The Piedmont Crescent, also known as the Piedmont Urban Crescent, is a large, polycentric urbanized region in the U.S. state of North Carolina that forms the northern section of the rapidly developing Piedmont Atlantic megalopolis (or "megaregion"), a conurbation also known as the "I-85 Boombelt", which extends from the Raleigh area in North Carolina, southwards to Atlanta, Georgia in the southeastern United States.[1]
The region includes seven of North Carolina's ten largest cities (with the exception of southcentral Fayetteville, coastal Wilmington and eastern Greenville) and encompasses many smaller cities, towns, and suburban areas. The three major metropolitan areas within the Piedmont Crescent are the Research Triangle, Piedmont Triad, and Charlotte metropolitan area, which have a total population of 7,492,161 people, roughly the same in geographic area (11,256.36 sq mi) and population as the Atlanta, Georgia region (7,221,137 / 10,494.03 sq mi), and together representing over 69% of the state's total population.[2]
Ten major universities—Duke, NC State, UNC Chapel Hill, UNC Charlotte, NC Central, Wake Forest, UNC-Greensboro, NC A&T State University, Elon University and High Point University —and three international airports (CLT, RDU and GSO), as well as Research Triangle Park, also are located within the Piedmont Crescent.
- ^ City of Greenville, SC Official City Website
- ^ Source: US Bureau of the Census, Annual Estimates of the Population Table CBSA-EST2007-02