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It's tough to choose one, but I think it's Los Angeles. While I don't necessarily like the style of Houston or Dallas, it seems to be the development style of choice for Post WW2 America. They both can spread pretty much as far as they desire (obviously Houston can't to the Southwest).
I think that Atlanta could make a case because their roads are a bit of a mess. Whenever I drove through there it was absurd how much traffic they had. The thing that saves it is MARTA...it's the best mass transit system in the Sun Belt and can relieve some of the mess that the highways create. It doesn't help that much...but it does enough to make it better than Los Angeles.
Ultimately I think Los Angeles' urban planning is just a trainwreck. It's understandable why cities like Dallas spread out forever...their location permits it. Though Houston is by the coast, it's far enough inland and surrounded by flat lands that it can spread in most directions without constraint. Los Angeles on the other hand not only borders an ocean, but is surrounded by mountains. Rather than concentrating on building a healthy core and building around their environment, the development in Los Angeles spread over the mountains and into the desert without limit. There are efforts to improve its rail system, but up until now mass transit outside of buses have been virtually nonexistent. The result is a city which has far and away the most air pollution in the United States.
By all means, Los Angeles should be the most beautiful city in the country. It started out that way, just like a young Hollywood starlet. As it grew in popularity and age it tried to maintain its beauty. Instead of exercising and eating right (building sufficient rail transit and encouraging a healthy urban core), LA went for the quick fix of plastic surgery (MOAR HIGHWAYS!)...but now it has gone too far. One of its fake ta-tas popped and its face lift is sagging...people are starting to see the years haven't been good to Los Angeles. Hopefully it's not too late.
I'd have to go with LA, for as populated as it is it was poorly planned. That is what happens when you start out with a 450+ mile CSA soon as the city is incorporated.
Atlanta is a weird breed altogether, it actually had an old city map, with lots of 1 lane way curving roads, then you throw in 16 lane freeways going right through. Quite a weird combination.
Houston and Dallas aren't good, but those 2 are worse, with LA significantly ahead of ATL. I remember it taking over 4 hours to get from Santa Monica to Riverside on I-10 when I was leaving after a vacation there. It's only like 60-70 miles. I swear the couple times I've been in LA I wasted sooo much time sitting in traffic trying to get from place to place.
ATL's problem are more with its building development more so than road nightmares.
Buses are congested street traffic hinders, metro rail is inefficient (tracks don't hit the most densely populated areas), gridlock on the freeways, Ugly urban sprawl.
When it takes 35 minutes + to travel 9 miles during rush hour on the freeway - it's bad!
I looked at metro areas at/above 5 million people in our nation and picked the four with the worst urban planning in my opinion.
I had to go with Dallas, Houston, Atlanta and Los Angeles for this title. All four of these cities have tons of freeways and many of them go directly through their downtown area.
Which one do you think is the worst of the four? Why do these cities have bad urban planning? What can these cities do to improve their reputation?
Trick question! None of these were the result of Urban Planning. They were all the result Urban Sprawl. There are small areas in each city that have a grid pattern, but then it looks like someone took the pencil out of their hand and stuck it in their toes.
Los Angeles is a mess, but in terms of smaller metro areas, there will always be a special place in my heart for the berserk planning behind Nashville, a city that sprawls with the determined fury of a city many times its size.
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