Quote Originally Posted by Catwho View Post
Edit: There is also an in-game explanation for why previous hubs are now more empty. Mor Dhona and Idyllshire were under construction for most of their patches; there were tons of people flowing in and out helping with the construction projects. Now it's over. Rhalgr's Reach is the capital of a newly liberated nation and in dire need of repairs - so of course it is going to be very busy!
Should have fixed up Ishgard while they were at it.

I kind of take it for granted that the areas we see are simply representative of an entire region, but we see it boiled down to the poin ts of interest needed for the story. So when I am in the Shroud, I assume it's 100s of thousands of acres of forest, and similarly for other zones, they are representative of much larger regions than we could realistically see in-game.