New England City and Town Area

A New England City and Town Area (NECTA) is a geographic and statistical entity defined by the U.S. federal government for use in the six-state New England region of the United States. NECTAs are analogous to metropolitan statistical areas and micropolitan statistical areas and are defined using the same criteria, except that they are defined on the basis of New England towns instead of entire counties. NECTAs are classified as either metropolitan or micropolitan NECTAs. A micropolitan NECTA has an urban core with a population of at least 10,000 but less than 50,000, while a metropolitan NECTA has an urban core with a population of at least 50,000.

In New England, towns (which are classified by the United States Census Bureau as minor civil divisions) are a much more important level of government than counties. Because of the towns are smaller than counties, a NECTA usually provides a much closer approximation to the real metropolitan area than a metropolitan statistical area does.

Large NECTAs (with population greater than 2.5 million) may be subdivided into smaller groupings known as NECTA Divisions. Adjacent NECTAs that have a high degree of employment interchange may also be combined to form Combined NECTAS (or CNECTAs). NECTAs that are part of a CNECTA retain their separate identities.

Famous quotes containing the words england, city, town and/or area:

    If men will believe it, sua si bona norint, there are no more quiet Tempes, nor more poetic and Arcadian lives, than may be lived in these New England dwellings. We thought that the employment of their inhabitants by day would be to tend the flowers and herds, and at night, like the shepherds of old, to cluster and give names to the stars from the river banks.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    The faults of the burglar are the qualities of the financier: the manners and habits of a duke would cost a city clerk his situation.
    George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

    The disadvantage of men not knowing the past is that they do not know the present. History is a hill or high point of vantage, from which alone men see the town in which they live or the age in which they are living.
    Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)

    The area [of toilet training] is one where a child really does possess the power to defy. Strong pressure leads to a powerful struggle. The issue then is not toilet training but who holds the reins—mother or child? And the child has most of the ammunition!
    Dorothy Corkville Briggs (20th century)