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View Poll Results: most urban?
SF 167 31.87%
LA 71 13.55%
DC 45 8.59%
Philly 165 31.49%
Boston 76 14.50%
Voters: 524. You may not vote on this poll

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Old 02-05-2012, 08:56 AM
 
Location: The City
22,379 posts, read 38,665,395 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler View Post
Yes, the area he included has a lot of industrial/non-residential areas (also has train tracks, depots, and stations, wide roads, parks, office buildings, etc. just as Philly has), but it's also an area that is a bit less than 100 miles compared to Philly's 135 while still having a larger population--so in that comparison, it's like attaching over 30 miles of uninhabited vacuum land. Also, this would be from numbers over ten ago for Los Angeles compared to Philly's current numbers when it's both cities that have supposedly added a large number of people to downtown. Added to that would be the probably hugely undercounted illegal immigrant population that mostly avoided the census.

When drawing different sizes of contiguous areas to compare (20, 50, 100, 1000), Los Angeles is the densest among the choices for most sizes. Its mass transit is comparable for those areas though not great (definitely at the back of the pack, though not out of its league). The way the city is built is sort of goofy in places, so it belies how dense the city actually is. There are a lot of factors to weigh in where LA alternately does well and does not so well in comparison, but I can see the argument for LA winning in some cases.

Not totally disagreeing but in the same context, one could add upper darby, darby, Camben, Milburne etc and trim the areas in Philly where it is miles of zero population (like airports, refineries, navy yards etc.) Am not saying that LA does not have some of this but not at the scale. I also agree there is population but again to me it isnt just about pure population either on this attribute.

The 135 sq miles of Philiadelphie are not even close to the densest continuous area (135 sq miles) around center city, and many of the areas on the borders are closer than areas within the city boundaries (Far Northeast Philly for example). I think they are more similar than Ray would suggest but again it isnt purely population density though that obviously plays a part. And extened beyond 200 miles LA maintains a lot more

As said earler there are 1.8-9 million in the most dense 135 of Philly, LA may be able to surpass this, but would be really close.

To your point on the disjointed aspects of LA, this factors in on feel for better or worse.

Also my original post should have read parkland, not farmland

on transit, LA is getting better but servicing the core, definatly the laggard IMHO (even on buses (core) but on rail options isnt even close)

http://ts4.mm.bing.net/images/thumbnail.aspx?q=1573994564295&id=eafc40be61c6fefe 41e60259559bee96 (broken link)
http://images.search.yahoo.com/image...a&fr=yfp-t-701
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Old 02-05-2012, 09:44 AM
 
Location: Crooklyn, New York
31,860 posts, read 34,362,591 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler View Post
possible depending on where you live and work. definitely know people who are or basically live carless existences in various parts of the city (mostly around downtown, the westside, long beach or pasadena-ish)
You could also live in Atlanta, Tampa, Orlando, Charlotte, Nashville, Durham, Richmond, San Diego, Dallas, Minneapolis, Houston, or Birmingham and live a carless existence. Are these cities all as walkable as Boston?

http://goingawocatlantawithoutacar.wordpress.com/

http://www.city-data.com/forum/tampa...thout-car.html

http://energyandenvironmentblog.dall...out-a-veh.html

http://www.examiner.com/sightseeing-...-without-a-car

http://www.city-data.com/forum/san-d...thout-car.html
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Old 02-05-2012, 09:58 AM
 
Location: Crooklyn, New York
31,860 posts, read 34,362,591 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by johnatl View Post
L.A. is going back to its roots, so to speak. The Pacific Electric red cars built SoCal - not the freeways. This embracing of transit is a great thing, imo.
This is such a red herring. A lot of cities, including cities that no one really considers walkable (i.e., Atlanta and Dallas), had streetcar systems. There's nothing special about a streetcar system that makes a city any more urban or walkable. It's a bus on tracks.

The bottom line is that much of the infrastructure of Los Angeles was designed to accommodate the automobile. It's trite to say that "Los Angeles was not built around the automobile, but rather parking lots."* How silly does that sound? That's about as dumb as saying, "Guns don't kill people, bullets do." How could you possibly have one without the other?

*Not saying you said that specifically; I read that in some of the literature on the web.
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Old 02-05-2012, 10:17 AM
 
Location: Atlanta
7,731 posts, read 14,284,505 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee View Post
This is such a red herring. A lot of cities, including cities that no one really considers walkable (i.e., Atlanta and Dallas), had streetcar systems. There's nothing special about a streetcar system that makes a city any more urban or walkable. It's a bus on tracks.

The bottom line is that much of the infrastructure of Los Angeles was designed to accommodate the automobile. It's trite to say that "Los Angeles was not built around the automobile, but rather parking lots."* How silly does that sound? That's about as dumb as saying, "Guns don't kill people, bullets do." How could you possibly have one without the other?

*Not saying you said that specifically; I read that in some of the literature on the web.
Hardly a red herring at all. L.A. built the the most comprehensive rail network North America had ever seen, and it truly did shape SoCal. All of the little downtowns of the region are byproducts of this. The Mainline in Philly wasn't built around the car, and neither was L.A. It's been retrofitted around the car.

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Old 02-05-2012, 10:28 AM
 
Location: Crooklyn, New York
31,860 posts, read 34,362,591 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by johnatl View Post
Hardly a red herring at all. L.A. built the the most comprehensive rail network North America had ever seen, and it truly did shape SoCal. All of the little downtowns of the region are byproducts of this. The Mainline in Philly wasn't built around the car, and neither was L.A. It's been retrofitted around the car.
It's a red herring because practically every major city in the United States was not built around the car. In that sense, all major American cities had to be "retrofitted around the car." That does not change the fact that most cities are highly accommodating of the automobile, which has an adverse effect on the quality of pedestrian life. On the flipside, cities like NYC, Boston, Philly and DC are very limited in their accommodation of the automobile due to the very nature of their urban design (one way streets, limited off-street parking, etc.).
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Old 02-05-2012, 10:33 AM
 
Location: Atlanta
7,731 posts, read 14,284,505 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee View Post
It's a red herring because practically every major city in the United States was not built around the car. In that sense, all major American cities had to be "retrofitted around the car." That does not change the fact that most cities are highly accommodating of the automobile, which has an adverse effect on the quality of pedestrian life. On the flipside, cities like NYC, Boston, Philly and DC are very limited in their accommodation of the automobile due to the very nature of their urban design (one way streets, limited off-street parking, etc.).
You simply refuse to give credit where credit is due. NOBODY had as comprehensive a rail network as SoCal did. If you refuse to believe it was responsible for shaping the region we see today, so be it. But you would still be wrong.
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Old 02-05-2012, 10:41 AM
 
Location: Crooklyn, New York
31,860 posts, read 34,362,591 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by johnatl View Post
You simply refuse to give credit where credit is due. NOBODY had as comprehensive a rail network as SoCal did. If you refuse to believe it was responsible for shaping the region we see today, so be it. But you would still be wrong.
Credit ain't got sh*t to do with it. I've already offered an article written by the Chair of UCLA's Urban Planning Department in which he states that Los Angeles was "relentless in its accommodation of the automobile." Then there's this book by Scott Bottles called Los Angeles and the Automobile: The Making of the Modern City. What do you have to bring to the table?

Yes, Los Angeles had an expansive streetcar network. But so did Dallas and Atlanta. What's your point exactly?
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Old 02-05-2012, 10:45 AM
 
13,940 posts, read 14,806,353 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee View Post
Credit ain't got sh*t to do with it. I've already offered an article written by the Chair of UCLA's Planning Department in which he states that Los Angeles was "relentless in its accommodation of the automobile." Then there's this book by Scott Bottles called Los Angeles and the Automobile: The Making of the Modern City. What do you have to bring to the table?

Yes, Los Angeles had an expansive streetcar network. But so did Dallas and Atlanta. What's your point exactly?
Your acting like Northeast cities don't change to accomidate the automobile, and this isn't a thing of the Past, ever hear of the Big Dig, that happened in Boston, Massachusetts, its not just the South and west building for the automobile. Cause know why, America will never be able to survive of just train tranist, not even Tokyo, Paris, or New York does.
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Old 02-05-2012, 10:51 AM
 
Location: Crooklyn, New York
31,860 posts, read 34,362,591 times
Reputation: 14961
Quote:
Originally Posted by btownboss4 View Post
Your acting like Northeast cities don't change to accomidate the automobile, and this isn't a thing of the Past, ever hear of the Big Dig, that happened in Boston, Massachusetts, its not just the South and west building for the automobile. Cause know why, America will never be able to survive of just train tranist, not even Tokyo, Paris, or New York does.
Did you not read the part where I said "cities like NYC, Boston, DC and Philly were limited in their ability to accommodate the automobile?" The question is not "Did New York accommodate the automobile?" The answer is an obvious one, yes, as can be seen from the existence of the FDR and West Side Highways. The question is rather "How far did it go in its accommodation of the automobile?" And the answer to that question is "not that far" or at least not nearly as far as other cities that have more off-street parking and wider roads to show for it.

The only people who get touchy about this topic are urban enthusiasts who want their cities to be something they're not.
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Old 02-05-2012, 11:04 AM
 
Location: So California
8,704 posts, read 11,041,227 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gwillyfromphilly View Post
For a city that has had population decline since 1950 I think that is something to brag about. You have to understand that Philly's city limits are small compared to Los Angeles and if Philly had about same city limits as Los Angeles, Philly would have a population of almost 3 million people(almost as large as Los Angeles 3.7 million).

The Philly area is a lot larger than what most people give it credit for.

I agree, it is good to reverse the trend even if slight.

I think people rate Philly right where it is. Its not NY or LA or Chi. Its in the 5-8 range depending on metric.
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