Comparing San Francisco's and Los Angeles' Chinatowns to Manhattan's Chinatown (Union: how much, neighborhoods)

[toby2016]

Does anyone know how large each Los Angeles's and San Francisco's Chinatowns are compared to Manhattan's Chinatown?

If you were to place Los Angeles's and San Francisco's Chinatowns one at a time onto Manhattan's Chinatown, how much space would it take up?

[Chava61]

I lived for 5 months quite a while ago near the San Francisco Chinatown. The tourist area is better developed and more blocks are tourist oriented than in Manhattan. But I think in general Canal Street in Manhattan is longer than any street in San Francisco's Chinatown but more geared to the locals. I have never been to the L.A. Chinatown.

[ShirlMastic Beach]

Only been to San Francisco's. It didn't feel right to me. Felt nothing like Manhattan's Chinatown, or even Queens's Chinatown.

[daaver]

I don't know anything about LA, but Manhattan's Chinatown has been contracting for the last, oh, 15 years and the general consensus seems to be that SF is bigger at this point. FWIW.

[OyCrumbler]

LA's chinatown isn't so comparable to the other two as it's much less densely built up and has something like a tenth of the people that the SF and Manhattan ones do. It's also physically cut off from the rest of the downtown area by a wide freeway (though there are proposals to cap the freeway there). The area's a bit less than one square mile officially, but probably more like a bit over half a square mile for parts that are actually Chinatown-ish as the southern part of it is the Union Square complex and Olvera Street which is not Chinatown-ish in the least and a good part of the eastern part of it is a massive sprawling correctional city complex (much, much larger in area than the one in Chinatown Manhattan).

So, the LA one is substantially smaller in area than the Manhattan one and is much, much less densely packed. It's also more isolated from other neighborhoods by walking. It's an alright neighborhood overall though.

I have less experience with the SF one, but from what I have seen, it's a lot more comparable to Manhattan's Chinatown and was quite similar in a lot of ways with how densely packed it was, but was perhaps smaller in area (maybe not officially, only that Manhattan Chinatown extends pretty far out of the traditional borders of Chinatown for a while now). I think the buildings were generally just a bit shorter in height and less prone to really horrid cheap new construction and also much hillier. There also weren't any super wide streets and everything just seem smaller-scaled. Aesthetically, SF Chinatown was more to my preference.

[Chava61]

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

I have less experience with the SF one, but from what I have seen, it's a lot more comparable to Manhattan's Chinatown and was quite similar in a lot of ways with how densely packed it was, but was perhaps smaller in area (maybe not officially, only that Manhattan Chinatown extends pretty far out of the traditional borders of Chinatown for a while now). I think the buildings were generally just a bit shorter in height and less prone to really horrid cheap new construction and also much hillier. There also weren't any super wide streets and everything just seem smaller-scaled. Aesthetically, SF Chinatown was more to my preference.

I too think that SF Chinatown is much more aesthetically pleasing than the Manhattan Chinatown.

[NJ Brazen_3133]

I have been to all three. Manhattan's Chinatown is larger than both the old chinatowns of San Fran and LA. But LA has the San Gabriel Valley, and San Fran has lots of chinese in the Bay Area.

I think a better contrast and comparison is GTA chinatowns vs LA Chinatowns. I started a thread on that before.

I will say though that the Manhattan Chinatown is getting or will be getting smaller due to gentrification.

Anybody been to Chicago's Chinatown?