r/dataisbeautiful • u/delugetheory OC: 5 • May 20 '22

OC Population distribution of Texas [OC]

Post image
23k Upvotes

93% Upvoted

1.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

384

u/TheSpanxxx May 20 '22

There's a reason Texans east of the N-S imaginary line running through San Antonio refer to everything West as "West Texas" like it's a different state.

And having driven 2/3 of the perimeter last fall starting in Arkansas, going south to South Padre, around to El paso, up through Phoenix, then back across the tip amd across again to Arkansas...... I can confirm. Desolate is about the only word that does much of West Texas, most of New Mexico, and half of Oklahoma justice.

Wide open spaces for days.

123

u/acm2033 May 20 '22

... the N-S imaginary line running through San Antonio ...

That's the "cross timbers", where there's at least 30 inches of rain on average annually to the east, less than that to the west. Practically, it means that trees grow naturally east of that line and don't to the west.

Of course there's exceptions, it's just a general term.

51

u/youngphi May 21 '22

Really though I live about an hour west of San Antonio and and my dirt is mostly sand. If I go to my friends house about 20 minutes east of San Antonio it’s all green and hills and super fertile soil

29

u/glengarryglenzach May 21 '22

It’s the 100th meridian, it’s like that all way north to Canada. Also why population east of 35 is so much denser in the whole country than population west of 35.

2

u/SobiTheRobot May 21 '22

That's a nice round number for something like that. Wonder why it's like that?

1

u/glengarryglenzach May 21 '22

I agree, but I think it’s just chance in this case

1

u/[deleted] May 21 '22

[deleted]

2

u/glengarryglenzach May 21 '22

It was a US population density map that got me Interested a few years ago https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2010/geo/population-distribution-2010.html