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Congrats on the bay area being more racially diverse than Philly for having more asians and Mexicans. But Philly is arguably more ethnically diverse than the Bay area. Btw, Philly also beats SF in many areas let alone the whole bay area. Also, last time I checked, SF and san Jose are not in the same msa.
Oh no, allow me to congratulate YOU, Philly, on having more blacks than the Bay Area! That is such an amazing accomplishment, I'm at a loss for words! Philly is now truly, truly a world class city b/c it has so many black people. I mean how else could a city count for anything or even be considered diverse? Everyone knows no city is truly diverse unless it is completely dominated by black and white people, so hats off to you Philadelphia!!
Care to show any data backing up your claim of Philly being more ethnically diverse? The racial boat has already sailed (away from Philly lol), which was all that was relevant in a reply to a comment knocking the Bay's diversity based on a smaller number of black people (nevermind the fact that the Bay Area's percentage of blacks is much closer to the national average than Philly's while Philly's Asian percentage is a joke compared to the Bay's). So now you're dropping the "ethnic diversity" gauntlet. Okay, well then either show some data backing it up, or don't even bother. Enough of you have come at us talking out your a$$es with this crap w/o ever being able to back up what you say, and the racial diversity difference has been covered already ad naseum. So either put up or shut up.
Btw, thanks for going tit-for-tat with the "my city beats your city comment" even though mine was retaliatory to begin with. So I guess its my turn again: SF beats Philly in many areas with or without the Bay Area, but with the Bay Area it PWNS Philly. Your turn!
Also, last time I checked my previous post, I never said SF and SJ were in the same MSA. Soooo....thanks!
They are part of the same metro (The Bay Area CSA...and will likely be combined as one MSA soon anyways), any claim otherwise is pretty ridiculous, just ask any Bay Area resident. I made a detailed post two pages ago addressing why SJ and SF are not currently one MSA, read it if you wanna know exactly why.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SirGreenDown
So just to double check, this thread is about the bay vs Philly or San Jose vs Philly? Can San Jose really not stand alone without including other nearby cities? If that's the case I understand, but I'd just like for someone to confirm.
Are you including the Philly metro along with the city when you say "Philly"? If so, then the Bay Area is also included in this comparison.
City proper vs. city proper, Philly wins no doubt. SJ is nice enough, but definitely not in the same league. On the metro level though, i'd say that the Bay Area wins it.
They are part of the same metro (The Bay Area CSA...and will likely be combined as one MSA soon anyways), any claim otherwise is pretty ridiculous, just ask any Bay Area resident. I made a detailed post two pages ago addressing why SJ and Sf are not currently one MSA, read it if you wanna know exactly why.
Are you including the Philly metro along with the city when you say "Philly"? If so , then the Bay Area is also included in this comparison.
City proper vs. city proper, Philly wins no doubt. SJ is nice enough, but definitely not in the same league. On the metro level though, i'd say that the Bay Area wins it.
When talking about Philly I myself would only be talking about all 142 sq miles of Philly. The thread title clearly says Philadelphia vs San Jose, so there should be no confusion or reason to fall on other nearby cities or even the metro. Really simple.
When talking about Philly I myself would only be talking about all 142 sq miles of Philly. The thread title clearly says Philadelphia vs San Jose, so there should be no confusion or reason to fall on other nearby cities or even the metro. Really simple.
Well, not really simple seeing as the criteria in the first post included beaches, countryside, and more (most of which is outside of the city limits in both cases). All of that would imply that the comparison is for more than just the city proper.
Beyond that, comparing just the city proper is really stupid. It's beyond idiotic to compare two different locations based solely on what is contained within the arbitrary line that defines the "city limits." Treating what's within those city limits as an island secluded from any/all of the surroundings is simply unrealistic. Residents of both San Jose and Philadelphia certainly travel beyond the city limits to take advantage of amenities out there and residents of the suburbs travel into the city for the city's amenities. Cities and suburbs function as a whole and to separate one from the other for the sake of a pissing contest creates a really unfair, unbalanced situation. A situation that's entirely unrealistic as it's just not how cities function.
When you're looking for a house, do you look simply at the physical building and disregard everything else? No! Of course not. You look at the yard, the secondary structures (garage, shed, etc), the driveway, and the neighborhood as a whole. Cities are the same. Comparing what's inside one city's arbitrary boundaries with what's inside another's merely shows a fraction of the reality. You have to look at the whole picture.
To take rah's point further, San Jose may not officially be in San Francisco's MSA (it is part of the CSA); but's most certainly an interconnected part of the Bay Area's urban environment. It's very much part of the Bay Area and anyone who's been there can attest that the entire Bay Area is very much a continuation of interconnected communities that have overlapping functions. It's a perfect example of statistics not telling you everything as it's only not included in the MSA due to the flaws of the ways MSAs are measured.
Well, not really simple seeing as the criteria in the first post included beaches, countryside, and more (most of which is outside of the city limits in both cases). All of that would imply that the comparison is for more than just the city proper.
Beyond that, comparing just the city proper is really stupid. It's beyond idiotic to compare two different locations based solely on what is contained within the arbitrary line that defines the "city limits." Treating what's within those city limits as an island secluded from any/all of the surroundings is simply unrealistic. Residents of both San Jose and Philadelphia certainly travel beyond the city limits to take advantage of amenities out there and residents of the suburbs travel into the city for the city's amenities. Cities and suburbs function as a whole and to separate one from the other for the sake of a pissing contest creates a really unfair, unbalanced situation. A situation that's entirely unrealistic as it's just not how cities function.
When you're looking for a house, do you look simply at the physical building and disregard everything else? No! Of course not. You look at the yard, the secondary structures (garage, shed, etc), the driveway, and the neighborhood as a whole. Cities are the same. Comparing what's inside one city's arbitrary boundaries with what's inside another's merely shows a fraction of the reality. You have to look at the whole picture.
To take rah's point further, San Jose may not officially be in San Francisco's MSA (it is part of the CSA); but's most certainly an interconnected part of the Bay Area's urban environment. It's very much part of the Bay Area and anyone who's been there can attest that the entire Bay Area is very much a continuation of interconnected communities that have overlapping functions. It's a perfect example of statistics not telling you everything as it's only not included in the MSA due to the flaws of the ways MSAs are measured.
This is fair and I would also suggest that the Philly MSA is likely the second most flawed MSA after the Bay actually but that also has been done ad naseum (there are 500K residents within 30 minutes of Center City and over a million within 60 minutes of Center City excluded (both MSA and CSA and continuously developed) and that excludes any from the NY MSA of which there is an additional million closer to CC than Manhattan)
This is fair and I would also suggest that the Philly MSA is likely the second most flawed MSA after the Bay actually but that also has been done ad naseum (there are 500K residents within 30 minutes of Center City and over a million within 60 minutes of Center City excluded (both MSA and CSA and continuously developed) and that excludes any from the NY MSA of which there is an additional million closer to CC than Manhattan)
I almost mentioned this. Philadelphia's metro is squeezed out by NYC and DC/Baltimore to a lesser degree. Philadelphia's a bigger city than the metro numbers let on.
I went to school in Portland, Maine where the MSA was skewed in the opposite direction. If you look up Portland's MSA, it says that it has around 515,000 people. It's a ridiculously high number. The problem is that the county-based system for measuring MSAs includes two counties that stretch far away from the city center (counties are pretty much irrelevant in New England). Most of that population is in areas that are VERY rural (like way in the sticks rural) and no one in those areas would consider themselves part of metro Portland. Portland's MSA covers a land area that's double the size of Rhode Island with less than 1/2 the people that RI has. Even the city of Portland's website says that the metro area is 230,000. Just another example of the flaws in measuring MSAs.
Personally, I'm a much bigger fan of Urbanized Area, but even that's not perfect as a city's influence extends into rural areas. Still, it's better than MSA. In the case of Philadelphia, you can see that it's clearly the 4th largest urbanized area in the U.S. (even if you combine SF and San Jose, it's still smaller).
Beyond that, comparing just the city proper is really stupid.
It's OK with me if you hold this opinion. I disagree, however. I find it completely fair to compare Philly with SJ. Philly is pretty self-contained in regard to daily life. Unless folks from SJ regularly use SF as a base for their lives (work, live, play), then let the two cities play it out head-to head based on the criteria set up by the OP.
It's OK with me if you hold this opinion. I disagree, however. I find it completely fair to compare Philly with SJ. Philly is pretty self-contained in regard to daily life. Unless folks from SJ regularly use SF as a base for their lives (work, live, play), then let the two cities play it out head-to head based on the criteria set up by the OP.
So no one from suburban Philadelphia commutes to the city from outside of the city limits? I understand that there are plenty of people who live within the city limits and work there as well. However, the suburbs of both cities are chalk full of people who live OUTSIDE the city limits and commute IN to work. That's the entire point of bedroom communities and it's why it's impossible to ignore the influence that a city's surroundings have on the city as a whole.
San Jose is a different animal entirely in a way that only someone with the Bay Area can understand. That whole stretch of the Peninsula, to the North of San Jose towards San Francisco, along the Bay is chalk full of suburban and urban centers that are major employment centers. It's very much interconnected with both San Francisco and San Jose. While there probably aren't TONS of people that commute all the way from San Jose to San Francisco every day (there are still plenty of them), there ARE plenty that would commute from San Jose to Sunnyvale, Palo Alto, Redwood City, San Mateo and beyond. A lot of people from San Francisco commute to the same places. It's very much interconnected which is why it's dumb to compare San Jose to Philadelphia contingent upon only what's in the city limits.
What's more, is that the OP included things like beaches and countryside. Sure, they may not be a part of everyday life, but they are huge factors in the overall quality of life and largely influential over the desirability of an area. It's impossible to include these two things in a comparison of the city limits alone because both cities have very little (or none) of either within the city limits. Factors from beyond the city limits ALWAYS end up influencing (even to the smallest degree) preferences for areas. That's why it's impossible to ignore them.
^^^ You have made your points already. Repeating them doesn't change my mind, however. For the reasons I gave, unlike you, I think it's reasonable for responders to this thread to compare the cities themselves.
As I also already said:
Quote:
Originally Posted by jm02
It's OK with me if you hold this opinion. I disagree, however.
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