There are eleven metropolitan regions in Germany[1] consisting of the country's most densely populated cities and their catchment areas. They represent Germany's political, commercial and cultural centres. The eleven metropolitan regions in Germany were organised into political units for planning purposes.
Based on a narrower definition of metropolises commonly used to determine the metropolitan status of a given city,[2] only four cities in Germany surpass the threshold of at least one million inhabitants within their administrative borders: Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, and Cologne.
For urban centres outside metropolitan areas that are a similar focal point for their region, but on a smaller scale, the concept of the Regiopolis and the related concepts of regiopolitan area or regio were introduced by urban and regional planning professors in 2006.[3]
Sorted alphabetically:
The five most important regions, collectively often called the Big Five,[4] [5] are frequently compared with other European metropolitan regions (EMR) in terms of investment and market development.[6] They are (from north to south):Hamburg, Berlin, the polycentric Ruhr-Düsseldorf-Cologne region (collectively referred to as Rhine-Ruhr), Frankfurt and Munich. The Globalization and World Cities Study Group (GaWC) considers Frankfurt and Munich as "α" (alpha) global cities, whereas the others are classified as "β" (beta) global cities.[7]
Each of them forms types of clusters and achieves varying levels of performance in areas, including business activity, human capital, information and technology exchange, cultural experience, and political engagement.[8]
| rank | metropolitan region (EMR) | core cities | states | data-sort-type="number" | population as by EMR[9] (2006) ! | data-sort-type="number" | population as by ESPON[10] (2007) ! | data-sort-type="number" | GDP per capita in €[11] (2006) ! | data-sort-type="number" | GMP in billion € (2006) ! | data-sort-type="number" | HQs of MNC (FG500[12]) ! | data-sort-type="number" | annual passenger traffic (2008) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rhine-Ruhr EMR | 29,486 | 30.80 million | ||||||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Ruhr | 25,266 | 132.90 | 4 | 2.30 million (DTM) | ||||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Düsseldorf | 3.12 million | 3.07 million | 34,658 | 108.13 | 5 | 18.15 million (DUS) | ||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Cologne/Bonn | 3.09 million | 3.07 million | 31,448 | 97.18 | 4 | 10.35 million (CGN) | ||||||||
| 2 | Frankfurt/Rhine-Main EMR | 6.0million | 4.15 million | 35,000 | 4 | ||||||||||
| 3 | Berlin/Brandenburg EMR | 5.95 million | 4.02 million | 21,981 | 130.78 | 1 | 21.40 million (TXL, SXF) | ||||||||
| 4 | Stuttgart EMR | 5.29 million | 31,909 | 168.80 | 3[13] | 9.93 million | |||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Stuttgart | 2.67 million | 2.67 million | 35,492 | align=center style="text-indent:20px" | 94.76 | 9.93 million[14] (STR) | ||||||||
| 5 | Munich EMR | 5.20 million | 3.27 million | 203.61 | 7 | 34.73 million | |||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Munich[15] | 2.59 million[16] | 2.67 million | 124.35 | 7 | 34.73 million (MUC) | |||||||||
| 6 | Central German EMR | 4.36 million | 21,482 | 93.66 | 0 | 4.88 million | |||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Leipzig/Halle | 1.50 million | 1.21 million | no data | no data | 0 | 2.46 million (LEJ) | ||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Dresden | 0.70 million[17] | align=center style="text-indent:20px" | 0.88 million | no data | no data | 0 | 1.86 million (DRS) | |||||||
| 7 | Hamburg EMR | HH, HL | 4.27 million | 2.98 million | 33,210 | 141.81 | 2 | 12.84 million (HAM) | |||||||
| 8 | Hanover-Braunschweig- Göttingen-Wolfsburg EMR | 3.91 million | 27,251 | 106.55 | 3 | 5.74 million | |||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Braunschweig/Wolfsburg | 1.00 million[18] | align=center style="text-indent:20px" | 1.00 million | no data | no data | 1 | 0.10 million (BWE) | |||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Hanover | 1.00 million | no data | no data | 2 | 5.64 million[19] (HAJ) | |||||||||
| 9 | Nuremberg EMR | 3.51 million | 29,955 | 105.14 | 0 | 4.27 million | |||||||||
| align=left style="text-indent:20px" | Nuremberg/Furth/Erlangen | 1.29 million | align=center style="text-indent:20px" | 1.58 million | no data | no data | 0 | 4.27 million[20] (NUE) | |||||||
| 10 | Bremen/Oldenburg EMR | 2.37 million | 1.08 million | 27,046 | 64.10 | 0 | 2.49 million (BRE) | ||||||||
| 11 | Rhine-Neckar EMR | 2.36 million | 2.93 million | 29,891 | 70.54 | 1 | 0 | ||||||||
| metropolitan regions in Germany | 57.74 million | 29,412 | 1,698.23 | 34 | 168.75 million | ||||||||||
| Germany | 80.22 million | 28,212 | 2,322.20 | 37 | 191.02 million[21] |