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What Im saying is Chicago is just bigger, so if it has more area with a density in the upper teens or even 20k, it still wont feel as busy or dense as San Francisco. The dense side of San Francisco is the northern half, again much smaller, but densities will exceed anything in Chicago so it will feel busier and does. Anyone who's spent time in both cities can see that just by driving or walking around. Even the two downtowns, Chicago's is massive but not as structurally dense as SF.
I agree, it's not structurally as dense, but that's not the point. This is pure population density. It has nothing to do with how many visitors are there on a daily basis or anything. It has to do with who lives there, and this area is denser than San Francisco for the same area. It doesn't even matter how the city of Chicago is larger - it's not taking into account visitors or anything. Population density is not that hard.
Actually, you failed to understand the post in which you quoted. I specifically lopped out the core of Chicago from those numbers, which would be Near North Side (River North, Streeterville, Gold Coast, and Old Town) and the Loop. None of the other ones are part of the core of Chicago, and it's still denser. I also lopped off Lincoln Park, which is directly north of Near North Side and replaced it with something further out and it's still denser.
Ah I see now, sorry. Would like to see this done anyhow though.
Those community areas cover most major institutions of Chicago (barring the glaring error of University of Chicago since it's pretty far removed) that's a lot more centered on the Loop and with its borders more equidistant for all axes rather than a sort of more narrow rectangular area going up the far north side. 56.22 square miles with 908,988 people. If you sort of lop off the most southern community areas and added a layer of community areas to the north, then you get an area with 51.42 square miles and 918,683 people with a density (using 2010 stats for Chicago community areas) virtually the exact same population density as that for SF in 2013. Very exciting.
Very, very interesting!
I ran more numbers. This time I did not include any of the Chicago core and I went as far as excluding any community area that has a large amount of high rises. That means no Lincoln Park, Lakeview, Rogers Park, Uptown, or Edgewater, even though most of those community areas are low rise. Since they contain more than just a few high rises though - not including them. I'm also not including any part of the core - that means no part of the Near North Side (not even Old Town), The Loop, Near West Side (i.e. West Loop), or Near South Side (South Loop).
These are 2010 numbers, not 2013:
* Albany Park | 51542 people | 1.93 sq mi | 26705.7 people/sq mi
* Logan Square | 73595 people | 3.23 sq mi | 22784.83 people/sq mi
* Hermosa | 25010 people | 1.17 sq mi | 21376.07 people/sq mi
* West Ridge | 71942 people | 3.53 sq mi | 20380.17 people/sq mi
* Belmont Cragin | 78743 people | 3.94 sq mi | 19985.53 people/sq mi
* Avondale | 39262 people | 2 sq mi | 19631 people/sq mi
* South Lawndale | 79288 people | 4.4 sq mi | 18020 people/sq mi
* West Town | 81432 people | 4.57 sq mi | 17818.82 people/sq mi
* Irving Park | 53359 people | 3.23 sq mi | 16519.81 people/sq mi
* Portage Park | 64124 people | 3.98 sq mi | 16111.56 people/sq mi
* Humboldt Park | 56323 people | 3.6 sq mi | 15645.28 people/sq mi
* North Center | 31867 people | 2.07 sq mi | 15394.69 people/sq mi
* Lincoln Square | 39493 people | 2.57 sq mi | 15366.93 people/sq mi
* Lower West Side | 35769 people | 2.8 sq mi | 12774.64 people/sq mi
* North Lawndale | 35912 people | 3.2 sq mi | 11222.5 people/sq mi
* East Garfield Park | 20567 people | 1.94 sq mi | 10601.55 people/sq mi
* TOTAL | 838,228 people | 48.16 sq mi | 17,405.07 people/sq mi
So that is almost identical to SF's 2013 estimates even without all the high rises in Chicago. It's about 462 people/sq mi behind SF. In fact, if you take the 2010 official numbers, that area above for Chicago is actually denser than SF because SF at 2010 had an official population of 805,235. for a density of 17,180 people/sq mi which would be 225 people/sq mi behind those Chicago numbers. Peanuts really - almost identical in both cases even not counting complete neighborhoods in Chicago that contain more than a handful of high rises.
Ah I see now, sorry. Would like to see this done anyhow though.
It'd depend on how exacting you want to be about it though. The parts of Oakland physically closest to SF is unfortunately the port area which has a very low population density. Going further into Oakland from there, it ramps up but for the most part will be equal or lower population density than the parts of SF that are equidistant from the part of SF closest to Oakland. It's really not so much the population density of the neighborhoods, but the (WONDERFUL) amount of greenspace that brings SF's population density down. The roughly equal area I was taking that included the central business district and most major Chicago institutions that would be equivalent to SF's (save for University of Chicago since it's so far off) also included much of Chicago's prime greenspace for what would amount to probably a similar percentage of greenspace that SF has.
Quote:
Originally Posted by marothisu
Very, very interesting!
I ran more numbers. This time I did not include any of the Chicago core and I went as far as excluding any community area that has a large amount of high rises. That means no Lincoln Park, Lakeview, Rogers Park, Uptown, or Edgewater, even though most of those community areas are low rise. Since they contain more than just a few high rises though - not including them. I'm also not including any part of the core - that means no part of the Near North Side (not even Old Town), The Loop, Near West Side (i.e. West Loop), or Near South Side (South Loop).
These are 2010 numbers, not 2013:
* Albany Park | 51542 people | 1.93 sq mi | 26705.7 people/sq mi
* Logan Square | 73595 people | 3.23 sq mi | 22784.83 people/sq mi
* Hermosa | 25010 people | 1.17 sq mi | 21376.07 people/sq mi
* West Ridge | 71942 people | 3.53 sq mi | 20380.17 people/sq mi
* Belmont Cragin | 78743 people | 3.94 sq mi | 19985.53 people/sq mi
* Avondale | 39262 people | 2 sq mi | 19631 people/sq mi
* South Lawndale | 79288 people | 4.4 sq mi | 18020 people/sq mi
* West Town | 81432 people | 4.57 sq mi | 17818.82 people/sq mi
* Irving Park | 53359 people | 3.23 sq mi | 16519.81 people/sq mi
* Portage Park | 64124 people | 3.98 sq mi | 16111.56 people/sq mi
* Humboldt Park | 56323 people | 3.6 sq mi | 15645.28 people/sq mi
* North Center | 31867 people | 2.07 sq mi | 15394.69 people/sq mi
* Lincoln Square | 39493 people | 2.57 sq mi | 15366.93 people/sq mi
* Lower West Side | 35769 people | 2.8 sq mi | 12774.64 people/sq mi
* North Lawndale | 35912 people | 3.2 sq mi | 11222.5 people/sq mi
* East Garfield Park | 20567 people | 1.94 sq mi | 10601.55 people/sq mi
* TOTAL | 838,228 people | 48.16 sq mi | 17,405.07 people/sq mi
So that is almost identical to SF's 2013 estimates even without all the high rises in Chicago. It's about 462 people/sq mi behind SF. In fact, if you take the 2010 official numbers, that area above for Chicago is actually denser than SF because SF at 2010 had an official population of 805,235. for a density of 17,180 people/sq mi which would be 225 people/sq mi behind those Chicago numbers. Peanuts really - almost identical in both cases even not counting complete neighborhoods in Chicago that contain more than a handful of high rises.
That is interesting. I do think one that includes the CBD and major institutions is a more equivalent comparison though. Especially when doing the boundaries to include a bit more of the north rather than south side as that would be closer socioeconomically to the composition of San Francisco. I guess that south/far southwest/far southeast side would be a bit more like putting in the rougher parts of Oakland but with a lot less sunshine and a lot more population loss. Do you reckon turning some of those urban prairies into larger parklands would help?
That is interesting. I do think one that includes the CBD and major institutions is a more equivalent comparison though. Especially when doing the boundaries to include a bit more of the north rather than south side as that would be closer socioeconomically to the composition of San Francisco. I guess that south/far southwest/far southeast side would be a bit more like putting in the rougher parts of Oakland but with a lot less sunshine and a lot more population loss. Do you reckon turning some of those urban prairies into larger parklands would help?
Well, my point was that people will claim "but high rises!!!!" for Chicago. So I removed all the areas with high rises (there's a small handful in the areas I showed, but they're pretty small like the new 99 unit 11 story building in Wicker Park (West Town). I can only name a few more like that in all the areas I listed really. Most don't have a single high rise or anything above 5 or 6 stories). It shows that even without high rises, there's parts of Chicago in large part that are just as dense over a large area as SF is in a continuous geographic area about the same size.
Well, my point was that people will claim "but high rises!!!!" for Chicago. So I removed all the areas with high rises (there's a small handful in the areas I showed, but they're pretty small like the new 99 unit 11 story building in Wicker Park (West Town). I can only name a few more like that in all the areas I listed really. Most don't have a single high rise or anything above 5 or 6 stories). It shows that even without high rises, there's parts of Chicago in large part that are just as dense over a large area as SF is in a continuous geographic area about the same size.
Yes, though I don't quite understand why someone needs to maker the argument about highrises. Like, should someone say something like "but lawns" or "but rowhouses" for other cities when talking about population density? Meh.
Oh, I went and did another larger grouping of roughly blob-ular contiguous spread of community areas that would have higher population densities than SF did in 2010 (since that's the numbers for Chicago's community areas). The idea is to find a roughly square contiguous area that has equal or higher than SF's city density and see how many community areas it would extend itself to.
Yielding 1,082,055 people in 62.08 square miles for a density of 17,430 ppsm versus SF's 805,235 people in 46.87 square miles for a density of 17,160 ppsm.
Granted, SF did post larger gains in 2013 since 2010 that are larger than what Chicago posted for 2012 since 2010 (only numbers available), but the trend for Chicago has been greater gains in much of the areas listed while many of the community areas not listed have been losing people with some losing 10,000 to 20,000 people a piece between 2000 and 2010--sort of a miracle that Chicago was able to post net gains at all. With that in perspective, it's likely the areas listed has maintained and even a slight chance it's increased its greater density numbers over SF.
I agree, it's not structurally as dense, but that's not the point. This is pure population density. It has nothing to do with how many visitors are there on a daily basis or anything. It has to do with who lives there, and this area is denser than San Francisco for the same area. It doesn't even matter how the city of Chicago is larger - it's not taking into account visitors or anything. Population density is not that hard.
I don't disagree, we both are basically correct. My point on the pure population density is that SFs core are is more dense than Chicagos core. That's it.
I don't disagree, we both are basically correct. My point on the pure population density is that SFs core are is more dense than Chicagos core. That's it.
Yes, I mostly agree with that. Not counting the census tract in Chicago at 500,000 per sq mile in Edgewater, San Francisco has 5 tracts that are denser than any census tract that Chicago has.
Turns out, I live in the densest tract in Chicago other than that 500k per sq mile one, ha. About 92,000 per sq mile. Funny thing is that there's about 2 rows of row homes and about a half block more of low rises in the same area plus a parking lot for Loyola University's nearby small campus. Crazy to think about that given the density. The parking lot could easily fit a 50 story building on it. Right near me a new 35 story rental building is being built on an adjacent census tract. If that gets all rented out (it will), then the tract next to it will jump up about 10,000 people per sq mile.
San Francisco will keep denser in those areas, but it will be interesting to see what happens with Chicago in the core. Lots of stuff happening. In the next few years there's supposed to be something like 6000 residential units added to the core, and probably more with the redevelopment of Cabrini Green. Some areas could see a big increase in density within the next 5 years ontop of what they already have.
Yes, I mostly agree with that. Not counting the census tract in Chicago at 500,000 per sq mile in Edgewater, San Francisco has 5 tracts that are denser than any census tract that Chicago has.
Turns out, I live in the densest tract in Chicago other than that 500k per sq mile one, ha. About 92,000 per sq mile. Funny thing is that there's about 2 rows of row homes and about a half block more of low rises in the same area plus a parking lot for Loyola University's nearby small campus. Crazy to think about that given the density. The parking lot could easily fit a 50 story building on it. Right near me a new 35 story rental building is being built on an adjacent census tract. If that gets all rented out (it will), then the tract next to it will jump up about 10,000 people per sq mile.
San Francisco will keep denser in those areas, but it will be interesting to see what happens with Chicago in the core. Lots of stuff happening. In the next few years there's supposed to be something like 6000 residential units added to the core, and probably more with the redevelopment of Cabrini Green. Some areas could see a big increase in density within the next 5 years ontop of what they already have.
500,000 per square mile? That has to be a typo, because that's insane. Is it just a single high-rise building? Or one dude standing in a 0.000002 square mile census tract. That would make sense. Well, hopefully it wasn't just a piece that broke off and floated off from Kowloon Walled City.
500,000 per square mile? That has to be a typo, because that's insane. Is it just a single high-rise building? Or one dude standing in a 0.000002 square mile census tract. That would make sense. Well, hopefully it wasn't just a piece that broke off and floated off from Kowloon Walled City.
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