How Airports Serve Minnesota
Mark Pearson
This map displays the major airports in and around Minnesota. It shows how the state can divided according to which airport is the closest as the crow flies.
The flags are a sample of 500 census tracts (of 1334 tracts total) within the state.
Some census tract flags may look like they are colored for one airport's region but are actually in another airport's region. The census tract flags are colored with which airport they are closest to as the crow flies along the surface of the earth (the Haversine distance formula). The region boundaries that are displayed on map were computed assuming assuming the earth is flat. (The lines that divide regions are a Voronoi diagram, and I couldn't find any algorithm that calculate the lines on a sphere such as the earth.) In short, although a few census tracts may look like they're mislabeled near a boundary, it's actually the boundary that is slightly wrong.
For more information, see the full report:
http://www.mark-pearson.com/airport-distances/

MSP serves 3,845,416 people in MN
Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (Wold-Chamberlain Field)

DLH serves 437,495 people in MN
Duluth International Airport

FAR serves 427,091 people in MN
Hector International Airport

RST serves 378,642 people in MN
Rochester International Airport

FSD serves 143,430 people in MN
Sioux Falls Regional Airport (Joe Foss Field)

LSE serves 71,851 people in MN
La Crosse Municipal Airport

dividing line

4,191 people
closest airport: MSP

4,689 people
closest airport: MSP

3,676 people
closest airport: DLH

closest airport: MSP

closest airport: FSD

closest airport: RST

closest airport: DLH

closest airport: FAR

closest airport: LSE

448 people