By John Kelly
Sunday, May 27, 2007

I always hear about the "Greater Washington such and such" or the "such and such of Greater Washington." What exactly is "Greater Washington"?

-- Brett Anders

If you call the U.S. Census Bureau, they will sniff and tell you they don't use the term "Greater Washington." They're all about precision over there, and "Greater Washington" is squishy and amorphous.

Instead, the U.S. Census uses something called a Metropolitan Statistical Area, or MSA, which it defines as a region with "at least one urbanized area of 50,000 or more population, plus adjacent territory that has a high degree of social and economic integration with the core as measured by commuting ties."

Our MSA goes by the tongue-fatiguing name of "the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area" -- or what Answer Man likes to call the WAADVMWV MSA. (It's pronounced just like it looks.)

The WAADVMWV MSA comprises the District of Columbia; the Maryland counties of Calvert, Charles, Frederick, Montgomery and Prince George's; the Virginia counties of Arlington, Clarke, Fairfax, Fauquier, Loudoun, Prince William, Spotsylvania, Stafford and Warren; the Virginia cities of Alexandria, Fairfax, Falls Church, Fredericksburg, Manassas and Manassas Park; and, last but not least, Jefferson County in West Virginia.

Wait a minute, Answer Man hears you saying, Jefferson County, W.Va.? That's 65 miles from the District.

"I think if you geographically look at the distance, you'll find it's not that far away," said Chris Colbert, president of the Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce.

Okay, fine. Welcome aboard.

Not so fast, says the Greater Washington Initiative, the economic development arm of the Greater Washington Board of Trade. Emphasis added. "We think we own that term," said Tim Priest, GWI executive director.

Tim's group defines "Greater Washington" as the District of Columbia and the counties of Frederick, Montgomery, Howard, Anne Arundel, Prince George's, Calvert, Charles, St. Mary's, Arlington, Alexandria (a city, technically), Fairfax, Loudoun, Fauquier, Prince William, Stafford and Spotsylvania.

No Warren County? "We don't lose a lot of sleep over that," Tim said.

The Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments is even more selective. It leaves out Fauquier, Stafford, Spotsylvania, Howard, Anne Arundel, Calvert, Charles and St. Mary's. (For the record, The Washington Post uses the more inclusive Board of Trade definition.)

David Garrison, deputy director of the Brookings Institution's Greater Washington Research Program, said Greater Washington is in the eye of the beholder. Brookings uses different boundaries for different studies.

"It's a question of what you're trying to measure," David said.

Robert Lang, director of Virginia Tech's Metropolitan Institute, predicts that the circle will get larger and larger. It has to. The economic interdependence is simply too strong to limit the "Greater Washington" area to the District and its cozy suburbs.

Before too long, he said, we'll be talking about "Greater Baltimore-Washington-Richmond."

If you have a question about the Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area, send it to answerman@washpost.com.