Talk:List of cities in Connecticut

Criteria
What is the criteria for inclusion on this list? It can't be geographical size, because Hartford is known for being quite small. It can't be population, since towns like Shelton and Ansonia (to name just a couple) certainly wouldn't appear on such a list. What are we basing this on? Beginning 00:53, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)


 * Surely it is based on those municipalities which are incorporated as cities. In Connecticut, there are cities and towns (and perhaps a few boroughs).  All of the places listed are cities.  This has nothing to do with population size, necessarily. john k 04:38, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)


 * Revisiting an old issue here, but I removed East Hartford, Manchester, and Willimantic since they are not cities. East Hartford and Manchester, regardless of population, are incorporated as towns.  Willimantic is a borough of Windham, which is also a town.  Beginning 00:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Merger
A list of principal cities has been created in the Connecticut article. Other than its inclusion of several towns, it's essentially a prettier version of this list. I don't think the information should be duplicated in both places.--Elipongo (Talk 04:32, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Against the proposal. Don't change this list. It is a list of statutory cities of Connecticut. Don't conflate cities and towns. See List of towns in Connecticut. Also see New England town and New England town for more background. Better, for your purposes, is to make a new page, which is general, and cares not about the form of government, entitled municipalities. Then cite the new municipalities page, with populations on the Connecticut state page, and then you can remove the tedious list from the Connecticut page. -- Yellowdesk 05:53, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * See this example: List of municipalities in Massachusetts by population (Massachusetts has a similar problem: some cities are smaller than other towns.)

Agree yes that does make more sense. Thank you for suggesting it. I will change the proposal.--Elipongo (Talk 09:20, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Defunct cities
Why are they not included in this list? I made the mistake of adding South Norwalk which was incorporated as a city in 1871 then consolidated with the Town of Norwalk (as was the City of Norwalk, which was a Borough before 1893) in 1913 to form the current larger City of Norwalk. Nowadays South Norwalk is considered a neighborhood within the city of Norwalk, CT so I suppose it is not completely defunct. I note that the article on Borough (Connecticut) does list defunct boroughs, but this list of cities does not list defunct cities. Would it be harmful to start listing defunct cities here? 67.86.73.252 (talk) 04:33, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't think that is harmful. In fact, it would be helpful to include them in my opinion. The only issue is it might not be so easy to get reliable, current population data. If you have information on these, please go ahead and add them. --Polaron | Talk 18:16, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. I do not see a place to post population figures on this article (as opposed to the List of municipalities of Connecticut by population article) so I presume you could accept some population estimates here on this discussion page for this article. The state of Connecticut posts historical census data at http://www.sots.ct.gov/RegisterManual/SectionVII/SecVIITOC.htm with census data for the whole Town of Norwalk posted at the two specific URLs listed in the specific pages cited in the table below. From those census data it should be possible to estimate the population of the City of South Norwalk if we could estimate the fractional population of the City to Town. To do that I note that on pages 172 and 173 of the book by Deborah Wing Ray and Gloria P. Stewart (1979) (3rd printing 2004). Norwalk: being an historical account of that Connecticut town. Norwalk, CT: Norwalk Historical Society. ISBN 0-914016-56-3; wherein the proportional represention of SoNo was 2 council members out of 7 yielding a fraction of 0.2857. A rough check of that ratio can be done by noting the ratio of votes for (2256) to against (1606) the consolidation referendum in 1913 was 1.404. Assuming (an admittedly politcally naive) 100% for or against voting pattern within geographic areas of the Town, and noting that Wing-Ray and Stewart mention that SoNo and East Norwalk voted against that ratio, assuming further that all other ares voted for we would obtain a ratio of (2+1+1)/(2+1) = 1.333 which is not far from the for/against consolidation vote ratio. In other words, it seems the South Norwalk population can be taken to be approximately 2/7 of the population of the whole Town of Norwalk. I can estimate the population of the City including the time just before incorporation (1870) and 7 years after consolidaton (1920) as the figure in the right hand column of this table adapted from the one in the article on History of Norwalk, Connecticut:

I hope these population estimates prove adequate to allow mentioning the 1871 to 1913 duration of the City of South Norwalk in the List article. 67.86.73.252 (talk) 00:14, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

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Here is a more explicit proposal. I suppose this could be implemented as a separate table: 67.86.73.252 (talk) 00:25, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Defunct cities
The following is a list of cities that no longer exist as cities in Connecticut

This looks good. Do you happen to have a list of all such former cities at hand? I can probably dig them up over the next few days but if you have a complete list, go ahead and add it to the article. --Polaron | Talk 00:36, 5 April 2008 (UTC)


 * No I do not. In looking at Category:Defunct cities in Connecticut I have taken a quick look at the article on Rockville (Vernon) and I cannot find anything that indicates it was ever incorporated as a city.  Similar comments obtain for the article on Winsted, Connecticut.  The lead sentence asserts it was an incorporated city but I am not not certain of the dates for its incorporation.  Also in the category is Putnam District which is now a CDP in Windham County.  Was Putnam District incorporated as a city?  I am not sure.  67.86.73.252 (talk) 00:48, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Oops - I see that this article already lists Winsted and its 1917 incorporation. The article on Winchester, Connecticut also mentions that Winsted is incorporated as a city.  Hence it does not belong in the defunct city table and should stay in the existing city table.  Now I wonder if it should no longer be in the Category:Defunct cities in Connecticut. 67.86.73.252 (talk) 00:59, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I managed to find the date of disincorporation for Rockville. The town of Vernon page at http://vernon-ct.gov/aboutvernon.html mentions that "In 1965, the Town of Vernon consolidated with the City of Rockville and the Vernon Fire District and assumed all assets and liabilities of the two governmental units.".  I am still looking for the date of incorporation.
 * Ah, I should have checked the categories. Anyway, this 1917 publication lists the existing cities at the time. Apparently Rockville was incorporated in 1889 while Putnam was incorporated in 1895. Will try to look for the disincorporation date for Putnam. --Polaron | Talk 01:24, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Here we go. This Census Bureau publication says 1984 is when Putnam was disincorporated. Note that Putnam and Rockville are also now CDPs similar to Willimantic. --Polaron | Talk 01:32, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Regarding Winsted, the only reason it is included in the main list is that it is still isted in the current State Register and Manual. Apparently, it still exists legally. --Polaron | Talk 01:51, 5 April 2008 (UTC)