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For cities that do not contract any of their services, see contract cityAn independent city is a city that does not form part of another local government entity. As a formal term it is mainly used in the U.S. Commonwealth of Virginia; however, there are equivalent entities in a number of other jurisdictions throughout the world. Independent cities should not be confused with city-states (such as Singapore), which are fully sovereign cities that are not part of any other nation-state. United States In the United States, an independent city is a city that does not belong to any particular county. Because counties have historically been a strong institution in local government in most of the United States, independent cities are relatively rare outside of Virginia (see below), whose state constitution makes them a special case. The U.S. Census Bureau uses counties as its base unit for presentation of statistical information, and treats independent cities as county equivalents for those purposes. Independent cities should not be confused with consolidated city-counties, such as Denver, Colorado, the City and County of San Francisco, California or Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Virginia Of the 42 independent cities in the United States•, 39 are in Virginia. The three that are not in Virginia are Baltimore, Maryland, St. Louis, Missouri and Carson City, Nevada. In the Commonwealth of Virginia, all municipalities incorporated as "cities" have also been "independent cities," also called "free cities," since 1871. Other municipalities, even though they may be more populous than some existing independent cities, are incorporated as "towns", and as such form part of a county. An independent city in Virginia may serve as the county seat of an adjacent county, even though the city by definition is not part of that county. Several Virginia counties, whose origins go back to the original eight shires of the colony formed in 1634, have the word city in their names; however, politically they are counties. Examples are Charles City County and James City County. List of Virginias independent cities The independent cities in Virginia are (as of January 2006): Notes Arlington County Arlington County, commonly referred to as just "Arlington," is not an independent city. However, it is often thought of as a city because it is fully urbanized, is close in size to other independent cities in the state, and includes no municipalities within its borders. It consists solely of areas ceded by Virginia to the Federal Government to form Washington, D.C. in the late 18th century, and retroceded to Virginia in 1846. See also Alexandria County, D.C. Former cities See also: Lost Counties, Cities and Towns of Virginia. Former independent cities now extinct that were long extant in Virginia include: Two other independent cities existed only for a short time: Other states Some states have created independent cities in order to cater for the special requirements of governing their largest cities and/or capitals: Other entities similar to independent cities An independent city is not the same as: Canada In the Canadian province of Ontario, the same type of city is referred to as a single-tier municipality (there are also separated municipalities). In Quebec they are often called separated cities, as they are not Regional County Municipalities. Austria In Austria, a similar concept is the Statutarstadt. Germany See also: List of German urban districts. In Germany, different states have either the Stadtkreis ("Urban District") or Kreisfreie Stadt (literally, "District-Free City"). Examples of German independent cities are: Hungary See also: List of towns in Hungary In Hungary 23 of the cities are "cities with county rights", these cities have equal rights with the 19 counties of Hungary. United Kingdom and Ireland Some cities in the United Kingdom are a unitary authority, and could be considered to be independent cities. In the UK, however, "city" has no inherent status; city status depends on a grant from the monarch and merely confers on the place so-designated the right to call itself a city. The standard for such a right was once thought to depend on whether the entity has a cathedral. As is now made clear by the Department for Constitutional Affairs *, there are no formal criteria such as this for the city to apply for, and be granted city status in the UK. It is perhaps remarkable that there are in fact only 66 cities in the UK - 50 in England, 5 in Wales, 6 in Scotland and 5 in Northern Ireland. County borough referred to a borough or a city independent of county council control in England and Wales from 1889 to 1972 with the term continuing in use in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Wales re-introduced the term in 1994 for use with certain unitary authorities. Japan All municipalities in Japan are similar to independent cities, with no intermediate level of government between the prefecture and the municipality. Towns and villages are grouped into districts, which were historically a level of government similar to the county level in the United States. Taiwan(Republic of China) Under the administrative division system of the Republic of China, some cities are directly administered by the Executive Yuan, some are administered by provinces(the province of Taiwan is nominal), and some are subordinate to counties. The centrally-administered and province-administered ones are like independent cities under this definition. Peoples Republic of China In mainland China under the administration of People's Republic of China, the Cities of Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and Chongqing are centrally-administered province-level regions, and they do not belong to any particular province. National capitals A number of countries have made their national capitals into separate entities. For example Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark, is outside of the country's system of counties, as is the capital of Romania, Bucharest. The capital of the United States is not within any of the 50 states. London is actually composed of the City of London and the county of Greater London, which is divided into a number of boroughs. The German capital, Berlin, is a Federal State with the same level of autonomy as much larger states, such as Bavaria. Brussels, the capital of Belgium, is a separate region (the Brussels-Capital Region), independent of both Flanders and Wallonia, despite being entirely surrounded by Flanders and sharing a common language with Wallonia (French). Federal capitals In countries with a federal structure, the federal capital is often separate from other jurisdictions in the country, and frequently has a unique system of government. Examples include: See also | |||||||
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