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Investigating the Overlooked

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Airports — By Metro
US airports and heliports, split by whether they actually run scheduled passenger service -- commercial versus small/private general aviation, with heliports shown separately. County and metro grains rank by commercial airports per 100,000 residents; jurisdiction ranks by raw commercial count. No drone-specific data on file -- the FAA drone registry has never been ingested.
94 metros with at least one airport on file · 609 commercial · 14,218 small/private · 7,689 heliports
# Metro Commercial Small / Private Heliports Total Population Commercial per 100,000
1 Alaska 181 530 73 784 733,971 24.66
2 Walla Walla 1 8 2 11 62,102 1.61
3 Wyoming 9 136 36 181 579,761 1.55
4 Montana 11 241 48 300 923,187 1.19
5 North Dakota 8 292 21 321 779,361 1.03
6 Washington State 17 254 99 370 2,234,930 0.76
7 Hawaii 11 18 51 80 1,445,635 0.76
8 Colorado 12 193 118 323 1,801,100 0.67
9 State College, PA 1 10 5 16 158,041 0.63
10 Bozeman & Greater Yellowstone 3 63 17 83 529,288 0.57
11 South Dakota 5 154 48 207 899,194 0.56
12 New Mexico 10 179 88 277 2,114,768 0.47
13 Nebraska 9 231 53 293 1,965,926 0.46
14 Idaho (Boise) 8 321 62 391 1,893,296 0.42
15 West Virginia 7 75 50 132 1,784,462 0.39
16 Erie, PA 1 12 6 19 269,544 0.37
17 Michigan 19 304 95 418 5,315,581 0.36
18 Richland 1 14 8 23 307,900 0.32
19 Green Bay -- Titletown 1 20 5 26 329,375 0.30
20 Arkansas 7 420 86 513 2,469,215 0.28
21 Missouri 7 328 105 440 2,743,854 0.26
22 Minnesota 5 269 89 363 1,994,110 0.25
23 Illinois 7 368 152 527 2,871,607 0.24
24 Mississippi 7 269 71 347 2,951,438 0.24
25 Monterey 1 12 10 23 435,834 0.23
26 the Cedar Rapids-Iowa City Corridor 1 16 10 27 453,380 0.22
27 Utah (Silicon Slopes) 7 233 100 340 3,331,187 0.21
28 Texas 20 1,365 367 1,752 9,587,775 0.21
29 New England (NH · VT · ME · RI · CT) 17 312 326 655 8,104,207 0.21
30 Upstate New York 14 359 124 497 7,008,487 0.20
31 Iowa 6 184 87 277 3,195,937 0.19
32 Madison, WI 1 29 4 34 564,777 0.18
33 Northwest Arkansas 1 26 12 39 563,436 0.18
34 Louisiana 5 315 167 487 2,760,883 0.18
35 Spokane 1 44 9 54 591,793 0.17
36 Harrisburg 1 23 22 46 597,894 0.17
37 Florida 16 413 253 682 9,828,514 0.16
38 Pennsylvania 7 243 169 419 4,448,668 0.16
39 Des Moines 1 21 7 29 682,467 0.15
40 Wisconsin 5 361 94 460 3,365,751 0.15
41 the Sun Belt — Arizona 10 329 256 595 7,268,175 0.14
42 Georgia 6 244 82 332 4,347,510 0.14
43 South Carolina 6 168 56 230 4,791,133 0.13
44 California 15 489 220 724 11,222,760 0.13
45 Nevada 4 210 88 302 3,141,000 0.13
46 Fort Worth 3 98 57 158 2,555,001 0.12
47 Oregon 5 371 111 487 4,093,795 0.12
48 Seattle 5 41 70 116 4,021,467 0.12
49 North Carolina 8 281 133 422 6,587,802 0.12
50 Alabama 6 223 170 399 5,054,253 0.12
51 Lehigh Valley (Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton) 1 27 48 76 866,764 0.12
52 Hampton Roads 2 24 35 61 1,782,590 0.11
53 Baton Rouge 1 38 44 83 871,379 0.11
54 Tennessee 5 200 113 318 4,942,369 0.10
55 Kentucky 4 149 106 259 4,061,369 0.10
56 New Orleans 1 11 50 62 988,763 0.10
57 Oklahoma 4 405 144 553 3,995,260 0.10
58 Cincinnati 2 49 54 105 2,246,830 0.09
59 Greater Columbus 2 54 41 97 2,151,847 0.09
60 Austin 2 48 70 120 2,357,497 0.08
61 Silicon Valley 7 72 68 147 9,101,124 0.08
62 Pittsburgh 2 61 58 121 2,443,921 0.08
63 Ohio 4 268 127 399 4,710,407 0.08
64 Greater Miami / South Florida 4 31 85 120 6,138,876 0.07
65 Greater Orlando 2 37 64 103 2,721,022 0.07
66 Denver 2 57 63 122 2,977,085 0.07
67 Greater St. Louis 2 73 64 139 2,809,414 0.07
68 Tampa Bay 2 25 57 84 3,240,469 0.06
69 Milwaukee 1 15 14 30 1,566,361 0.06
70 Greater San Diego 2 46 77 125 3,282,782 0.06
71 Piedmont Triad (Greensboro-Winston-Salem-High Point) 1 58 8 67 1,709,224 0.06
72 the DMV (DC, Maryland, Virginia) 3 84 82 169 6,263,796 0.05
73 the Twin Cities 2 62 27 91 3,693,351 0.05
74 Kansas City 1 91 37 129 2,202,006 0.05
75 Nashville 1 45 29 75 2,043,713 0.05
76 Indianapolis 1 102 31 134 2,128,089 0.05
77 Greater Cleveland 1 48 47 96 2,171,978 0.05
78 Greater Los Angeles 5 24 502 531 13,012,469 0.04
79 Greater San Antonio 1 99 56 156 2,612,802 0.04
80 New York City 7 57 244 308 19,756,722 0.04
81 the Research Triangle 1 46 25 72 2,287,314 0.04
82 New England 2 18 91 111 4,917,661 0.04
83 Houston 2 123 177 302 7,274,714 0.03
84 Greater Chicago 3 100 116 219 9,359,555 0.03
85 Greater Atlanta 2 131 87 220 6,176,937 0.03
86 Philadelphia 2 83 161 246 6,241,882 0.03
87 Dallas 1 119 102 222 5,252,554 0.02
88 Detroit 1 39 61 101 4,367,620 0.02
89 Ames 0 1 1 2 98,592 0.00
90 Portland — the Silicon Forest 0 20 7 27 2,510,529 0.00
91 Greater Charlotte 0 9 4 13 421,641 0.00
92 Boulder 0 8 8 16 328,317 0.00
93 Gettysburg 0 13 7 20 105,183 0.00
94 Youngstown 0 29 5 34 428,430 0.00
What "commercial" means here: Split on scheduled_service, not the airport size field alone -- 141 of the 15,254 small-airport-type fields nationally and 7 of the 8,220 heliports actually carry real scheduled passenger service, so classifying by type alone would misfile real regional commercial airports as private and vice versa. Large + medium + small airport types with scheduled service are counted as Commercial; the same types without it are Small/Private. Heliports are shown as their own column regardless of scheduled-service status, since almost none carry it (7 of 8,220). Ranked by commercial airports per 100,000 residents, not raw count -- a large county with zero commercial airports still ranks below a small one with even a single scheduled field, since the rate is what actually answers "does this place have real air access." No drone data is on file at all -- the FAA drone registry has never been ingested, so this report is airports and heliports only.