Greater Bridgeport

Southwestern Connecticut
Metropolitan statistical area
Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk-Danbury Metropolitan Statistical Area
View of Bob's Discount Funiture in downtown Bridgpeort from Route 8, View of downtown Stamford lookling south, view of Main Street in Danbury
Country	United States
State(s)	Connecticut
Largest city	Bridgeport
Other cities	- Stamford  - Norwalk  - Danbury
Area
• Total	625.8 sq mi (1,621 km2)
Population  (2015)
• Total	948,053
• Rank	57th in the U.S.
• Density	1,514.9/sq mi (584.9/km2)

Greater Bridgeport is the metropolitan area centered on the city of Bridgeport in the U.S. state of Connecticut. The area is located in Southwestern Connecticut. In its most conservative form the area consists of the city of Bridgeport and five surrounding towns – Easton, Fairfield, Monroe, Stratford, and Trumbull. This definition of the Bridgeport area has a population of more than 305,000 and is within the Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk-Danbury metropolitan statistical area (Bridgeport metropolitan area), which consists of all of Fairfield County, Connecticut. The estimated 2015 county population was 948,053. The area is numbered as part of the New York-Newark metropolitan statiscial area NY-NJ-CT-PA by the United States Census Bureau.

The combined metropolitan area is the 4th largest of New England (behind the Boston, Providence, and Hartford areas). As of 2022 the Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk-Danbury area has been split into two different Connecticut regions (the state equivalent to counties), the Western Connecticut region (around Stamford, Norwalk and Danbury), and Metropolitan Connecticut (MetroCOG), consisting of the five towns of Greater Bridgeport.

Definitions

Greater Bridgeport Region

The smallest official definition of Greater Bridgeport is the area under the authority of the Greater Bridgeport Regional Planning Agency, which oversees transportation, land use and economic development planning for its member towns. The region consists of the six towns indicated in the introduction.

Towns of the Greater Bridgeport region

Bridgeport Labor Market Area

The Bridgeport Labor Market Area includes the core region above and also extends northeast into Milford and the Lower Naugatuck Valley (including Ansonia, Beacon Falls, Derby, Oxford, Seymour, and Shelton) for a total of 13 towns.

Bridgeport-Stamford NECTA

The urbanized areas of Stamford and Bridgeport are contiguous and considered by the U.S. Census Bureau as a single urban core. The towns containing this merged urbanized area, plus surrounding towns with significant commuter interchange to the central towns, are grouped together as the Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk New England City and Town Area. The area contains 25 towns and includes the Greater Bridgeport Region, the Gold Coast, the Lower Naugatuck Valley, and the additional outlying towns of Milford, Newtown, Redding, Ridgefield, Southbury, and Woodbridge. As of the 2000 census, the population of the NECTA was 892,283

A slightly smaller definition known as the Southwest Service Delivery Area consists of the Greater Bridgeport Region, the Lower Naugatuck Valley (including Oxford), the Gold Coast, and the town of Milford (20 towns).

Metropolitan Statistical Area

The MSA associated with Bridgeport is the Bridgeport–Stamford–Norwalk–Danbury MSA and consists of the entirety of Fairfield County with 23 towns. While statistically similar in terms of population and extent to the NECTA definition, the MSA includes the city of Danbury and its suburbs, and excludes the Valley region.

Economy

The Greater Bridgeport area is home to multiple Fortune 500 companies including; , Emcor, Xerox, and Booking Holdings in Norwalk, Charter Communications Syncrony Financial, United Rentals, and Frontier Communications in Stamford, and the New England base of M&T Bank in Bridgeport (company based in Buffalo, NY).

The Greater Bridgeport area, particularly Stamford, is a media mecca, being home to WWE, NBC Sports Group, their studios, all due to Connecticut tax incentives. Blue Sky Studios was based in Greenwich.

See also

• Gold Coast (Connecticut) for the contiguous urbanized area that goes along the whole coast of Fairfield County
• Lower Naugatuck River Valley which is part of the Bridgeport Labor Market Area