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I'm just making a new topic to discuss something that came up in the high density suburbs thread without taking that thread too off topic... the idea is that high and low density areas are typically wealthier while areas of moderate density are poorer.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nei
^^^
This link illustrates the less is more and more is more idea:
High and low densities tend to have higher income people, in between not as much.
Interesting, it seems like on average, the wealthiest densities the United States are 500-2000ppsm or 100,000-150,000 ppsm and the poorer densities are typically 5000-30,000 ppsm. Also the poor seem to be mostly living at densities of 2000-5000ppsm. In Toronto, the poorest communities are those with lots of apartment buildings, tower-in-the-park style, typically further from the core with densities of around 20,000 to 50,000 (example). Rowhouse communities further from the core can be pretty low income as well, as well as some non-gentrified inner city neighbourhoods, both being around 15,000-40,000ppsm. 500-5000ppsm communities would pretty much inevitably be wealthy in the Toronto area, but 5000-15,000 ppsm is rarely poor, being middle class is the suburbs and upper class closer to the city. The examples of dense subdivisions I posted (in the dense suburbs thread) were 10-20k ppsm, and aside from maybe Malvern, they were solidly middle class. The neighbourhoods North of downtown, which includes Lawrence Park, Summerhill, Rosedale, Moore Park and Forest Hill are among the wealthiest in the metro and are all 5000-20,000 ppsm.
The densest community is St Jamestown, a cluster of ~30story apartment buildings next to downtown at 150,000ppsm and is among the poorer communities in the city. In the 50,000-100,000 ppsm range, there is a wide mix of wealth including upper class (Yorkville), middle class (City Place, Midtown, Uptown, Humber Bay) and lower class (The Westway, Crescent Town) and everything in between. Probably a lot of this has to do with the fact that density doesn't decrease very consistently as you move away from the core, so the location of the density matters too.
So large swath of high density is in the core, but there are a lot of pockets of density scattered all over the suburbs. I think this is according to dissemination areas, it looks smaller than census tracts. Btw, the legend in ppsm is:
Blue: 23-6032ppsm
Light blue: 6032-8081ppsm
Aqua: 8081-11084ppsm
Green: 11084-15043ppsm
Yellow: 15043-20129ppsm
Orange: 20129-28498ppsm
Red: 28498-1606372ppsm
It seems like distance to the core and density both influence wealth in Toronto, although other factors like being close to the lake (for Humber Bay), being in the North quadrant and having access to subways (North York Centre) might have an effect too.
Looking at the graphs in the article, they are scaled logarithmically (which can be deceptive) and per capita income doesn't really start to rise until you hit near the 100000 ppm mark. My interpretation of this is that at these densities you generally have to build residential skyscrapers and for the most part those are built in the urban core on the most expensive land catering to the rich who can afford the location and cost to keep the building running.
What actually is more interesting is the hump prior to this point between 1000 and 10000 ppm since so many more people live at those densities. There seems to be a sweet spot around 1000-7000? ppm.
I'm not quite used to reading log graphs, but now that I look at it again, it seems like the poorest densities are more around 8,000 to 80,000 ppsm rather than 5,000 to 30,000 as I said earlier. Densities of more than 50,000 ppsm without highrises are pretty uncommon, so if 50,000-80,000ppsm can still be poor, that means there is still poverty in high rises. I'm guessing that the highrise poverty is mostly in the form of towers from the 60s and 70s. These were often built with greenspace and parking lots around them, which is why they wouldn't be as dense as the older (pre-WWII) or newer contemporary condo communities which I think generally have less open space (ie denser) and have wealthier occupants.
I'm not quite used to reading log graphs, but now that I look at it again, it seems like the poorest densities are more around 8,000 to 80,000 ppsm rather than 5,000 to 30,000 as I said earlier. Densities of more than 50,000 ppsm without highrises are pretty uncommon, so if 50,000-80,000ppsm can still be poor, that means there is still poverty in high rises. I'm guessing that the highrise poverty is mostly in the form of towers from the 60s and 70s. These were often built with greenspace and parking lots around them, which is why they wouldn't be as dense as the older (pre-WWII) or newer contemporary condo communities which I think generally have less open space (ie denser) and have wealthier occupants.
NYC has a number of neighborhoods that are low-rise (mostly 5 stories are less) and in the 50,000-80,000 ppsm range. From what I recall, Greenwich Village is about 60,000 ppsm. A number of non-Manhattan get to that density range with few if any high rises. One neighborhood in Brooklyn, Park Slope is about 60k ppsm with mostly 4 story row houses and a few apartment buildings (but not many really tall high rises). The densest neighborhood in NYC, Upper East Side is roughly 125k ppsm and more high rises than anywhere else in the city.
Outside of NYC, I know San Francisco has a couple of neighborhoods a bit over 50000 ppsm and little high rises. Philly might as well. I doubt any other American city does.
Paris and Tokyo is mostly at the 50-60k ppsm range with few high rises. The densest Paris neighborhood gets to 120-130 ppsm without high rises.
This shows the distribution of population with density:
The age graph is interesting. The 22-29 years old show a spike at high densities that none of the other graphs do.
There's a high likelihood that the spike of wealthy inhabitants at high densities might be almost entirely due to NYC, since it has a very large population of people at the highest densities and many (but definitely not all) of those neighborhoods are well off.
I was a bit surprised at how few elderly live at even moderately high densities. It seems like they live mostly at rural densities or 1000-4000ppsm, which could be small towns or suburbs.
Do you think the 50,000-80,000ppsm range would still be dominated by New York?
Do you think the 50,000-80,000ppsm range would still be dominated by New York?
Yes, that's likely a typical NYC low rise density, but not common elsewhere. My guess is that 50,000 ppsm might be close to the weighted density of the city.
The population of people in the 50000+ range in non-NYC cities is dwarfed by NYC. I'm a bit puzzled by Paris, its core density doesn't seem much lower than NYC. Perhaps it did decreases after 2 million or so while NYC continues further? The link does say Paris density is calculated at a neighborhood level while the others at a census block level.
I thought Philly would be higher than Boston. Boston's number is probably entirely from the North End, which is the most "old world" district in North America except for maybe Montreal or Quebec City. Suprised LA comes in #2: there's a probably a neighborhood in the core that's nothing but blocks of low-rise (5-6 story) apartment buildings.
Barcelona is an outlier here; not a huge city like NYC or Paris (urban area population of 4.2 million) but very dense. And some streetviews I've seen look it.
Yea, so my link was a bit misleading. Looked interesting, but isn't what it seems.
Yes, that's likely a typical NYC low rise density, but not common elsewhere. My guess is that 50,000 ppsm might be close to the weighted density of the city.
The population of people in the 50000+ range in non-NYC cities is dwarfed by NYC. I'm a bit puzzled by Paris, its core density doesn't seem much lower than NYC. Perhaps it did decreases after 2 million or so while NYC continues further? The link does say Paris density is calculated at a neighborhood level while the others at a census block level.
I thought Philly would be higher than Boston. Boston's number is probably entirely from the North End, which is the most "old world" district in North America except for maybe Montreal or Quebec City. Suprised LA comes in #2: there's a probably a neighborhood in the core that's nothing but blocks of low-rise (5-6 story) apartment buildings.
Barcelona is an outlier here; not a huge city like NYC or Paris (urban area population of 4.2 million) but very dense. And some streetviews I've seen look it.
Yea, so my link was a bit misleading. Looked interesting, but isn't what it seems.
Well the city of Paris (2.2 million) has a density of 54,000... so there are likely significant portions of the city proper that are just below the 50,000ppsm threshold and relatively little outside of the city proper. Meanwhile, I think pretty much all of Manhattan is 50,000+ (71k ppsm avg), and I guess good chunks of the other boroughs are too...
As for Barcelona, it seems like all of Spain is very dense. Madrid is isn't huge either (though a bit bigger than Barcelona) and it has a lot of high density. Valencia and Saragossa are dense too. If you look at the edge of the urban area of Madrid, it's almost all midrises with maybe some townhouses, while most European cities will have detached homes before transitioning to countryside.
Is most of the higher density housing in Toronto high rises? I haven't found any neighborhoods in Toronto that looked like my NYC link. And it seems that Toronto has high rises scattered in areas that near the center.
I'm curious how the amount of high rises compares to New York. Maybe it's possible that proportionally Toronto has just as many?
I think you (memph, and hopefully the other posters) would find these stats interesting. This blogger calculated the weighted density of each metro area or rather the density of the average census block weighted by the number:
This puts an end to the silly myth "LA is denser than NYC". It doesn't matter if the last 1 million people in NYC live on giant lots, the average resident of the metro area lives in a denser spot (30,000 people per square mile) than the average LA resident (12,000 people per square mile). Note the densities sound higher than typical city densities because they are at the neighborhood level, so parks, industry, vacant land, offices that tend to lower a cities' density get ignored. (A district that is that has few people living in it gets weighted less)
Any thoughts on how Canadian cities would rank? My guess is Toronto would be the highest Canadian city, then Montreal, then Vancouver. Toronto might rank just below LA.
This graph shows you have the density is distributed in metro areas. You can see almost all of the people living at densities (> 20 k /sq km) are in the NY metro. Atlanta is a low density outlier. Boston's distribution is weirdly flat; lots of people living at both high and low densities. The Bay Area is lower density than LA because this graph combines the SF and San Jose metros; the first table separated them.
This would be more interesting if some Canadian and European cities were there. My guess is that they'd resemble western US cities in density profile more than eastern ones.
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