There are many imporant differences between small and large water systems, and between rural and urban areas.
Common sense tells us that there are fundamental differences between small and large water systems, and between rural and urban areas. Understanding these differences should provide a foundation for addressing policy issues that will arise about the regulation of small water systems and ways to provide safe, reliable and affordable water service in rural communities.
The federal government has adopted new criteria to define the extent of a "metropolitan area." A metropolitan area can contain both urban and rural communities, but metropolitan areas tend to be much more heavily populated than non-metropolitan areas. Most of the people in the United States live in metropolitan areas, but they occupy just a small fraction of the total land area in the country. Simply, about 80 percent of the people live in a metropolitan area, but they occupy just 20 percent of the land area of the country.