November 08, 2013

How Big is Israel? How Small is the San Francisco Bay Area?




The San Francisco Bay Area and Israel are about the same size!

They’re also about the same population. The SF Bay has somewhat fewer people and is losing population while Israel is growing in population.

In terms of geography, the Bay Area may be considered either a little bigger or a little smaller than Israel depending mostly on where you live in the Bay. Since there are no official borders to the Bay Area, people in the farthest north reaches do not necessarily consider the farthest south reaches really Bay Area – and the reverse, and so on.

Even in such close proximity to a map of Israel there is nothing analogous to say about borders here.

The California map above is typical in that it includes nine counties in the Bay Area.  Some maps give the Bay 12 counties, which I think is really overstating the range of the Bay Area.  Again, no analogy.

Imagine these counties rearranged in the shape of Israel. Now, especially if you’re from the West Coast, you have a good image of how small, or big, is Israel. Also, given its similar size to Israel, the size of the Bay Area can be suggested by the map below.

It is useful to look at facts on the ground, so to speak.


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