By the Numbers

Texas Triangle population auto-charted by county on Google.:.

Texas Triangle highlighted in Federal study

Academic research not just "academic" when it comes to long-range planning

The Federal Highway Administration commissioned a survey of literature related to planning on a regional and mega-regional basis. The extensive 103-page document highlights the handful of mega regions identified by regional planners and academics.

1. Piedmont Atlantic Megaregion
2. Northeast Megaregion
3. Northern California Megaregion
4. Southern California Megaregion
5. Great Lakes Megaregion
6. Texas Triangle
7. Southern Florida Megaregion
8. Gulf Coast Megaregion
9. Cascadia
10. Arizona Sun Corridor
    

Interestingly, Houston is one of the few metro areas to belong to two different mega regions: the Texas Triangle and the Gulf Coast. While certainly Houston is connected to the Gulf Coast because of the oil and gas industry, I would argue other ties are much more tenuous than compared to the strong bonds connecting H-town to the Texas Triangle.

This would all be academic apart from the fact that plans for high speed rail are being bandied about, and, as mentioned before (see "Mind the Gap"), no rail link is being proposed to connect Houston to the rest of the Lone Star State.

Below is material adapted from the FHWA report, describing the various mega regions. .:.

Fortune 1000 Braggin' Rights for Lone Star State

Texas emerges as dominant state and region for business

As Fortune Magazine released its seminal list of big companies online, the numbers came in big for Texas. According to the site, the Lone Star state had more companies in the top 500 than other state. Additionally, Irving-based Exxon-Mobil edged out Wal-Mart to become the only member of the Fortune 1 list.

Rank # of Fortune 500 Companies
Texas	64
New York	56
California	51

In the overall top 1000, Texas took 118 spots and, of those, 114 companies were based in Texas Triangle.



Within the Triangle, here's how the regions breakout:

1. Houston Area - 56
2. Dallas-Fort Worth - 48
3. Austin/San Antonio - 10

The four remaining Fortune 1000 firms were 1 in El Paso, 1 in Corpus Christi, 1 in Pittsburg, and 1 in Angleton.

With these numbers, it's now undeniable that Texas and the Texas Triangle has emerged as a dominant business community in the United States and the world.

2007

• Houston [49]
• Dallas-Fort Worth [43]
• Austin-San Antonio [9] .:.
  

New 150-Page Texas Triangle Report

Aggies Launch Blog Dedicated to Texas Urban Triangle

Graduate students from Texas A&M established a blog this week to make their 2008 study available for public consumption.

Entitled "Texas Urban Triangle:Framework for Future Growth," the study was funded by a grant from the Southwest Universities Transportation Consortium (SWUTC).

Professors Michael Neuman and Elise Bright oversaw creation of the report, which weighs in at 141 pages. The full report is downloadable in sections or in full at http://texasurbantriangle.tamu.edu/.

The site describes the next stage of development for the long-term project as developing a tool to "aid policy and investment decision making regarding future urban development and infrastructure."

Welcome to the party..:.

Not So Sunny Solar Power Forecast

National solar power study forecasts meager growth in Texas

In the last decade or so, energy has gone from being a ho-hum industry where nothing ever changes to being front page news - outside of Texas. Not since the anti-nuclear movement of the 1980s has the energy stirred such emotions - outside of Texas. Within Texas, of course, energy has been front and center for more than a century (Spindletop's oil was discovered January 10, 1901).

Energy's bandwagon fans are hard at work these days trying to make the economic case for any and all sorts of energy feed stocks, except oil and gas. The latest study comes from the Solar Energy Research & Education Foundation (SEREF), a 501(c)(3) run by the Solar Energy Industries Association, that commissioned an 8-year study to look into solar energy's impact on the economy. The big conclusions:

...[T]he solar industry will create 440,000 permanent jobs, and capture more than $230 billion in new investment by 2016 with passage of an 8-year solar investment tax credit (ITC) by Congress. The report also found that an 8-year extension of the ITC would triple solar energy production from 9,000 to 28,000 gigawatts by 2016.

Texas' share of this bonanza... 0.227%. Yes, that decimal is in the right place. According to the report, other states will do far better, e.g., Florida should add 22,000 jobs and New Jersey 10,000.

The foundation does provide some pretty nifty visuals, including a U.S. solar jobs map in Google Earth (requires download of a free Google Earth viewer) and state-by-state analyses of potential job creation. Texas' fact sheet can be downloaded from here as a PDF, and includes 17 manufacturers, 128 installers and project developers, and 7 organizations. .:.

Boom, Crash, Presto

Creative Class' Florida envisions how crash will reshape America... and Texas

Not everyone favorite's urban theorist, Richard Florida always manages to be provocative. In the coming March 2009 issue of The Atlantic, Florida's cover story discusses how the boom will reshape the urban topology of America.

He notes that in a recent survey of 381 metro areas by Moody's Investor Services, 302 were already in recession, 64 were at risk, and only 15 were continuing to expanding. Guess where?

"Notable among them were the oil- and natural-resource-rich regions of Texas and Oklahoma, buoyed by energy prices that have since fallen; and the Greater Washington, D.C., region, where government bailouts, the nationalization of financial companies, and fiscal expansion are creating work for lawyers, lobbyists, political scientists, and government contractors."

That may no longer be true, but it means Texas and our energy kith and kin to the north got some reprieve from the heartache affecting most of the country.

Also worth noting is a fantastic map detailing data for hundreds of cities including population change since 1860, patents issued since 1975, and income change since 2001. .:.

Texas Triangle Sightings [1.3]

Interesting discussion thread on Richard Florida's Creative Class blog regarding Houston's place in the Texas Triangle versus being part of a Gulf Coast mega region. Tory Gattis at Houston Strategies was the instigator of this thought-provoking conversation. .:.

Texas Triangle Sightings [1.2]

A short study by three University of Texas academics, on the America2050.org site, looks at the Texas Triangle and historical transportation linkages. "Connecting the Texas Triangle: Economic Integration and Transportation Coordination by Ming Zhang, Frederick Steiner, and Kent Butler (5 MB)" .:.

Texas Triangle Sightings [1.1]

Some new posts over at Houston Strategies by Tony Gattis, whose urban planning site regarding Houston is quite impressive.

• High-speed rail in Texas Triangle - Refers to article in The Houston Chronicle that argues for rail links within the TXT.
  
• Texas Triangle Top 10 Global Region - Discusses report publicized by Richard Florida, known for his work "The Rise of the Creative Class" that lists top 40 megaregions. .:.

Texas Triangle Sightings [1.0]

Two recent posts from Elise Bright, an urban planning professor at Texas A&M, at 4D Planning. The links reference an extensive survey of the TXT region:

• Texas Triangle
• Urban Megaregions .:.