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New condos are going up in that area, but no, it doesn't feel very different. We came to DC for the Cherry Blossom festival.
I think over the next year or so, that area will clean up quite a bit. Especially as the new businesses open up along 7th St./Georgia Ave. Whole Foods just signed on to anchor the massive development coming to the parking lots behind Howard University so that will probably be the breaking point for the neighborhood. The Wizards are also in talks to open up a training facility that will double as a recreation center for the University to come to another one of the parking lots behind Howard University. There are a multitude of things in the pipeline for that area. Maybe when you visit in about three years, you will notice a difference.
So does anyone have a regular video of Koreatown? And I ask that because the New York Times articles about gentrification and up and coming "nabes" can border on the ridiculous at times. Koreatown has a lower median HHI than the poorest section of Bedford-Stuyvesant, so while I don't doubt there's gentrification going on there, I'd have to say the overall feel of the neighborhood is probably very different from what's reflected in that video.
Yes that video was very slick. I didn't see any good videos searching very quickly on Google.
Two things that will help increase mode share is getting some better rail transit to the Westside (Expo now, Purple Line later) and an increased focus on downtown. While there isn't a huge migration of white collar jobs to DTLA (I believe in general that is increasing though), there are lots of new retail and hospitality amenities being constructed which can employ lots of semi-skilled or low-skilled employees. Koreatown, Westlake and Boyle Heights seem like prime candidates to draw that workforce from, and all three have easy access downtown.
I don't think that the citizens of Koreatown are culturally car-centric. I think relying on cars is more out of necessity than desire.
I have absolutely no proof of this, but I wonder if the huge manufacturing core to the east and southeast of Los Angeles and its large numbers of employees also makes car travel more necessary (and perhaps partially explains the higher than average carpool numbers). Again, I have no idea if there are enough manufacturing employees in K-Town to make a significant difference in mode share, but sprawling industrial districts are pretty difficult to service with efficient transit.
I wonder, does Koreatown have the highest transit mode share in the city? I would imagine it would have to be either K-Town or Westlake.
So does anyone have a regular video of Koreatown? And I ask that because the New York Times articles about gentrification and up and coming "nabes" can border on the ridiculous at times. Koreatown has a lower median HHI than the poorest section of Bedford-Stuyvesant, so while I don't doubt there's gentrification going on there, I'd have to say the overall feel of the neighborhood is probably very different from what's reflected in that video.
That HHI is pretty dependent on how far into Westlake you go which is much, much more poor while still having a very high population density. We're talking about eight people crammed in one or two bedroom apartments kind of poverty. There's a fairly good portion of the neighborhood that's accurately reflected in the video.
That HHI is pretty dependent on how far into Westlake you go which is much, much more poor while still having a very high population density. We're talking about eight people crammed in one or two bedroom apartments kind of poverty. There's a fairly good portion of the neighborhood that's accurately reflected in the video.
I saw in some article that LA has estimated that 1/3 of units in the city are overcrowded.
RE: Parking podiums and subterranean parking, here are some new construction apartments in Koreatown:
Southwestern School of Law student housing (I don't think this has any student/public parking, I only saw a service entrance on Shatto), could have used some retail:
So does anyone have a regular video of Koreatown? And I ask that because the New York Times articles about gentrification and up and coming "nabes" can border on the ridiculous at times. Koreatown has a lower median HHI than the poorest section of Bedford-Stuyvesant, so while I don't doubt there's gentrification going on there, I'd have to say the overall feel of the neighborhood is probably very different from what's reflected in that video.
I think the video is great. I think DDirt's pics are great ones of KT. Your obsession with statistics don't always reflect what YOU think an area is like. Also when I lived in KT I owned a car but honestly only really used it on the weekends. I worked dt then and walked to the subway station 3 blocks away. I know of no one who lived in KT and drove to work dt. But I also know people who live in Koreatown and drive to jobs in Venice, Marina Del Rey and Encino. To me the comparison of the two is odd. Koreatown is so much bigger, more of a city within a city.
I think the video is great. I think DDirt's pics are great ones of KT. Your obsession with statistics don't always reflect what YOU think an area is like. Also when I lived in KT I owned a car but honestly only really used it on the weekends. I worked dt then and walked to the subway station 3 blocks away. I know of no one who lived in KT and drove to work dt. But I also know people who live in Koreatown and drive to jobs in Venice, Marina Del Rey and Encino. To me the comparison of the two is odd. Koreatown is so much bigger, more of a city within a city.
My cousin drove to Burbank from Koreatown. Then she moved to Burbank and might even walk to work.
^^^Those are nice examples of smaller new infill developments with concealed parking structures below (I wonder what the ratios are though). Still they are quite different from what you'd see developed in San Francisco (and DC). Here's the difference and it's not necessarily bad:
In this area it appears you have a grass curb, then sidewalk, then small bit of landscaping around the "front door" area that leads you up to your building/unit, and I don't see any retail or "sidewalk friendly" presence. Probably 90+% of the new infill buildings that get built in SF of this size or any size are built right up to the sidewalk (no "front door landscaping") which in turn is right along the street with no grass curb, and there's always at least going to be a spot in the ground floor for a corner store, nail salon, eatery, etc etc.
The feel I get just from your Google shots (and dare I say that as if "I'm just studying Google maps", but yes, I've been to this area a couple times and am often in LA in general) is just more of a resort/tropical island vacation-y feel rather than a walking city feel.
I don't know, it's just different. In having been in the area and even just these Google shots, I've always been baffled at just how this area even achieves that density, to be honest. It doesn't even feel all that dense - maybe around the 30k ppsm mark, but not exceeding 50k ppsm over a wide area. My neighborhood in SF exceeds 50k ppsm and feels A LOT more closed in and dense, and you'd never see front door landscaping or grass curbs around here, streets much narrower, no vacant lots, etc etc. It's not like units in SF are large -they are probably quite a bit smaller than LA on avg (for instance, someone actually just bought a 291 sf studio for $415k, so a teeny tiny hotel room of a condo is actually acceptable in SF, not sure they are in LA?).
I still cannot speak to CH but if walk/transit usage is that much higher in CH, then it's got more of a traditional urban vibe and I'd suspect new developments there would reflect that more than what you see in these Goog pictures of LA.
Sure it looks different than San Francisco, but if you lived there and wanted to walk places, the layout of the front of the building would have 0 effect on your decision. My building in Pasadena is set back about 15 feet from the street with a stairway that leads to the door and rose bush planters between it - that's never been the deciding factor in whether to walk to Trader Joes or drive. I do think that having the parking entrance right on the street is the worst thing about these buildings' (as well as my own building's) designs.
Regarding the retail, these are purely residential streets, which DC has a lot of (especially in Columbia Heights it seems) and so does San Francisco. If these buildings were on commercial streets like Wilshire, 8th, 6th, 3rd, Vermont, etc., they would certainly be mixed use. The big exception is the SW Law School building, which is on a commercial street (right across from a strip mall actually), but perhaps that would not have penciled out for an organization with a smaller budget than your typical developer.
No idea on apartment size, but I do not think they are very big in LA either.
Last edited by munchitup; 04-23-2015 at 11:39 AM..
To Anonelitist: Is it more of a look to you? I find Koreatown just as dense and walkable. Do a few flowers, trees and buildings set back a little make it feel less dense or walkable? To me, no. It hasn't stopped people from walking in Koreatown.
Maybe I've been the wrong times of the day, I haven't seen busy sidewalks. And purely residential means nothing in a super dense walk-friendly urban environment. I think you'd be hard pressed to find streets in NYC or SF with no commercial...DC less so to this extent, but in 50k+ ppsm, yes, I'd expect to see commercial on every street, not just Wilshire Blvd or Vermont or 8th. My neighborhood of 54k ppsm as of 2010 has a commercial street every block running one direction and "residential streets" running the other, however, there are corner stores and small service businesses and ground floor laundromats on the residential streets, on every block.
And look and feel has A LOT to do with it. Coincidentally, the cities in America that look more like vacation towns have less walkers and less transit.
Having wide landscaped curbs and landscaping around the doorway to me is a sign that those areas are looked at more than used (by walkers). Walkers litter and throw cigarette butts on the ground (just a human error/fact). Pretty landscaping everywhere is not conducive to that (not to mention CA drought and maintenance factor). It has more the look and feel of "I'll be there in a bit, I need to go down to get the car" rather than "I'm going to come down to meet you".
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