as metro (Vancouver) and other cities call it greater (Toronto). Is there a functional difference? Generally speaking, is one more urbanized than the other?
In the U.S., the census department defines the metro areas based on a number of factors (like one factor is the number of commuters). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area
There’s also a larger combined statistical area that often involves multiple major cities that are close enough to form an economic region. For instance, DC and Baltimore basically share suburbs and are connected by public transportation: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington–Baltimore_combined_statistical_area
I believe greater is only used colloquially here but the UK’s Office of National Statistics uses “Greater” in a formal way: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_London_Built-up_Area https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_Manchester_Built-up_Area
I assume that’s why it’s part of North American vernacular.
Metro can often refer to the core city plus the suburbs in its county. So LA County more or less == LA metropolitan area; contiguous development despite there being technically multiple cities contained—LA proper, Hollywood, Studio City, Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, Venice, etc. Oklahoma City metro contains OKC, Moore, Edmond, and so on.
From my basic understanding
Greater = the area including and around a city
Metro = the parts of a community within some sort of combined local government
I always took it like Manhattan vs all of NYC. Manhattan and maybe Brooklyn is the metro part, and all 4 boroughs are the greater city.
I would say Chicago is maybe a better example. All around Chicago, you have a number of cities where a good majority of people living there commute into “the city.” All these places kind of run into one another to make a large metro area. Further out, there’s more space between towns, so they don’t seem like part of Chicago. Still a good number of people in those towns often work somewhere in the metro area.
I’ve always considered a “metro area” to include the immediate feeder communities that but up to one another and “the city” itself, and the “greater area” getting into the further out suburbs that are a little more spread out but feed into the metro area.
I’m not sure about actual functional definitions, but I think of it based on the size of the various cities involved. Metro seems to be used when referring to relatively large cities and towns that have blurred together to the point you move between them without distinct separation. Whereas Greater is applied when there is still a more clear separation between the core “big city” and the suburban towns around it.
