Upstate
Appearance
The term upstate often refers to the northernly portions of a handful of U.S. states. It is also sometimes used to refer to parts of states that have a higher elevation and are away from sea level. Often these portions are also more rural, though the opposite is true for states like Illinois and Delaware, whose rural areas are located in their central and southern regions.
On the east coast, the states which use it refer to those parts further inland and away from the Atlantic Ocean.
- Upstate California refers to the 20 northernmost counties of California, the portion north of but not including the San Francisco Bay Area and Sacramento metro area, approximately the northern half of Northern California
- Upstate Connecticut, the northern counties that are located in the Appalachian Mountains and the Metacomet Ridge Mountains. Though much of this area is rural, it also includes the majority of the Hartford metropolitan area.
- Upstate Illinois, the heavily urbanized northeast region of that state, informally known as Chicagoland.
- Any part of Maine not "Down East"
- Upstate New York, any part of New York state north of the New York metropolitan area.
- Upstate South Carolina, the northwestern corner of South Carolina