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Well my initial comment was related to office space. For example, if LA and SF had the office space of DC in 61 sq. miles which includes 130 million sq. feet of privately owned office space and millions more of Federally owned office space, the population density would free fall in LA and SF to accommodate a tripled increase in office space compared to what LA and SF currently have. Keep in mind, I was referring to office to residential conversions or obsolete office building tear downs to build residential across the city specifically in downtown DC.
The reality of the built environment in DC compared to LA and SF is that buildings in DC have to be built taller across the 61 sq. miles to accommodate growth because of height limits. SF and LA only have taller buildings in a very small fraction of their cities compared to DC. DC is on average a much taller built city over a much larger area and that will only expand even more every year. DC is now beginning to build 12-15 story buildings even in Ward 7 and 8 across the river.
DC has a daytime population density similar to San Francisco’s residential density so office space doesn’t close the gap.
DC has a daytime population density similar to San Francisco’s residential density so office space doesn’t close the gap.
DC’s daytime population density only using the core 48 sq. miles would surpass SF’s residential density. Almost the entire increase in daytime density is in the urban core. Dropping the low density fringes down to 48 sq. miles would not only have DC’s density increase exponentially, it would also include close to 200 million sq. feet of combined privately and publicly owned office space which is more than double SF.
What would SF’s population be with 200 million sq. feet of office space in its borders?
DC’s daytime population density only using the core 48 sq. miles would surpass SF’s residential density. Almost the entire increase in daytime density is in the urban core. Dropping the low density fringes down to 48 sq. miles would not only have DC’s density increase exponentially, it would also include close to 200 million sq. feet of combined privately and publicly owned office space which is more than double SF.
What would SF’s population be with 200 million sq. feet of office space in its borders?
SF in the daytime has almost an identical population to the entire city of DC ~1.15 million.
So maybe commuters+residents surpass residents in SF if you gerrymander a bit, but DC is never denser than SF.
Do people from DC just have massive offices?
Maybe.
And for fun, Boston+Cambridge at 54 sq miles has ~1.2 million people during the day.
DC’s daytime population density only using the core 48 sq. miles would surpass SF’s residential density. Almost the entire increase in daytime density is in the urban core. Dropping the low density fringes down to 48 sq. miles would not only have DC’s density increase exponentially, it would also include close to 200 million sq. feet of combined privately and publicly owned office space which is more than double SF.
What would SF’s population be with 200 million sq. feet of office space in its borders?
It would depend on how that additional office space was built to get to 200 million, and if that's happening, how development of residential parts go in hand. It would likely be a much higher population in SF at that point than it has now.
As for right now, wouldn't SF's daytime population also greatly increase (well, pre-pandemic) due to its fairly large office component? I'm guessing it doesn't grow by as much as DC's does, but it's probably still on net more people.
SF in the daytime has almost an identical population to the entire city of DC ~1.15 million.
So maybe commuters+residents surpass residents in SF if you gerrymander a bit, but DC is never denser than SF.
Do people from DC just have massive offices?
Maybe.
And for fun, Boston+Cambridge at 54 sq miles has ~1.2 million people during the day.
How how much office space? I think you are confused on the topic at hand. The discussion has been about land used for 200 million sq. feet of office space and the residential impact DC would experience if part of that land is converted to residential by either office conversions or obsolete office building tear-downs.
Let’s make this easier, what would the population of Boston or San Francisco be if they currently had 200 million sq. feet of office space in their borders? How much residential space would be lost to accommodate that much office space and what impact would it have on the residential population? How much office space does Boston and San Francisco currently have?
How how much office space? I think you are confused on the topic at hand. The discussion has been about land used for 200 million sq. feet of office space and the residential impact DC would experience if part of that land is converted to residential by either office conversions or obsolete office building tear-downs.
Let’s make this easier, what would the population of Boston or San Francisco be if they currently had 200 million sq. feet of office space in their borders? How much residential space would be lost to accommodate that much office space and what impact would it have on the residential population? How much office space does Boston and San Francisco currently have?
Office+Residential population is higher in Boston and SF than DC during the day. So it wouldn’t make enough impact to make a difference.
Office+Residential population is higher in Boston and SF than DC during the day. So it wouldn’t make enough impact to make a difference.
DC is simply less dense than those cities.
Nobody said DC was denser than San Francisco or Boston currently. It’s hard to be that dense with 200 million sq. feet of office space in a city that is 61 sq. miles. To be clear, with around 200 million sq. feet of office space, if DC converted 100 million sq. feet of that office space to residential, what would the residential impact be?
Let’s say each office building was 500,000 sq. feet. That’s 200 building that would now be residential whether converted or built from the ground up as a result of an office tear down. Let’s say each building has an average of 450 units. Using a 1.6 average household size, that’s 144,000 people in downtown DC alone. Keep in mind that’s space that was considered builtout with no room for growth. DC is already projected to reach around 1,000,000 people without any future growth downtown. DC could accommodate a bunch of residential growth downtown in the future.
Nobody said DC was denser than San Francisco or Boston currently. It’s hard to be that dense with 200 million sq. feet of office space in a city that is 61 sq. miles. To be clear, with around 200 million sq. feet of office space, if DC converted 100 million sq. feet of that office space to residential, what would the residential impact be?
Let’s say each office building was 500,000 sq. feet. That’s 200 building that would now be residential whether converted or built from the ground up as a result of an office tear down. Let’s say each building has an average of 450 units. Using a 1.6 average household size, that’s 144,000 people in downtown DC alone. Keep in mind that’s space that was considered builtout with no room for growth. DC is already projected to reach around 1,000,000 people without any future growth downtown. DC could accommodate a bunch of residential growth downtown in the future.
What if Logan was as Densely populated as the rest of East Boston? That’s 120,000 people instead of 0.
But alas different places have different land uses.
What if people lived where they don’t live is silly.
But all that office space (and workers who use it) still doesn’t bring DC up to the level of those other two cities. And office while in use is a denser land use than residential
Regardless, I think you lost the plot I was trying to say ~11,900 ppsm DC and ~15,100 ppsm Boston+ is not something you can really detect on the ground
Last edited by btownboss4; 09-29-2021 at 05:37 PM..
How how much office space? I think you are confused on the topic at hand. The discussion has been about land used for 200 million sq. feet of office space and the residential impact DC would experience if part of that land is converted to residential by either office conversions or obsolete office building tear-downs.
Let’s make this easier, what would the population of Boston or San Francisco be if they currently had 200 million sq. feet of office space in their borders? How much residential space would be lost to accommodate that much office space and what impact would it have on the residential population? How much office space does Boston and San Francisco currently have?
If Boston and SF both had an increase of office space to have 200 million square feet totals in their 46 square mile SF-ish boundaries (for SF, that'd just be the SF), wouldn't you expect a boost in residential construction to go with the large addition of office space? For example, for Boston to do such, I would imagine that would mean clearing out the railyards in the core a bit for development (which they can do if they had through-running), simplifying the tangle of roads leading to and from I-90 in the Seaport District and opening up that for development and/or shutting down Logan and opening large parts of it for development and allow for taller development in downtown and Seaport.
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