Urbanicity is the degree to which an area is considered urban, ranging from highly urban, like a city center, to more rural settings (Ole, 2024). Urban influence codes have nine categories based on three classifications– metropolitan, micropolitan, and noncore counties. Metropolitan counties have two categories based on its population size, greater than or less than 1 million people. Micropolitan counties have three categories: adjacent to a large metro, adjacent to a small metro, and non-adjacent. Noncore nonmetropolitan counties have four categories based on their adjacency to large and small metro areas and whether they are greater than or less than 5,000 residents (USDA, 2025). Each county in the United States is assigned a code from 1 to 9, 1 being the most urban and 9 being the most rural. Codes 1-3 identify counties associated with large metropolitan areas, 4-6 identify counties associated with small metropolitan areas, and 7-9 identify counties that do not belong to any metro area and that are not adjacent to any metro area. The state of Virginia is composed of 95 counties, ranging from 1 to 9 in urbanicity. 

Median home prices across the United States have been found by using the House Price Index growth data from FHFA and combining it with the latest housing statistics from the American Community Survey (NAR, 2025). These home values show the overall worth of all homes in a given area, as opposed to just home sales data. Housing costs in Virginia, whether buying or renting, are near an all-time high. The average home price in Virginia rose from $225,000 in December of 2013 to $372,000 in December of 2023 (Horowitz, 2024). Six Virginia areas have average home prices exceeding $1,000,000: Great Falls, McLean, Dunn Loring, Vienna, Upperville, and Waterford. All of these areas are included in the greater metropolitan area of Washington, D.C., which explains the high prices, as these areas also have high populations of creative class workers. Washington D.C’s creative class makes up nearly half the metro’s workforce (Florida, 2017). Four of the Metro’s top ten creative class neighborhoods are in Arlington, with median home prices of $910,843, and one in Alexandria, with median home prices around $816,533. Across the US, the creative class increasingly clusters together in its own areas, separate from the less advantaged service and working classes.

In the New Urban Crisis, Richard Florida discusses a phenomenon within the creative class that causes housing and living affordability to rise in cost. The creative class includes artists, engineers, architects, lawyers, teachers, and others who create connections between knowledge and ideas to solve problems (Cochran, 2002). As a whole, creative class members are drawn to and cluster around locations depending on 4 key factors: proximity to an urban core, proximity to transit, proximity to major universities and other knowledge-based universities, and proximity to natural amenities (Florida, 2017). Due to this, highly paid knowledge workers, the affluent, and young people have been returning in large numbers to urban centers over the past decade or two, while growing numbers of the poor and disadvantaged are being edged out into the suburbs. This is also known as a patchwork metropolis, a collection of areas that are not cohesive but together create a larger urban fabric.

A patchwork metropolis is an urban area that is a divided, yet integrated, urban development where different functions and activities are located in distinct areas but are interconnected. It is shaped by the clustering of the advantaged creative class, whose members occupy the most economically functional and physically desirable locations, leaving the members of less-advantaged working and service classes with what is left over. The rich live wherever they want, and the poor live where they can (Florida, 2017). Northern Virginia is an example of a patchwork metropolis, where the rich are living where they want: Arlington, Alexandria, Fairfax, Falls Church, Vienna, Great Falls, and McLean, and the less-advantaged are living around them wherever they can, in parts of some of these areas. These areas are attracting the creative class because they are near a major metro area, Washington D.C., and have the four key factors that draw people to them: urban center, transit, knowledge institutions, and natural amenities. The housing costs in these locations are much higher than in other areas around them due to the high incomes of this creative class driving up costs. These cities are all in the most urban counties in the state of Virginia, all with an urbanicity code of 1. This leads to the conclusion that the more urban an area is, the more the creative class wants to live there, and this leads to a creation of higher housing costs.

Florida, R. (2014, September 15). Insight: Divided City. Martin Prosperity Institute. https://www-2.rotman.utoronto.ca/mpi/content/insight-divided-city/ 

Florida, R. (2017). Patchwork Metropolis. In The New Urban Crisis: How Our Cities Are Increasing Inequality, deepening segregation, and Failing the Middle Class--and What We Can Do About It (pp. 121–150). Essay, Basic Books. 

Cochran, K. (2002). The Rise of the Creative Class. Grantmakers in the Arts. https://www.giarts.org/article/rise-creative-class 

Horowitz, A., & Hatchett, C. (2024, January 22). How Restrictive Zoning in Virginia Has Hurt Housing Affordability. The Pew Charitable Trusts. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/articles/2024/01/22/how-restrictive-zoning-in-virginia-has-hurt-housing-affordability 

National Association of Realtors. (2025, January 8). Median Home Prices and Mortgage Payments by County. https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics/housing-statistics/county-median-home-prices-and-monthly-mortgage-payment 

Ole, El. (2024, December 16). 12 Things to Know About Urbanicity Data. ArcGIS Blog. https://www.esri.com/arcgis-blog/products/esri-demographics/decision-support/12-things-to-know-about-urbanicity-data#:~:text=1.,are%20classified%20as%20Urban%20Core. 

US Department of Agriculture. (2025, January 7). Urban Influence Codes. Economic Research Service. https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/urban-influence-codes/documentation