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I meant commuterbelt as in all of the commuters that are going from the IE to LA by all modes of transit not just train. I was mainly speaking of the four freeways LA has into the IE.
I don't doubt that SoFla's commuter belt is just as long. I even pointed it out that everything from Palm Beach county to Dade is one big commuter belt. That's why they're a metro in the first place.
Maybe this is what city-data was talking about when they said people from Atlanta love to boost their city. Let's be honest. Atlanta is not more urban then Detroit at it's core. It just isn't. You can walk 5 minutes from North Midtown and be in the surburban areas of Sherwood Forest and Ansley park...When I walked through there, I asked myself, if I was still in Atlanta.
Obviously, most cbd's are urban. Most Downtowns in mid-size-major cities are urban. But there isn't a continuous urban fabric throughout much of the city. There are small neighborhoods that go from urban to suburban in a heartbeat.
Atlanta main urban neighborhoods ARE Downtown, Midtown, ad the Buckhead-Peachtree Str. Corridor, then you have other small neighborhoods like Virginia Highlands, Old 4th Ward, Castleberry hill, West Midtown...etc...but these are small neighborhoods and they aren't continuous with the Downtown/Midtown areas.
Compare this with say, New York where there areas are continuous urban fabric interwoven without any breaks.
Obv, most cities aren't New York, but Chicago, Boston and even LA has a continuous urban fabric for at least 2 miles outside of the CBD.
First of all I was replying to someone who said Detroit suburbs aren't urban and then said Atlanta is very urban. That's why I stated neither Atlanta or it's suburbs are very urban. "newsflash"
Detroit and Atlanta are NOT on the same level as far as being urban goes. Southfield maybe, but not Detroit. If that was the case than Atlanta would have the same population within it's city limits since both cities are the same size land wise. Atlanta does have the rail and a few neighborhoods like downtown, midtown, and maybe bucktown but mostly on a suburban maze like street system. Detroit is on the street grid system, has many storefronts lining up for miles along major/ semi major streets and around 20-50 homes on the average city block. Nowhere near the same. Not saying Detroit is Tokyo or Atlanta is any less of a city. But we all know they both are 2 different types of cities in this category.
Hey Marvin! Have you ever been to Chicago?
Quote:
Originally Posted by JoeTarheel
Simply having streets on a grid system does not make Detroit more urban than Atlanta, nor does a higher city population. What does make a difference is all of those empty/uninhabited lots that make Detroit so desolate in some areas. I don't see that as urbanity.
Bucktown? You obviously don't know much about Atlanta...and you seem to have a stereotypical idea about the city that isn't factual.
Greetings Joe,
There is a Chicago neighborhood called Bucktown. I've said Bucktown when referring to Buckhead more times than I can count.
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
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I'm not sure why people are saying Detroit is the "most urban" out of these cities. Sure it is certainly urban and was once the blue collar manufacturing capital of the country/world, but it was not at all built like other industrial cities of the Northeast or Midwest (except Cleveland). Before it's demise Detroit city saw the majority of it's growth in the early to the mid-20th century and it was all fueled by one thing: the automobile.
It shaped the way the city was developed (around the automobile, not mass transit) and provided those worked there a salary large enough for pretty much everyone to own a car and a single family home (albeit on a smaller lot size than you'll find in most of the cities in this thread). It never had a subway and dismantled it's streetcar system far earlier than every other city on this list. There are no brownstones and very few row houses to speak of, nor are there many high density apartment blocks or high rise towers. Essentially, Detroit is the blue print for the layout of all of the sunbelt cities people love to hate on in this forum.
Also, while I won't get in to a back and forth with any of the poster's before this post, the reason for Atlanta's seemingly low metropolitan density can all be explained by looking at a map. Essentially the city is laid out with the old city core in the center that was built in the middle of the 19th century onward and surrounded by the suburban areas the exploded in the late 20th century. What everyone is overlooking here is that the suburban area is massed pretty much along the interstates. Due to this, the metro developed with a bulbous center, then strings emanating out. This creates pockets in between where the development levels swing widely. In the southern half of the metro, there is barely any development whereas on the North and East sides it is fairly well developed.
Since population density is literally just a computation of how many people in a given width and height of an area, this cause Atlanta to look like on paper a barely developed metropolitan area. Obviously, with a metro population nearing 6 million that isn't true. It's just developed different given there are no natural boundaries or resource constraints to hem in how long the development could flow out along the interstates. Given that this is a exceptionally hard idea for people to understand on this forum, please do not be surprised when I do not reply to anyone who argues that Atlanta clearly isn't large or urban. That is an idiotic position based on an incorrect look at the data.
While we're on the subject of density, it is also important to remember that while the residential population of the city of Atlanta seems oddly small, the city itself is a huge employment and trade center. Every single day, and additional 300,000 workers stream in to Downtown (150,000), Midtown (100,000), and Buckhead (50,000) and another 70,000 to the Airport. This alone pushes the daytime population well above 700,000, however that is not all. Atlanta hosts quite frequently trade shows and major events and it is not uncommon for another 200,000 people to be in the city for such an event. It home to 6 universities (Georgia Tech, Georgia State, Emory, Morehouse, Clark-Atlanta, Spelman) and a bunch of other smaller schools with a combined enrollment of 100,000 plus. When you add it all up, Atlanta during the day has well over 1 million inhabitants on a regular basis. I'm not even going to add the added presences from people shopping in the major retail districts or in town for an entertainment or sporting event (all of Atlanta's professional sports venues are in Downtown) as it is immeasurable.
While I understand that this is by no mean permanent, does it really matter? The city functions the majority of the day with a much higher population which drives it's vibrancy. Stick only to population density if you want, but there is much more at play when determining how vibrant and urban a city is. Especially in the 21st century.
Well, then we totally disagree...and I would think you might know that it's Buckhead (rather than "Bucktown") if you've been to Atlanta "a few times". I'm not buying it. You're opinions of Atlanta sound like the typical view of someone who doesn't have any experience here and is going by what he/she has heard.
If you want to believe that Detroit is more urban than Atlanta then that is up to you. Feel free.
It was a MISTAKE. It's not like I live in Atlanta or even think about Buckhead all the time. And I could care less what your buying. Before I actually went to Atlanta I thought it would be more urban then what it is. Especially with how much goes on in Atlanta and how busy it is. Aside from what me and other posters have said as well, the facts speak for it's self on that website that Fitzrovian posted. After Atlanta's core, the density drops off dramatically. 25 miles away from Detroit's city center is still more dense than just 10 miles away from Atlanta's city center.
The sad thing is, Atlanta has the potential to be a dense city, especially with it's grid pattern in the Midtown areas. Slowly, it's getting denser with the new projects. I'd say in 10-20 years, Midtown will be a lot different...possible very vibrant with people walking everywhere, not just the main avenues.
There is no reason why Atlanta's city population shouldn't be at least a million. There's a lot of undeveloped land that can be filled in, especially on the west side.
Yes, this is exactly how I view all of these cities. I've been to most of the US top 20 and I've traveled to Prague, Milan, Amsterdam, Marsielles, Lyon, Stockholm, Nice, Berlin, Rotterdam, Naples, and Munich. For the "smaller" European cities.
Seattle for example has never felt like a place of 4 million to me. It's got some dense areas for US standards but they're small and right outside of that it really does feel like a billy goats mountainside town on steroids. It takes Seattle a thousand miles to reach a population of 3 million with a density of 3,000 and it takes Naples 400 square miles to reach a population of 3.7 million with a density three times more than Seattle at 9,400.
American cities are naturally very sprawled out, including the much hyped LA urban area and they all lack that consistent density the rest of the world has. This is why both Fitzrovian and I pertain to the core. Suburbs in the rest of the US are uselessly the same with some varying density, yes the metros are large and feel large but US sunbelt cities all typically lack a vital core that other non sunbelt US cities have. Not to mention the other cities in the world have.
Outside of the Northeast, Seattle is the most urban of the 2-4 million metros (Denver, Minneapolis, San Diego, etc.) - by US standards, it has a very large swath that is walkable and urban with many different sections, and even in the less urban parts, the neighborhoods almost always have a walkable center.
Compared to European cities of similar metro size (or even half the metro size) Seattle and all US cities - save NYC, Boston, SF, Philly, and Chicago - are completely outclassed in terms of urbanity.
But Seattle is more urban than all of the six cities mentioned here. You can walk several miles from Pioneer Square to Belltown to Westlake, up to First Hill and Capitol Hill and have a much more urban, bustling experience than anywhere in the any of the other cities.
Seattle's dense in the core 10 sqmi area. After that point it's a billy goats town on steroids. We place Boston as a medium sized city and hold Seattle to the same expectations it does feel significantly smaller than 4 million.
A billy goats town? It definately feels like an area of 4million imo. What I love about the Seattle area is it doesn't sprawl out forever. 30 minutes outside of the city you can be in complete beautiful pnw wilderness and you can ski, hike and see beautiful waterfalls.
Detroit has more older established skyscrapers/smaller buildings where as Atlanta has more newer ones. The two downtowns boomed from two different eras.
Nice maps...they really do a good job reinforcing my earlier point about Atlanta vs Detroit. Thanks for posting them.
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