Is LA more urban than people think? (metro, suburban, downtown)

[michigan83]

Is LA more urban than people think?

No. It's less urban than people think.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

Not sure, I'm not super familiar with DC (two visits so far, both about two years ago). I guess on face value, you can argue Westwood (save for the Holmby Hills part) is a dense college-driven community that's not well-served by rapid transit, but has numerous shops, boutiques, business, and bus lines with a lot of pedestrian and bike traffic. Though I myself dislike Westwood--also, there are a lot of high-rises built along Wilshire in that area with some really douchy people. It does have a lot of urban amenities though and it is pedestrian heavy.

If this is the case, then how can you possibly say that LA is comparable to DC? LA and DC offer two completely different lifestyles. Keep in mind that DC's dense neighborhoods are all adjoined. So you walk from Ledroit Park (my old hood) a little ways down to U Street, then to Adams-Morgan, then to Mount Pleasant, then to Columbia Heights, etc. Or from Shaw, to Logan, to Dupont. That's what people want: a contiguous, unbroken, interconnected series of urban neighborhoods. You're not really living in a "city" if you have various pockets of urbanity scattered all over the place. That's essentially what Atlanta offers.

There's downtown LA itself especially the Historic Core and the areas around that.

How many cities (Houston, Dallas, Phoenix, Atlanta, Charlotte) have non-urban downtowns? The CBD is almost always the most urban part of any city, so we can just scrap that.

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

But Atlanta has a more extensive rapid transit network. And the two cities have roughly the same proportion of people using buses. You can't expect a city of 450,000 to have an equal number of bus riders as a city of 3.7 million. What type of sense does that make?



The city of Atlanta is much smaller than LA. Just like DC is much smaller than LA. That has no bearing on how easy it is to get around in those cities.

And I didn't compare West Philly to Koreatown to compare "vibrancy." That wasn't the point. The point was to show that even the distant parts of West Philly have a more dense, compact built environment and active street life than LA's most urban neighborhood. In other words, LA can give its very best shot and still fall flat against Philly. Did you not see the strip malls and parking lots in that video?



And Donald Shoup clearly disagrees with your assessment. That's why he said that LA lacks the "vital core we associate with older urban centers."

Where is the ridership heaviest in LA though? In the urban core. The Wilshire corridor has several lines running through it and for good reason--the buses go where there is actually demand for it. You aren't going to see massive bus lanes going through the suburban areas. Atlanta has a larger subway system (kudos to them), but LA has a more extensive system overall since LA includes an entire light rail (which serves the urban areas since it's the only way to make it cost-effective) which also ties into intermodal Union Station with a commuter rail system. Also, if you want to argue that LA is vastly underserved for transit funding, I will wholeheartedly and absolutely agree with you. The demand is there, the supply is not. The purple line extension through Beverly Hills, Century City, Westwood, and Santa Monica would probably be one of the most cost-effective and used lines the US can build right now. Fast track the damn thing.

Philly has dense rowhouses and narrower streets which are great, but does it mean that you get less from walking or doing transit in Koreatown (which we saw only a portion of in that video)? If you wanted just the structural look of dense neighborhoods, but not actually the function or amenities, then you could've just as well chosen parts of Hollywood, Old Town Pasadena, or the downtown LA. But if it's just the structure without the use, if it's mostly aesthetics without the practice, then we're talking about something different.

And again, you aren't familiar with the city at all. It's interesting to hear your perspective since it falls in line with this topic. Yes, LA is more urban than some people think. Give it a shot at some point, and I'll be glad to hear what you think.

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

If this is the case, then how can you possibly say that LA is comparable to DC? LA and DC offer two completely different lifestyles. Keep in mind that DC's dense neighborhoods are all adjoined. So you walk from Ledroit Park (my old hood) a little ways down to U Street, then to Adams-Morgan, then to Mount Pleasant, then to Columbia Heights, etc. Or from Shaw, to Logan, to Dupont. That's what people want: a contiguous, unbroken, interconnected series of urban neighborhoods. You're not really living in a "city" if you have various pockets of urbanity scattered all over the place. That's essentially what Atlanta offers.



How many cities (Houston, Dallas, Phoenix, Atlanta, Charlotte) have non-urban downtowns? The CBD is almost always the most urban part of any city, so we can just scrap that.

Well, I visited and I was with friends who lived there. It was decently recent and I was taken around--but I wouldn't comment in depth on it (I have been to Georgetown, U Street, and Adams-Morgan, I think I might've hit some of the other spots but aren't sure). You are very willing to comment on LA though without spending much time there or having been there particularly recently or having been to the actual areas we're talking about.

The comparison to Atlanta is ridiculous in terms of scale. It's not anywhere near as dense and its transit system overall as extensive. Atlanta's boom also came to a pretty quick halt since the recession while LA continued with its loft conversions and construction.

Also, I don't think DC's most urban parts were its CBD. It was certainly built up, but it didn't seem like it was much for mixed-use. Does that seem pretty accurate to you?

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

Philly has dense rowhouses and narrower streets which are great, but does it mean that you get less from walking or doing transit in Koreatown (which we saw only a portion of in that video)? If you wanted just the structural look of dense neighborhoods, but not actually the function or amenities, then you could've just as well chosen parts of Hollywood, Old Town Pasadena, or the downtown LA. But if it's just the structure without the use, if it's mostly aesthetics without the practice, then we're talking about something different.

It's not just about a "look." The neighborhoods function very differently. The streets of Philadelphia have a very "public" character to them. You see kids walking to King's Water Ice, guys walking to the barbershop, girls bobbing their heads to the iPods while walking to the corner store, hustlers with their mixtape spread laid out on the corner of Germantown and Chelten.

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

And again, you aren't familiar with the city at all. It's interesting to hear your perspective since it falls in line with this topic. Yes, LA is more urban than some people think. Give it a shot at some point, and I'll be glad to hear what you think.

We haven't even established how urban people think it is. That's the baseline, no? Most people don't think it's Mayberry, but they don't think it's Philly with cats hanging out on their stairs and chasing women down the street, either.

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

It's not just about a "look." The neighborhoods function very differently. The streets of Philadelphia have a very "public" character to them. You see kids walking to King's Water Ice, guys walking to the barbershop, girls bobbing their heads to the iPods while walking to the corner store, hustlers with their mixtape spread laid out on the corner of Germantown and Chelten.

We haven't even established how urban people think it is. That's the baseline, no? Most people don't think it's Mayberry, but they don't think it's Philly with cats hanging out on their stairs and chasing women down the street, either.

As the most complex city in the country, I think even establishing a baseline for just how urban people think LA is, is a complex question with many different answers, all depending on who you ask.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by OyCrumbler

Also, I don't think DC's most urban parts were its CBD. It was certainly built up, but it didn't seem like it was much for mixed-use. Does that seem pretty accurate to you?

The CBD is definitely its most urban part. It also happens to be its lamest part.

[BajanYankee]

Originally Posted by munchitup

As the most complex city in the country, I think even establishing a baseline for just how urban people think LA is, is a complex question with many different answers, all depending on who you ask.

I don't know about the "most complex city in the country" part. But there has to be some baseline for how urban people think it is in order to answer the question. Otherwise, there's no way for people to jump on here and yell, "Yes, absolutely! It's far more urban than most people think!" How could you say that when you don't even know how urban most people think it is?

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

The CBD is definitely its most urban part. It also happens to be its lamest part.

It seemed mostly like a job and tourist center to me, and not much in terms of retail or residences.

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by BajanYankee

I don't know about the "most complex city in the country" part. But there has to be some baseline for how urban people think it is in order to answer the question. Otherwise, there's no way for people to jump on here and yell, "Yes, absolutely! It's far more urban than most people think!" How could you say that when you don't even know how urban most people think it is?

How about when most people say you have to drive in LA (just flat that and nothing else) or that there is no city there or that no one walks in LA or that there is no mass transit in LA (including from friends who were born and raised in the suburbs of LA who had no idea there was a subway or light rail up until a year ago) or only the poor take transit, or that everyone lives in a suburban home with a lawn and driveway, etc.? Isn't that pretty prevalent?

And how much of a shock is it to you for someone to say that the urban walkable parts of LA are about on par for what they offer in comparison to the urban walkable parts of the Bay Area, Philly, DC, or Boston (maybe Chicago)?

How about anecdotes of people who left or visited LA's urban core a decade or even five years ago and then come back within the last year or two and see a strikingly different city? There's a lot of that, too (I would be an example of that).

How's that for a baseline?

Though it would be interesting if common perception has already shifted towards LA being urban. Perception usually lags behind reality by a fair bit, so I'd be really surprised.