2015 county predictions

[Torie]

NYC continues its slower pace of growth for the past three years, en route to shoving Sullivan and Columbia counties into N&-18 in all probability. As Muon2 noted, Cook County actually lost 10,000 in population last year, while the population of the collar counties is stagnant. Apparently the charms of Chicagoland are proving resistible.

[Torie]

I cranked the NY numbers, and assuming the growth rate of the counties in NY continues at the same rate for the balance of the decade as during the past three years, the NYC metro area plus Sullivan county has 18.001 CD's, and thus the map below is a perfect fit (I drew NY 16-18). I sent the map to Will Yandik, and he was most pleased (his career would end if Columbia County is absorbed into NY-18). He thinks he can beat Teachout with a high turnout election (more moderate voters), but not otherwise (more hardcore Lefties). He says his polls show him in good shape in the general election. So if he can navigate through all of this, he might be in Congress for a long time. It will be kind of nice to have someone in Congress who is a personal friend.



And here is the map for upstate NY:

[Torie]

I changed the map. It generated a disfavored bridge chop, and anyway, this version is better in all events. Comment on that one. Yes, the pack rule is alive and well. I created it, follow it where profitable, and protect it against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Herk's chop is small, and the chop to the north is popular, because the area is so remote. Cutting deeper is messy. It could interfere with the east-west arterial in that county, as well as generate a macro-chop. The court this time similarly chopped Herkimer. It's a popular choice. Yes, the chop of Allegheny is probably necessary. There is a 7.2k gap, with only two CD's to absorb it. If that were done, there would be a subunit chop in Erie, or Allegheny (and although Allegheny does not involve a macro-chop, subunit chops should be punished always in some manner), or both.


NY-19 is like the number of a champion baseball player, and NY-19 is that champion. It's the best place on earth, and getting better all the time. So the number has been permanently retired. I hope that helps.

[Torie]

"What if you put all of Herkimer in your Hudson-centric district, and get the extra population for the North County district from Oswego? Won't that improve the splits of Seneca and Chenango?"

No enough to get rid of them. My cut in Madison generated the bridge chop. There is no state highway between Onondaga and Otsego in that narrow boundary.

[Torie]

My question is how much the macrochop of Saratoga hurts. You can trade a pack chop of Albany for a county chop and get rid of the macrochop. I get that doesn't get the political result for Hudson you would like, but should that be relevant for a neutral map?

What county chop is lost by Columbia being absorbed into the Albany CD?

Well, it looks like the map below would work. It loses one chop net. Hopefully it is not competitive with my map in erosity (due to macro chopped Saratoga), since I very much dislike it. Albany losing Schenectady and taking in all of Saratoga and Columbia  leaves it about 6k short in population, and i don't see where NY-22 picks up the 60k population lost in Columbia without another chop. But my computer crashed, so much of my split data on my spreadsheet was lost, so I am just eyeballing it.

[Torie]

Yes, I assume the growth rates stay the same as for the past three years (NYC continues at a slower growth rate, which seems reasonable to me).  But that would not make much difference for upstate, which has a steady population decline in most places, or a steady uptick in a couple of places, like Saratoga County. Your map is certainly creative. You detached Albany from the rest of its metro area! That map won't happen in real life. Is there a danger with our metrics, that such a map would knock all the other maps out of the box, because it wins on both erosity and chops, while detaching the inner city county and putting it with an otherwise rural zone? That is not good. The folks on the Fruited Plain won't like it.

I don't like what you did to Erie either. Why did you do that? It seems bad form to create more of a chop of Erie, but having its inner core take in another county. That's just bad policy to me. Does it reduce highway cuts?

One penalty point for each county severed off from the core county in a metro area, and a penalty point for increasing the size of a chop of a county larger than a CD, are rules that one might consider. Yes, I know, you won't like it.

[Torie]

Much better (although your NY-19 does snake around but that's life), although the underlying issue remains. It would only really obtain however for metro areas about the size of Albany, where substantially more than one CD, but less than two CD's, are in play, with more than two counties involved. Still, that involves a fair amount of places.

[Torie]

Much better (although your NY-19 does snake around but that's life), although the underlying issue remains. It would only really obtain however for metro areas about the size of Albany, where substantially more than one CD, but less than two CD's, are in play, with more than two counties involved. Still, that involves a fair amount of places.

Albany's issue is complicated because the UCC lacks any small counties (ie under 10% of the quota). In this case it forces a macrochop to maintain the pack rule. If Schoharie, which is in the MSA, urbanized enough to meet the UCC standard, then the pack could be addressed with a simple chop.

The situation was similar in the Grand Rapids UCC when we were first fleshing out the UCC rules. By use of a number of plans, and some detailed analysis, we came to the conclusion that the UCC rules and macrochop erosity were reasonably balanced.

In Grand Rapids, you have only two counties in the zone, and severing them from each other is not that much of an issue. It is when you sever the core county out of a pack of three, or if a four pack, have two counties each in separate CD's and so forth, that the common sense rule is put under a lot of strain, and becomes something that folks won't like.

[Torie]

Yes, that map is the winner.

[Torie]

Yes, that map is the winner.

Feel free to share it with Yandik, et al.

Poor Will has to deal with the Bernie bulge, which might drive up the turnout of the left in the Dem primary. Will however thinks he will do better with a higher turnout. I tend to disagree. He's clearly positioning himself as the moderate candidate. Bad luck that. If Hillary had it all wrapped up, the turnout would be low, and he would be better positioned.

[Torie]

Yes, that map is the winner.

Feel free to share it with Yandik, et al.

Poor Will has to deal with the Bernie bulge, which might drive up the turnout of the left in the Dem primary. Will however thinks he will do better with a higher turnout. I tend to disagree. He's clearly positioning himself as the moderate candidate. Bad luck that. If Hillary had it all wrapped up, the turnout would be low, and he would be better positioned.

Isn't the congressional primary in the summer (June 28)?

No, this April along with the POTUS primary.

Yes, you're absolutely correct. My bad. My focus is on another election at the moment, more locally based, so I am going to give myself a pass.