Of course, some of the suburbs around Dallas are actually turning into fairly large cities. Arlington has over 300,000 people. Plano, Garland, and Irving are over 200,000, with Grand Prairie fast approaching the 200,000 mark. Phoenix is another metro area where the suburbs are growing into large cities. Mesa is over 400,000 now. However, the first suburb to actually grow to be larger than the major city next to it was Virginia Beach. It is now around 450,000, while neighboring Norfolk is only about 250,000.