[hudkina]

BTW, I just did a comparison using sub-county employment data from 2000 with both "Downtown" and "8 Mile/Woodward" as the regional center.

The six-county Detroit Metro Area had 2,050,367 jobs in 2000. With Downtown as the "center" there were 15 municipalities that were mostly within a ten mile radius. Those 15 municipalities had a combined 492,850 jobs, which equates to 24.0% of the total number of jobs int he Metro Area. Dearborn and Downtown are the only major job centers within that area. That means that 75.9% of jobs are outside a 10 mile radius. So using my sloppy method, I got a number pretty close to the 77.4% quoted in the study.

Now, if I move the "center" closer to the actual center of population for the Metro area which is close to the intersection of 8 Mile and Woodward, the ten mile radius includes 26 municipalities. Those municipalities had a combined total of 949,085 jobs, or about 46.2% of the total jobs in the Metro Area. Dearborn, Southfield, Troy, Sterling Heights, Warren, and Downtown are the major job centers within that area. In other words, only 53.7% of the jobs in the Detroit Metro area are more then 10 miles away from the actual center of population.

If you only include Detroit's Tri-County area (the urban core) the percentage of jobs within 10 miles of 8 Mile and Woodward jumps to 49.6% or about half of all Tri-County area jobs.