50 Equal States

[Flake]

Very good work Elections Guy! Reminds me of my map were I redistricted the country for 100 Senate seats.

I just did some calculations and Obama won my Senate district in this map by a little over 2,000 votes.

[Goldwater]

Relevant.

I can't tell which state Reno is on that map. Whatever it is. I was born there and now live in Salt Lake.

[Skill and Chance]

Very good work Elections Guy! Reminds me of my map were I redistricted the country for 100 Senate seats.

Very interesting.  It always amazes me how much more dense central CO is than anything within  500 miles.  Is the purple MS Delta district >50% black?  Does it include New Orleans?  Also, did Obama win the Tidewater VA/NC plus Eastern Shore district?

[Miles]

^ Yeah, Gass wanted to create a majority-black seat, he did the New Orleans/Delta/Memphis district.

[Skill and Chance]

This reminds me of my "8 Californias" proposal, formed by combining existing states:

One of my goals was to keep 2 of the 8 contiguous states as rural as possible.  When targeting 50-60 CDs per state, the COI issues with the northwestern state are almost impossible to avoid.  Otherwise, I think they are pretty strong COIs, although New Mexico, Northern Ohio and South Florida probably hate me right now!

[ElectionsGuy]

Some changes. I think it looks much better now.

[muon2]

Some changes. I think it looks much better now.

If only you could get rid of that grey finger in central NY.

[ElectionsGuy]

Does this look a bit better?

[ElectionsGuy]

State #13: Alabama + Escambia, FL + Eastern Mississippi. Population: 6,216,325

Biggest City: Birmingham (212,237)

Romney: 1,638,647 (60.8%)
Obama: 1,025,800 (38.1%)

[ElectionsGuy]

State #14: Rest of Mississippi + Louisiana – (Caddo, LA + Bossier, LA + De Soto, LA + Sabine, LA) + South and Eastern chunks of Arkansas. Population: 6,146,096

Biggest City: New Orleans (343,829)

Romney: 1,490,708 (55.4%)
Obama: 1,160,819 (43.1%)

[ElectionsGuy]

And just because this is easy...

State #15: Cook, IL + DuPage, IL. Population: 6,111,599

Biggest City: Chicago (2,695,598)

Obama: 1,687,997 (70.0%)
Romney: 690,588 (28.6%)

[ElectionsGuy]

Here's what I did with LA/Ventura counties. These states will be lesser in population to compensate for NYC being 2 million over. Since I had to go into DRA for this, I can only provide 2008 election data with no third party votes, though both are Safe D so it shouldn't matter too much. I tried to draw everything within municipal boundaries, but as you may be able to tell the precincts don't fit perfectly all the time.

State #16: Los Angeles and its immediate surroundings. Population: 5,201,487

Largest City: Los Angeles (3,792,621)

Obama: 1,250,934 (75.5%)
McCain: 405,676 (24.5%)



State #17: Ventura County + Los Angeles suburbs in LA County. Population: 5,440,436

Largest City: Long Beach (462,257)

Obama: 1,103,752 (62.6%)
McCain: 660,518 (37.4%)



Here's an updated version of the map (with other changes as well):

[Miles]

The new Louisiana state is more Democratic than I was expecting

It looks like taking in the delta in southern AR/west MS, plus Jackson, more than cancelled out losing Shreveport.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Cool, DFW is its own state.

[ElectionsGuy]

The new Louisiana state is more Democratic than I was expecting

It looks like taking in the delta in southern AR/west MS, plus Jackson, more than cancelled out losing Shreveport.

Basically the most Democratic parts of Mississippi and Arkansas are combined with most of Louisiana, as I tried to make it delta central. Obama just about tied Romney in the Mississippi and Arkansas portions. Its pretty much the new Mississippi, if I had to guess its probably 37-38% black, and its votes exactly like it.

[Miles]

^ Ah, yep. The total population is probably less white, but the voting age breakdown for it in DRA is 55% white, 37% black.

[Vern]

I don't like the way NC is done. You split the triad up between two states.

[ElectionsGuy]

I don't like the way NC is done. You split the triad up between two states.

Would you suggest a better alternative? With the way I have it set up (northern Georgia being a state, Florida pretty much being 3 states), its pretty hard not to split that region up. At least Greensboro and Winston-Salem are together.

[muon2]

I'm not a fan of the link from Ventura to the Antelope Valley to Long Beach. I'd rather split LA city at the Hollywood Hills. The hills extend east to west and form a natural break across the county. That puts the San Fernando Valley with Ventura, Antelope Valley and the San Gabriel Valley. Southern LA would go with Long Beach and the SE LA county suburbs. The split is very close to even.

[ElectionsGuy]

I'm not a fan of the link from Ventura to the Antelope Valley to Long Beach. I'd rather split LA city at the Hollywood Hills. The hills extend east to west and form a natural break across the county. That puts the San Fernando Valley with Ventura, Antelope Valley and the San Gabriel Valley. Southern LA would go with Long Beach and the SE LA county suburbs. The split is very close to even.

While that looks much better than the one I drew, I promised myself I wouldn't split any municipalities. I'll wait to decide what to do with that.

[ElectionsGuy]

State #18: Southern Georgia + Western/Southern South Carolina. Population: 6,183,197

Biggest City: Augusta (195,844)

Romney: 1,334,600 (53.0%)
Obama: 1,155,206 (45.8%)

[ElectionsGuy]

State #19: Western North Carolina + Northern South Carolina + Bits of Eastern Tennessee. Population: 6,153,492

Biggest City: Charlotte (731,424)

Romney: 1,549,514 (56.3%)
Obama: 1,163,372 (42.3%)

[ElectionsGuy]

State #20: Northeastern South Carolina + Eastern North Carolina. Population: 6,142,531

Biggest City: Raleigh (403,892)

Romney: 1,408,992 (49.5%)
Obama: 1,403,475 (49.3%)

[ElectionsGuy]

So here are some final adjustments (outside of the Ventura/LA county conundrum):



Nothing I did affects states I've calculated so far except adding Columbia County, AR to the delta state (which I've already changed). I don't plan on making any other changes to this besides #16 and #17. I'm pretty happy with it now.

[ElectionsGuy]

State #21: Rest of Tennessee + Northeastern Arkansas + Southern Bootheel of Missouri. Population: 6,188,437

Biggest City: Memphis (646,889)

Romney: 1,382,247 (58.0%)
Obama: 964,218 (40.5%)