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neither are very urban, but SF is obviously more urban than LA.
the most urban part of SF is the downtown area. but once you go outside of the downtown the walkability goes down drastically and the urban form starts to look more like LA. though the housing form in the large residential districts is mainly attached SFH. but they may as well be stand-alone suburbs. though technically within city limits, I would describe these residential districts as streetcar suburbs because many people there commute by streetcar to go to work downtown. but other than that it would be difficult to live there without an automobile.
most people in SF work downtown but you certainly don't want to live there if you can help it. the downtown is inhabited mostly by the poor and the down and out. there's tons of cheap residential hotels everywhere of which is occupied mainly by shady-looking types many of whom appear to be meth addicts. the downtown has lots of rundown scary-looking neighborhoods so its one of the least desirable places to live in the city.
I'm sure it's a cakewalk compared to Downtown L.A.
neither are very urban, but SF is obviously more urban than LA.
the most urban part of SF is the downtown area. but once you go outside of the downtown the walkability goes down drastically and the urban form starts to look more like LA. though the housing form in the large residential districts is mainly attached SFH. but they may as well be stand-alone suburbs. though technically within city limits, I would describe these residential districts as streetcar suburbs because many people there commute by streetcar to go to work downtown. but other than that it would be difficult to live there without an automobile.
most people in SF work downtown but you certainly don't want to live there if you can help it. the downtown is inhabited mostly by the poor and the down and out. there's tons of cheap residential hotels everywhere of which is occupied mainly by shady-looking types many of whom appear to be meth addicts. the downtown has lots of rundown scary-looking neighborhoods so its one of the least desirable places to live in the city.
Am I the only one that finds SF's precious walkability misleading? That city is 7 MILES LONG BY 7 MILES WIDE!!!! No s**t it's walkable! I could freaking jog from one side of that place to the other without getting tired. It's easy to walk everwhere in a city that you could throw a football across.
Also, when the hell were SF and LA not very Urban?
Am I the only one that finds SF's precious walkability misleading? That city is 7 MILES LONG BY 7 MILES WIDE!!!! No s**t it's walkable! I could freaking jog from one side of that place to the other without getting tired. It's easy to walk everwhere in a city that you could throw a football across.
(walkability has nothing to do with the area of a city)
Am I the only one that finds SF's precious walkability misleading? That city is 7 MILES LONG BY 7 MILES WIDE!!!! No s**t it's walkable! I could freaking jog from one side of that place to the other without getting tired. It's easy to walk everwhere in a city that you could throw a football across.
Also, when the hell were SF and LA not very Urban?
This is true and helps San Francisco, but I do think that SF overall is more "pleasantly walkable" than Los Angeles - but both cities are highly walkable.
San Francisco is a city that is generally overrated on how urban it is, while Los Angeles is generally underrated. I'd say they are about equal though with Los Angeles infilling at a pretty rapid rate there will be a time in the near future which it passes SF in my opinion.
Few if anyone is doing a 7 mile walk in either city, I fail to see how the size makes much of a difference.
I have trouble believing that they're equal, they're similar in density and LA goes on for a long distance. I guess the difference is LA is more scattered and built up differently.
Few people walk all the way across San Francisco. But a lot of people walk to work from the dense neighborhoods surrounding. LA has got underdeveloped areas on all sides of its downtown. Not every property is vacant, underutilized, or surface parking, but a lot of them are. If more people lived in those places it would create a natural constiuency to walk to work and other activities in Downtown LA.
Size does not correspond to walkable. I can show you 1 mile stretches of sprawl that would make your skin crawl to be on foot on.
OTOH, the Island of Manhattan is 13 miles long. It is extremely walkable.
Walkability has to do with the experience of the pedestrian - does it have a sense of place, does it feel safe, does it have items of interest (stores, restaurants, parks, art, gathering places, people), do the walking cooridors feel safe from cars (does on street parking provide a buffer between traffic, are sidewalks wide enough to accommodate foot traffic, do trees provide another buffer, soften the noise of traffic and the hard edges of the city), are there transit options to get across town quickly and conveniently, is there sufficient density to provide a critical mass of people.
Size does not correspond to walkable. I can show you 1 mile stretches of sprawl that would make your skin crawl to be on foot on.
OTOH, the Island of Manhattan is 13 miles long. It is extremely walkable.
Walkability has to do with the experience of the pedestrian - does it have a sense of place, does it feel safe, does it have items of interest (stores, restaurants, parks, art, gathering places, people), do the walking cooridors feel safe from cars (does on street parking provide a buffer between traffic, are sidewalks wide enough to accommodate foot traffic, do trees provide another buffer, soften the noise of traffic and the hard edges of the city), are there transit options to get across town quickly and conveniently, is there sufficient density to provide a critical mass of people.
In most of these areas SF is far superior to LA.
Eh, I'd only say superior as opposed to far superior. The biggest difference is that San Francisco is more consolidated in its pleasant-walkability while Los Angeles is more disjointed (though not the the level some would have you believe).
I think it has been covered in this thread already but SF and LA are pretty even in terms of public transit and within the next 5-10 years Los Angeles will pass it by with the Regional Connector and Purple Line extension (among a half-dozen other projects).
One thing neither of these cities suffer from is a lack of density, which is why both cities have fairly vibrant and active streets as far as pedestrians are concerned. Los Angeles definitely has more areas where there is a lack of pedestrian activity - but on the other hand it might also have more areas with a lot of pedestrians. Just a symptom of being a much larger city overall.
Eh, I'd only say superior as opposed to far superior. The biggest difference is that San Francisco is more consolidated in its pleasant-walkability while Los Angeles is more disjointed (though not the the level some would have you believe).
I'd say that SF has more "pleasant walkability" on an absolute scale, which does the make the walking experience there "far superior" to that of Los Angeles. It's tough for me to identify pedestrian-scaled streets that I would actually be walking on in Los Angeles. These streets are abundant in San Francisco, however. I also think there's a very noticeable difference in pedestrian activity between these two cities.
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