If the Sierra Club gets its way, urban densities will be increased to 100 families per acre. At that density, the population of the world would fit into the state of Virginia. Here’s the math:

The state of Virginia has a land area of

39,594 square miles (US Census Bureau 2000)

Times 640 acres per square mile equals

25,340,160 acres in Virginia

Times 100 housing units per acre equals

2,534,016,000 housing units could fit into Virginia

The population of the world is

6,409,765,942 (US Census Bureau 1/1/2005)

Divided by 2.7 the average household size equals

2,373,987,386 number of households in the world.

As you can see, there would be room for over 160 million more households in Virginia.

This uses the land area of Virginia, not the total size, which is 42,769 square miles. An area the size of Virginia would actually hold 2,737,216,000 households.

This also uses the average household size in the United States, the world average household is much larger.

The land area of Wisconsin (54,310 sq. miles) would hold 3,475,840,000 households, at 100 households per acre. Wisconsin currently has an average density of about 1 household per 17.5 acres, or .06 households per acre.

Dane county has an average density of 1 household per 4.9 acres, or .2 households per acre.

Madison has an average density of 1.75 households per acre.