Reading
Reading ( RED-ing; Pennsylvania German: Reddin) is a city in and the county seat of Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city had a population of 95,112 at the 2020 census and is the fourth-largest city in Pennsylvania after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Allentown. Reading is located in the southeastern part of the state and is the principal city of the Greater Reading Area, which had 420,152 residents in 2020. Reading is part of the Delaware Valley, also known as the Philadelphia metropolitan area, a region that also includes Philadelphia, Upper Darby, Camden, Atlantic City, Wilmington, and other Philadelphia-area cities and counties. With a 2020 core metropolitan statistical area population of 6.288 million and a combined statistical area population of 7.366 million, the Delaware Valley is the nation's seventh-largest metropolitan region. Reading gives its name to the now-defunct Reading Company, also known as the Reading Railroad, and since acquired by Conrail, that played a vital role in transporting anthracite coal from the Pennsylvania's Coal Region to major East Coast metropolitan markets through the Port of Philadelphia for much of the 19th and 20th centuries.
