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Yeah the only area of Boston that is on a grid is Back Bay, which was filled in during the 19th century. The street network in central Boston pre-dates the era when grids were en vogue.
To me, the pictures of Atlanta show what I described in a previous post (and you get a better sense of it while there). Atlanta has big city points because it has tall buildings popping up out of the tree canopy, but when you're on the street the place looks like a very vertical office park.
Boston doesn't have nearly the number of tall buildings that Atlanta has. Boston's big city points come from its dense (though lower-rise) neighborhoods. Look into North End, South End, Beacon Hill, Back Bay, Comm Ave, Cambridge, Harvard Square, Copley Square, Brookline, etc. I'm sure a google image search would yield some examples of what these places look like. But of course pics don't suffice. You have to spend plenty of time on the ground in each city go get a feel for them.
ScraperEnthusiast, I'm sure most people here are very aware 1955 is long gone (and thankfully so, if you ask me), but perhaps you're living in 2055?
I live in Atlanta. Have since 1984. I've seen the skyline triple in size (or more) since I moved here. I've visited Boston. I can say without a doubt that Boston definately feels MUCH more like a city than Atlanta.
Downtown Atlanta is little more than a huge are of office towers filled with suburban workers who only venture out on short distances at lunch to get something to eat. Even at that, many of them don't even leave their offices due to the extremely high number of vagrants and panhandlers downtown (see story HERE (http://www.11alive.com/news/article_news.aspx?storyid=114754 - broken link)). Once 5pm hits, poof - those workers are gone. A small area around Centennial Olympic Park just to the West of the major downtown area now has the Park, CNN Center, Aquarium, and world of Coke Museum (woo). It's only recently developed as a tourist area where you will see groups of people waiting for the attractions or attending a special event at the World Congress Center, and it's a relatively small area that still doesn't have a lot in the way of street side restaurants or shops for people to visit.
Just North of downtown is Midtown. More offices, fewer bums, and a few restaurants and such, but only recently have more condos and other housing options really taken off, bringing people back intown to live. Piedmont Park is located here which does have an urbanish feel to it as you have the green spaces with the Midtown skyline as a backdrop, along with a very mixed group of visitors.
North of there is "Buckhead" - the more expensive area. South Buckhead is developing an area called The Streets of Buckhead which will be a high-end shopping district within walking distance of existing and new condos and hotels in that area. It will be one of the few "feels like a city" areas in town (though the average person won't be able to afford to shop there). Just north of that area is the main Buckhead district with more office buildings, some new high rise condos/hotels going up, and two large shopping malls. Nice, but it's not very pedestrian friendly or attractive at eye-level when walking around, lacking cafes, street level shops, etc.
There are a few scatterings of village-style shopping areas in Atlanta such as the Virginia Highland neighborhood, but you could find something like that in a small New England town just as easily as a big city.
Boston could not be more different. More compact, more shops and restaurants when you walk, etc. It "feels" like a city. Atlanta just feels like a bunch of buildings with sidewalks that connect them and maybe a restaurant or two here and there, but if you're driving it, yes, Atlanta feels LARGER due to the vast amount of land area it takes up and how long you have to drive before you stop seeing sprawl. They haven't nicknamed us the "L.A. of the East" for nothing.
I went a little overboard picking out picture of different neighborhoods in Boston and surrounding urban areas, so to save you all the trouble I'm just going to link to them. Everything that's not labeled with a different town name is within Boston.
Thanks Wikedripeplum for the pictures. I was hoping to get an idea of the feel and urban development of Boston's outer regions in comparison to Atlantas. Most of the neighborhoods you show are well within 5 miles of Bostons center.
But what about when you get like 8 or more miles from Boston's center. Some towns that are about 8 miles from Boston's center include Winchester, Quincy, Dedham, Waltham, and Lynn. Do any of those cities look anything like this?
I doubt it. These are pictures of Buckhead, a full 8 miles from the center of Atlanta. Boston doesn't have this kind of development that far from it's center which is why I think Atlanta feels bigger than Boston
Buckhead could function as its own seperate city if it were not within the city limits of Atlanta. That's truly amazing. What's also amazing is that these pictures are old. The buckhead skyline has changed dramatically since these were taken, with the completion of Mansion, Terminus, 3344 Peachtree, and a few others.
At the rate it's going, Buckhead is set to dwarf both Midtown and Downtown. Maybe not in height, but in the sheer number of buildings.
A friend of mine was visiting from Canada this spring. We went to perimeter to eat. She asked " is this the downtown area?" I was like, "no". Then we went to Buckhead. She asked "is this downtown?". I said no. A couple of hours later, we went to eat in Midtown. She was like, "okay, this is downtown right?". I was like, no. It really screwed with her mind. She was confused. I finally took her downtown that evening.
Last edited by willrusso; 04-25-2008 at 07:48 AM..
These last two posts highlight the diferences between a big sprawled city (Atl.) and a big city that has maintianed its development patterns (Boston). One feels bigger when driving around, the other feels bigger out of the car.
Some towns that are about 8 miles from Boston's center include Winchester, Quincy, Dedham, Waltham, and Lynn. Do any of those cities look anything like this?
Quincy, Lynn and Waltham are all pretty big cities. Do they have skyscrapers? No. But they have urban character in the residential areas. Check out "street view" on google maps
Quincy, Lynn and Waltham are all pretty big cities. Do they have skyscrapers? No. But they have urban character in the residential areas. Check out "street view" on google maps
Agreed. This is really a debate about density. Boston and its suburbs are some of the most dense in the country, whereas Atlanta is one of the most sprawled out urban areas in the country, with a notable amount of modern high-rises spread throughout. Nevertheless, insofar as high-density development engenders the true "big city" feel, Boston indubitably has the upper-hand compared to Atlanta.
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