Baton Rouge Metropolitan Area - History

History

The Baton Rouge metropolitan area was first defined in 1950. Then known as the Baton Rouge Standard Metropolitan Area (or Baton Rouge SMA), it consisted of a single parish – East Baton Rouge – and had a population of 158,236. Following a term change by the Bureau of the Budget (present-day Office of Management and Budget) in 1959, the Baton Rouge SMA became the Baton Rouge Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (or Baton Rouge SMSA). By the census of 1960, the population had grown to 230,058, a 45% increase over the previous census. A total of 285,167 people lived in East Baton Rouge Parish in 1970.

Three additional parishes were added to the Baton Rouge SMSA in 1973 – Ascension, Livingston, and West Baton Rouge. These four parishes had a combined population of 375,628 in 1970. The area grew rapidly during the 1970s and by the 1980 census, the population had increased 32% to 494,151. In 1983, the official name was shortened to the Baton Rouge Metropolitan Statistical Area (or Baton Rouge MSA), which is still in use to date. 528,264 residents lived in the metropolitan statistical area in 1990 and 602,894 people lived in the four parishes by the year 2000.

In 2003, the Baton Rouge MSA was expanded to its current size with the addition of five more parishes – East Feliciana, Iberville, Pointe Coupee, St. Helena, and West Feliciana. This nine-parish region had a population of 705,973 in 2000.

Read more about this topic:  Baton Rouge Metropolitan Area

Famous quotes containing the word history:

    ... that there is no other way,
    That the history of creation proceeds according to
    Stringent laws, and that things
    Do get done in this way, but never the things
    We set out to accomplish and wanted so desperately
    To see come into being.
    John Ashbery (b. 1927)

    Anyone who is practically acquainted with scientific work is aware that those who refuse to go beyond fact rarely get as far as fact; and anyone who has studied the history of science knows that almost every great step therein has been made by the “anticipation of Nature.”
    Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)

    Free from public debt, at peace with all the world, and with no complicated interests to consult in our intercourse with foreign powers, the present may be hailed as the epoch in our history the most favorable for the settlement of those principles in our domestic policy which shall be best calculated to give stability to our Republic and secure the blessings of freedom to our citizens.
    Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)