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So you're basing this on one person you know who's been to Phoenix(my father you mean) and you fail to see how I can even dare to compare Phoenix to any other city on the east coast? While it's true that cities weren't born in a day and many of them have had their fair shares of ups and downs, you seem to believe that if a city elsewhere isn't a carbon copy of one on the east coast, that somehow makes it lesser?
Cities on the east coast developed around urban centers....they developed based on how far one could walk....the foot, not the car. 99% of cities were founded the same way. Phoenix and other sunbelt cities are the odd ones out.
I still fail to see how any of this has anything to do with the fact that the Boston urban area still sprawls heavily, even with your history and neighboring cities growing into each other over a much longer period nonetheless. Once you're past route 128, there is plenty of sprawl with homes on larger lots than you'll typically find in the suburbs of Phoenix or other Sunbelt cities. Are there more jobs in the inner city or in the perimeter of Boston these days?
Boston's proper population swells to nearly 2 million people during the day.
Providence is nearly 53 miles south from Boston.
Worcester - 44 miles west
Lowell - over 30 miles northwest
Manchester - over 52 miles northwest
Fall River - almost 55 miles south
New Bedford - over 60 miles south
These cities (as well as Cambridge, Brockton) only take up a fraction of the population in the Boston metro area who are not actually living in Boston. So where is everyone else living?
You don't get it at all. Am I an elitist because I'm from the Northeast? Most people from the South and/or West on this forum would say so by virtue of me being from Massachusetts.
All of these cities are old industrial cities that had massive populations and that when suburbanization hit in the post WWII, people moved out into the surrounding regions. So you have a pattern where all of these cities developed their own suburbs and beginning in the past 25 years or so you have these individual suburbs and urban areas growing into each other to ultimately form Greater Boston. Notwithstanding the fact that eastern Massachusetts is all of 3500 square miles. I know how far each city is away from Boston. There are large cities that fill in the gaps--none of which might be considered suburban. Everyone of those cities in an hour (or less) train ride from downtown Boston.
Boston is not immune from (sub)urban sprawl...hardly, I never said it was, I said it was a matter of understanding the urban forms of the Northeast. The government of the state and the MBTA have taken great strides to improve transportation and sustainability, by developing TOD's for example as a way of curbing urban sprawl. Most people in New England/Masachusetts in recent years have made huge strides and enacting bylaws and codes to halt urban sprawl.
Don't come on here and call me an elitist...I'm not a wealthy buisness tycoon who stares down his nose at the homeless person. I'm a recent college student who makes it his buisness to understand the world around him...btw I have a degree in architecture/urbanism. So don't presume to tell me what I should think about the region I live in and grew up in.
What's truly tragic is that a town of about a 100,000 people 50 years ago grew into a city and region of 4.3million people. It effectively destroyed an entire ecosystem. Billions of gallons of water have to be diverted from somewhere to support such a population even to just provide basic needs. Food has to be trucked in from 1000s of miles (there are no farms in a desert). Rivers dammed to create artifical lakes for recreation, Rivers don't even flow to sea anymore (Im thinking of the Colorado) simply because it's so used to provide water and electricty to tens of millions of people who live in an environment where humans are not really adapted to do so. In the matter of a generation, the people who live in the southwestern US have rewritten the rules of interaction between humans and natures.
Boston may have its big box stores and large suburban houses. But it's not responsible for the displacement of an entire ecosystem.
I'm personally not a huge fan of boomtowns. The population grows so fast that it seems like a good amount of the new infrastructure being built is not always of the best quality, as the cities and suburbs in those booming metro areas are forced to rush everything to accommodate the rapidly growing population, such as the case with many of the sunbelt cities. I think Atlanta, Raleigh, and Austin are exceptions though, they seem to be doing a good job of handling the growth. Still, with the exception of Pittsburgh, I'd take almost any boomtown over a metro area that has virtually no growth or is actually declining in population. I think the metros with ideal situations are Seattle, Minneapolis, DC, Columbus, Portland, and Denver. They have relatively good economies, and they have a very healthy level of population growth. New York, Boston, Chicago, the Bay Area, and Philadelphia have slow but steady growth, and I think that's actually a good thing for those metros as they are such established cities.
Are there more jobs in the inner city or in the perimeter of Boston these days?
According to Grubb-Ellis, about 102,191,370 square feet of office space is located in Boston/Cambridge/inner-burbs. Total MSA space is 189,166,727. However that doesn't include cities like Worcester or Providence.
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Providence is nearly 53 miles south from Boston.
Worcester - 44 miles west
Lowell - over 30 miles northwest
Manchester - over 52 miles northwest
Fall River - almost 55 miles south
New Bedford - over 60 miles south
These cities (as well as Cambridge, Brockton) only take up a fraction of the population in the Boston metro area who are not actually living in Boston. So where is everyone else living?
The cities/towns of Boston, Cambridge, Brookline, Somerville, Chelsea, Watertown, Everett, Revere, Winthrop, Medford, Malden, Quincy, Lynn, Arlington, Belmont, Waltham, Newton, and Salem total to be about 1,600,000 people in a total land area of 172.5 square miles (9,275 ppsm). So 40% of our UA population lives in 10% of the UA area.
Quote:
So how is Boston immune from sprawl?
We aren't...but our sprawl is different than most cities (I know you're annoyed by that, but it's true). In the Boston area there are many very urban cities surrounded by small towns/villages. Do we have plenty of the classic big box sprawl? Definitely. I won't deny that...but it seems most cities sprawl in a way that consistently becomes less dense as you move away from the city. In Boston that happens, but there are also dense satellite cities spotted all over the metro.
I think another factor which helps mask our sprawl is the rail connections Boston has with these satellite cities.
Thanks (http://www.flickr.com/photos/mspdude/3855308442/sizes/l/ - broken link)
Since Boston has a very extensive commuter rail system (and a decent commuter boat system), it avoids having the outrageously wide highways (though there are definitely some wide parts) that are seen in many of the Sunbelt cities. So while we sprawl out, we often try to improve our rail systems as opposed to roadways.
I think Atlanta, Raleigh, and Austin are exceptions though, they seem to be doing a good job of handling the growth.
Do tell me why you think these cities are handleing growth better than the others?
Austin doesnt have freeway system to accomodate what it has much less good public transit. Atlanta (while I love it) is sprawling worse than any other sunbelt city (save Charlotte). I dont know enough about Raleigh to comment.
To be fair, I love Austin and Atlanta.
On the flip side of that coin, Dallas, Phoenix, and Houston are working hard and fast to develop their transit.
You don't get it at all. Am I an elitist because I'm from the Northeast? Most people from the South and/or West on this forum would say so by virtue of me being from Massachusetts.
All of these cities are old industrial cities that had massive populations and that when suburbanization hit in the post WWII, people moved out into the surrounding regions. So you have a pattern where all of these cities developed their own suburbs and beginning in the past 25 years or so you have these individual suburbs and urban areas growing into each other to ultimately form Greater Boston. Notwithstanding the fact that eastern Massachusetts is all of 3500 square miles. I know how far each city is away from Boston. There are large cities that fill in the gaps--none of which might be considered suburban. Everyone of those cities in an hour (or less) train ride from downtown Boston.
Boston is not immune from (sub)urban sprawl...hardly, I never said it was, I said it was a matter of understanding the urban forms of the Northeast. The government of the state and the MBTA have taken great strides to improve transportation and sustainability, by developing TOD's for example as a way of curbing urban sprawl. Most people in New England/Masachusetts in recent years have made huge strides and enacting bylaws and codes to halt urban sprawl.
Don't come on here and call me an elitist...I'm not a wealthy buisness tycoon who stares down his nose at the homeless person. I'm a recent college student who makes it his buisness to understand the world around him...btw I have a degree in architecture/urbanism. So don't presume to tell me what I should think about the region I live in and grew up in.
What's truly tragic is that a town of about a 100,000 people 50 years ago grew into a city and region of 4.3million people. It effectively destroyed an entire ecosystem. Billions of gallons of water have to be diverted from somewhere to support such a population even to just provide basic needs. Food has to be trucked in from 1000s of miles (there are no farms in a desert). Rivers dammed to create artifical lakes for recreation, Rivers don't even flow to sea anymore (Im thinking of the Colorado) simply because it's so used to provide water and electricty to tens of millions of people who live in an environment where humans are not really adapted to do so. In the matter of a generation, the people who live in the southwestern US have rewritten the rules of interaction between humans and natures.
Boston may have its big box stores and large suburban houses. But it's not responsible for the displacement of an entire ecosystem.
I never said you are an elitist because you are from the NE. Your own statements make you an elitist. If you're trying to understand the world around you, then I strongly suggest you get out and see the parts of the world you so strongly critique, yet haven't visited. Having a father who's visited the desert once doesn't cut it. I'm happy for you with your degree in architecture/urbanism , yet that still doesn't negate the fact that there are many homes and businesses on large lots of land between your "so called" old industrial cities with massive populations (I hardly call 110,000 massive) and your inner core. From the last census count, even though the Phoenix actual core may not be as dense as Boston's (one of the densest cores in the nation), the urban area consisted of 2.9 million people living in 755 sq miles, only one eastern urban area was more dense, and that was NYC (Miami if you count the South). Naturally, you're more likely to have more people living near your older core, but your urban area as a whole is also much bigger population-wise. In addition, the Phoenix area is more evenly spread when it comes to density, and the area (while setting aside open spaces for parkland) doesn't consist of much rural land within its urban area where people live on huge lots of land like you'll see in the NE.
In reference to public transportation, the initial 20-mile Metro light-rail, which is only a little over a year old, sees a daily ridership already of around 45,000. The planned future extensions, along with the push to get commuter rail in as a compliment to the light rail will hopefully push more people to live within our current metro without raking any more desert land.
In reference to life in a desert, how do you mean the desert is an environment that humans are not adapted to? Humans have been living in desert environments in North America (among other places) long before Boston was ever on the map. The area now known as Tucson was once inhabited by Paleo-Indians known to have been in the area nearly 12,000 years ago. The floodplain of the Santa Cruz River was heavily farmed around 1200 BC. The Hohokam people created 135 miles of irrigation canals making arable land and those canal paths are now used for the Arizona Canal, Central Arizona Project, and the Hayden-Rhodes Aqueduct. Phoenix delivers the same amount of water (from several sources, not just one) today as it does 10 years ago, despite almost a 30 percent growth in population. Despite the fact that there are certain precautions that need to be taken to reduce damage to our ecosystem and ensure desert recovery and restoration like water conservation and cutting: recreational use of off-road vehicles, invasions by non-native plants, construction of overhead power transmission lines, overgrazing by cattle and sheep, military exercises (although they do protect thousand of acres from other types of disturbances), losses of all kinds of all kinds of ecosystems have been most pronounced in the South, Northeast, Midwest, and California.
Regardless of the ignorance of some posters regarding other parts of the country, it hasn't stopped me from visiting all over the US, and I happen to enjoy Boston.
I never said you are an elitist because you are from the NE. Your own statements make you an elitist. If you're trying to understand the world around you, then I strongly suggest you get out and see the parts of the world you so strongly critique, yet haven't visited. Having a father who's visited the desert once doesn't cut it. I'm happy for you with your degree in architecture/urbanism , yet that still doesn't negate the fact that there are many homes and businesses on large lots of land between your "so called" old industrial cities with massive populations (I hardly call 110,000 massive) and your inner core. From the last census count, even though the Phoenix actual core may not be as dense as Boston's (one of the densest cores in the nation), the urban area consisted of 2.9 million people living in 755 sq miles, only one eastern urban area was more dense, and that was NYC (Miami if you count the South). Naturally, you're more likely to have more people living near your older core, but your urban area as a whole is also much bigger population-wise. In addition, the Phoenix area is more evenly spread when it comes to density, and the area (while setting aside open spaces for parkland) doesn't consist of much rural land within its urban area where people live on huge lots of land like you'll see in the NE.
In reference to public transportation, the initial 20-mile Metro light-rail, which is only a little over a year old, sees a daily ridership already of around 45,000. The planned future extensions, along with the push to get commuter rail in as a compliment to the light rail will hopefully push more people to live within our current metro without raking any more desert land.
In reference to life in a desert, how do you mean the desert is an environment that humans are not adapted to? Humans have been living in desert environments in North America (among other places) long before Boston was ever on the map. The area now known as Tucson was once inhabited by Paleo-Indians known to have been in the area nearly 12,000 years ago. The floodplain of the Santa Cruz River was heavily farmed around 1200 BC. The Hohokam people created 135 miles of irrigation canals making arable land and those canal paths are now used for the Arizona Canal, Central Arizona Project, and the Hayden-Rhodes Aqueduct. Phoenix delivers the same amount of water (from several sources, not just one) today as it does 10 years ago, despite almost a 30 percent growth in population. Despite the fact that there are certain precautions that need to be taken to reduce damage to our ecosystem and ensure desert recovery and restoration like water conservation and cutting: recreational use of off-road vehicles, invasions by non-native plants, construction of overhead power transmission lines, overgrazing by cattle and sheep, military exercises (although they do protect thousand of acres from other types of disturbances), losses of all kinds of all kinds of ecosystems have been most pronounced in the South, Northeast, Midwest, and California.
Regardless of the ignorance of some posters regarding other parts of the country, it hasn't stopped me from visiting all over the US, and I happen to enjoy Boston.
So are the Native Americans who inhabited repsonsible for such rapid growth? Their inhabitation of that area versus European/American populations is not the same thing at all. But they adopted to the climate and life there, that can't be said for modern cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas. Those cities are only possible due to the invention of the air conditioner.
Massive cities exist in places where MODERN human habitation is all but impossible. It is only made possible by the manipulation of vast resources. The Colorado River doesn't flow to the sea anymore. Millions of acres of marsh and coast have been destroyed within the past few years.
When you have a dozen cities of 110,000 then it adds up, bearing in mind the density of each of those cities is around 9,000ppm. They are also not sprawling suburbs like Scottsdale and Tempe. You still don't get what's being said to you about the nature of Boston's Metro area. All of these industrial cities and their subordinate towns grew into each other, this is why there is perception of massive urban sprawl, when in fact sprawl is contained to the cities and you could drive for 10 miles through forests and not see a town/big box mart and yet only be a few mins from downtown Boston. Metro Boston is home to huge tracts of conservation, the Middlesex Fells and the Blues Hills Reservation for example. Combined there are 1000's of acres of public land only within a few miles of the Inner Core.
The MBTA has a DAILY ridership of 1.3 million people, with over 1990 miles of track. 20 miles and 45,000 people hardly constitutes ground breaking pulbic transportation.
Btw, I've been all over the world, and this country. Just because I didn't agree with your frankly outrageous-blindly stated statment about Boston's offensive sprawl, doesn't make me ignorant. I suggest you look at several things before judging those elitist Northeast cities. 1) geography, 2) history, 3) transportation, 4) economy, 5) culture...these will clue you in as to how eastern cities operate.
So are the Native Americans who inhabited repsonsible for such rapid growth? Their inhabitation of that area versus European/American populations is not the same thing at all. But they adopted to the climate and life there, that can't be said for modern cities like Phoenix and Las Vegas. Those cities are only possible due to the invention of the air conditioner.
Massive cities exist in places where MODERN human habitation is all but impossible. It is only made possible by the manipulation of vast resources. The Colorado River doesn't flow to the sea anymore. Millions of acres of marsh and coast have been destroyed within the past few years.
When you have a dozen cities of 110,000 then it adds up, bearing in mind the density of each of those cities is around 9,000ppm. They are also not sprawling suburbs like Scottsdale and Tempe. You still don't get what's being said to you about the nature of Boston's Metro area. All of these industrial cities and their subordinate towns grew into each other, this is why there is perception of massive urban sprawl, when in fact sprawl is contained to the cities and you could drive for 10 miles through forests and not see a town/big box mart and yet only be a few mins from downtown Boston. Metro Boston is home to huge tracts of conservation, the Middlesex Fells and the Blues Hills Reservation for example. Combined there are 1000's of acres of public land only within a few miles of the Inner Core.
The MBTA has a DAILY ridership of 1.3 million people, with over 1990 miles of track. 20 miles and 45,000 people hardly constitutes ground breaking pulbic transportation.
Btw, I've been all over the world, and this country. Just because I didn't agree with your frankly outrageous-blindly stated statment about Boston's offensive sprawl, doesn't make me ignorant. I suggest you look at several things before judging those elitist Northeast cities. 1) geography, 2) history, 3) transportation, 4) economy, 5) culture...these will clue you in as to how eastern cities operate.
What is your hate-on for Phoenix? I'm assuming you've never been there since you stated your father is the only person you know who has, so I'm not sure why you're being so relentless, unless you hate to be proven wrong. You're calling me out on my "frankly outrageous-blindly stated statement" about Boston's offensive sprawl (mind you I wouldn't have commented had you not had blinders on about Phoenix), when I've laid the facts out with sources right in front of you.
BTW, I'm not judging those elitist Northeastern cities, I'm speaking to you.
As Phoenix has grown, so have the cities/towns in the area. Like I stated before, many of those cities were established in the 1800's, not just after 1950. Sprawl happens all over the place, and again, you can put whatever spin you would like to on it, but it is what it is, whether Boston, NYC, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Phoenix, San Francisco, etc., and although the city of Boston and its core has great density, the overall urban area of Boston is most certainly not as dense.
In reference to your statement above about public transportation, I simply stated that Phoenix is making strides in that direction, since you boasted about Boston in a previous post. Why do you insist on having to prove how much better Boston is at public transportation? It should be better. The city has been established a heck of a lot longer than Phoenix has. Would you rather Phoenix have no alternate transportation plan?
BTW, are you trying to tell me that no cities have existed in desert environments prior to the invention of the modern air conditioner?
BTW, are you trying to tell me that no cities have existed in desert environments prior to the invention of the modern air conditioner?
You're right AZLiam. Phoenix is literly built on top of what used to be Hohokom land. In fact, Phoenix still uses the canals/irrigation system that they built 500 years ago. Also, Casa Grande to the south is near a pueblo of the same name.
What is your hate-on for Phoenix? I'm assuming you've never been there since you stated your father is the only person you know who has, so I'm not sure why you're being so relentless, unless you hate to be proven wrong. You're calling me out on my "frankly outrageous-blindly stated statement" about Boston's offensive sprawl (mind you I wouldn't have commented had you not had blinders on about Phoenix), when I've laid the facts out with sources right in front of you.
BTW, I'm not judging those elitist Northeastern cities, I'm speaking to you.
As Phoenix has grown, so have the cities/towns in the area. Like I stated before, many of those cities were established in the 1800's, not just after 1950. Sprawl happens all over the place, and again, you can put whatever spin you would like to on it, but it is what it is, whether Boston, NYC, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Phoenix, San Francisco, etc., and although the city of Boston and its core has great density, the overall urban area of Boston is most certainly not as dense.
In reference to your statement above about public transportation, I simply stated that Phoenix is making strides in that direction, since you boasted about Boston in a previous post. Why do you insist on having to prove how much better Boston is at public transportation? It should be better. The city has been established a heck of a lot longer than Phoenix has. Would you rather Phoenix have no alternate transportation plan?
BTW, are you trying to tell me that no cities have existed in desert environments prior to the invention of the modern air conditioner?
I don't hate Phoenix...in fact I didn't even consider this whole thing until I read your bs rant about Boston being the worse offender when it comes to urban sprawl.
Considering the fact you live in a desert.
I saw those sources, I and others tried to explain what urban sprawl is like in Boston, you didn't seem to want to listen. Whose fault is that?
Great, Phoenix was settled on top of Native American settlements. Was their population 4 million? No, I know it wasn't. The infrastructure needed to support the tens of millions of peolple who live in a desert far exceeds the works of a native population from 500 years ago. When Phoenix was founded it had a few thousand people, in a little over a hundred years, that popualtion has centupled multiple times over. Are you telling me those same infrastructure and practices of then apply today...NO! They can't. All those retirees are not Prospectors. Yeah, the air conditioner is directly repsonsible for you being able to enjoy your lifestyle in that area. In summer when its 120 outside, try going with out it for a day...you'll be begging for a cool New England ocean breeze.
How is being well educated being an elitist? You only called me that because I wrote a lengthy vitriolic response to you, and you didn't care much for it.
Most of these sunbelt states have diverse economies. You get paid more up north, because everything cost more. The quality of living up North isn't much better then what you can find in the Sunbelt. Not to mention that the Sunbelt cities are making strides to improve there public transit. I think people are jumping to conclusions thinking the the Sunbelt will bust, because of how spread out the cities are.
The comment in bold is comical. Have you ever lived in the Northeast?
The northeast has an extreme higher quality of life over southern states. There is a reason why the northeast has a higher COL, better quality of life.
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, yet that still doesn't negate the fact that there are many homes and businesses on large lots of land between your "so called" old industrial cities with massive populations (I hardly call 110,000 massive) and your inner core. From the last census count, even though the Phoenix actual core may not be as dense as Boston's (one of the densest cores in the nation), the urban area consisted of 2.9 million people living in 755 sq miles, only one eastern urban area was more dense, and that was NYC (Miami if you count the South). Naturally, you're more likely to have more people living near your older core, but your urban area as a whole is also much bigger population-wise. In addition, the Phoenix area is more evenly spread when it comes to density, and the area (while setting aside open spaces for parkland) doesn't consist of much rural land within its urban area where people live on huge lots of land like you'll see in the NE.
