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The SF numbers I used aren't visitors to Market Street institutions, they are pedestrian counts on Market St. Both the Chicago and SF reports I linked to include volume counts at individual intersections throughout the city.
That being said, having been on both repeatedly I agree Michigan Av seems like it oughta be busier
See my post above. These are stats I've seen before, but they are all dated (2008-2010 time period) except for LA's. These are as close as we are going to get.
Bourbon Street is not the only heavy foot traffic in New Orleans. Frenchman St., Canal St. and South Peters St. have pretty heavy foot traffic ALL the time.
Nowhere near the other cities being discussed though
Looking at the Chicago one - it's from 2008 while some of the others are more recent. There are more people in these areas nowadays than 2008 I would say (and also more people living there too). Not to mention that tourism is definitely up and Michigan Avenue is a huge section for tourists. I live not far from Water Tower Place and nowadays I don't think that's the busiest section that I've experienced in the last few years. Actually, the areas a few blocks north of the bridge are much busier, or seem that way to me at least.
Interesting data though - it would be cool if they had more recent numbers and not from 7 years ago.
Listing Orlando at the bottom of this list is harsh considering that Downtown Orlando is actually very walkable and has made significant strides over the past decade, I would say that Orlando has actually become more walkable than Houston, Dallas, San Diego, and Houston. The new SunRail commuter rail system that opened in 2014 is also changing the region and is the biggest push yet to make Orlando a somewhat less car-centric. See article below that talks about Orlando's most walkable downtown neighborhoods:
I just want to clarify, this isn't comparing which city is the most walkable. It's solely comparing foot traffic in raw numbers and busyness. I opted to include Orlando, the second smallest city on this list purely because of Disney World/Sea World/Universal Studios and the ensuing traffic many of those attractions bring to the city. I'm not sure if those tourists like to stay around downtown and walk a lot or not.
I doubt a few years would make a dramatic difference in any of these cities though
In a tight race of numbers between San Francisco and Chicago it could. Chicago's downtown population has swelled in the past 10 years. I don't follow San Francisco as closely, so I'm not sure how much it has changed in the last decade.
I doubt a few years would make a dramatic difference in any of these cities though
I'm not sure about dramatic but in some of these cities, it would. Chicago's tourism numbers are higher than they've ever been. 2007 in Chicago, when this study was actually done, had 46.3 million visitors but 2014 had over 50 million. On an average day, you could work that out to 11,000 more people in the city in 2014 than 2007 saw. If even 50% of these visitors visited Michigan Avenue (which is very likely and probably even a higher percentage), then that's an average of 11,000 more visitors per day in the city. 50% of them might increase those numbers by over 5000 per day. Yes, that's not dramatic, but you know it's still a large percent increase.
Not to mention that there's been many new residential high rises completed in the general area since that study was done putting the numbers even higher.
Nowhere near the other cities being discussed though
Somewhat true. The only cities listed on this poll that have more foot traffic than NOLA are: Chicago, D.C., PHilly, Boston & maybe Seattle, that's it. NOLA is one of the most walkable cities in the U.S. as it is also one of the most URBAN cities in the U.S. This is fact but I get what you are saying though.
It's never the downtown residential population that swells foot traffic on streets like Market or Michigan. It really is tourism, largely driven by retail. Both cities have absolutely changed since 2008-2010 when these studies were commissioned. In fact, "locals" actually AVOID such streets, typically. Nobody is in a rush to get anywhere on either, while locals are likely to be on a mission, or don't want to rub shoulders with suburban visitors and tourists.
Walnut St in Philly has also exploded, but it's limited, as it is a much narrower sidewalk and doesn't have the tourism or retail concentration of the others (namely big flagship department stores adding millions of square feet by themselves).
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