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Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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LA is an interesting case study. Before the boom of the film industry and the shift to places in the Valley, Hollywood, and the dispersion of jobs to the vast LA metro area, Downtown LA was culturally dominant. LA has always been de-centralized by 'big city' standards, but LA actually had quite a happening down town scene, with a lot of interesting early architecture. When I think 'noir' I think Paris, I do not think LA, yet we have 'LA Noir' in early Hollywood.
I think Houston is the best comparison I can think of.
PARTS of Downtown Miami at street level resemble downtown LA. I guess logically Phoenix would be the closest resemblance to DT LA.
Very much so.
The downtowns of both Phoenix and Los Angeles tend to be on the small side for how large both cities are but both cities have made strides in downtown redevelopment recently.
Both Los Angeles and Phoenix grew rapidly on the post-war outward sprawl craze, both cities look more suburban than cities like San Francisco, Boston, or New York.
Of the two I would say Los Angeles has the better downtown area but Phoenix has really come to life more than what it was 15 years ago with light rail, ASU-downtown, and more residential buildings.
PARTS of Downtown Miami at street level resemble downtown LA. I guess logically Phoenix would be the closest resemblance to DT LA.
Parts of downtown Miami do resemble downtown Los Angeles, but doesn't quite reach the size and scope of LA. I think those photos of Houston, LA and Miami from the 30's really capture how they differ. While all three have a nice historic core, Los Angeles' has been the biggest from the get-go, and thankfully much of that core is still intact (other than Bunker Hill).
Phoenix is not a good analog to Los Angeles, even a cursory google-maps viewing will show vast differences in street life, density, skyline height and footprint. ASU gives downtown Phoenix one feather in its cap that LA doesn't have, a university campus downtown. However, with the way downtown development has pushed further and further south past LA Live while the Expo Park neighborhood adds more northern development (along with the opening of a light rail line) there may be a day when USC is considered to be in Downtown LA as well.
Either way Los Angeles blows Phoenix out of the water in every 'more urban' argument (I think the San Fernando Valley is more urban than Phoenix) and that is especially true downtown.
I liked the mix of Atlanta/Houston and Philly/SF. Somewhere between those four.
I describe downtown LA as comparable to downtown Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta in terms of skyline.
Although LA is a little more dense in terms of low-rise/street level life mixed in.
Which makes sense since LA was 100,000 in 1900, whereas the big three southern cities were less than 50,000 in 1900.
So, its like downtown DAL/HOU/ATL with a bit more eastern city historic buildings/blocks mixed in.
It does seem like there is significantly more surface parking lots in Houston than Los Angeles.
I think downtown Houston has more in common with the west end of downtown (Bunker Hill, Civic Center, parts of the Historic Core and maybe South Park) but there is nothing like the vast area east of say, Los Angeles St. You have to remember, DTLA is not just the narrow swath of highrises next to the 110, it goes all the way east to the Los Angeles River. From the looks of google maps, downtown LA appears to be close to twice the size of DT Houston.
The reason I picked Phoenix was not because they mirror each other, just google any downtown (insert city) streets and the one that resembled LA the most was Phoenix with Denver coming in second, when I did the same with Houston all I got was streets with office buildings/skyscrapers which is not what what I think of when thinking of DTLA, I mean of course DTLA has office buildings but that's not the part of downtown that is full of life, from afar Houston does resemble LA, but from a street POV it would be a mix of Phoenix and Denver.
The reason I picked Phoenix was not because they mirror each other, just google any downtown (insert city) streets and the one that resembled LA the most was Phoenix with Denver coming in second, when I did the same with Houston all I got was streets with office buildings/skyscrapers which is not what what I think of when thinking of DTLA, I mean of course DTLA has office buildings but that's not the part of downtown that is full of life, from afar Houston does resemble LA, but from a street POV it would be a mix of Phoenix and Denver.
That has got to be the strangest way to get a feel for what a downtown is like .
I don't think there are much similarities between DT LA and Phoenix at all.
LA is an interesting case study. Before the boom of the film industry and the shift to places in the Valley, Hollywood, and the dispersion of jobs to the vast LA metro area, Downtown LA was culturally dominant. LA has always been de-centralized by 'big city' standards, but LA actually had quite a happening down town scene, with a lot of interesting early architecture. When I think 'noir' I think Paris, I do not think LA, yet we have 'LA Noir' in early Hollywood.
Interesting you don’t readily associate noir with Los Angeles. I guess that literary and film history gets washed out by the celebrity culture spotlight. Living here, it’s the other way around.
Interesting you don’t readily associate noir with Los Angeles. I guess that literary and film history gets washed out by the celebrity culture spotlight. Living here, it’s the other way around.
Yeah I definitely think of LA when I think of noire. Though the Paris connotation makes sense too.
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