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I think it's obvious that Atlanta is more built up than kc. It's in a different league as far as that goes. All I said was that having more highrises does not equate to walkable areas. Some parts of Atlanta are very walkable though.
KC is not Atlanta, but it's not the country city people think it is either.
Only 750 people live in the country club plaza district of kc? In what, two buildings? Downtown KC is now quite walkable and ranking KCMO 43rd is a joke. They must be taking into account all the suburban parts of the city north of the river or something.
Having said that, I think most cities have comparable areas to KCMO. Miami and Atlanta still seem like car cities to me, despite all the highrises. Those hi-rises are typically locked down with parking garages and don't interact well with the street, especially Miami. But, like KC, they still have some pretty walkable districts.
I don't think 43rd is a joke... but keep in mind its a ranking and there are many great cities around. I think on these threads people often get so competitive they forget how many great places there are and being ranked a certain number isn't all that bad.
As far as car oriented... ehhh... I'm conflicted on how to respond here... one is about Atlanta-centric (and by extension I think the same argument can be made for Miami), but the other is KC-centric.
Atlanta is very much a car-oriented city, no doubt. However, you have to remember its a metro of over 5 million people and the urban area of 4.5 million. Just because you have a highly walkable core, that doesn't mean you don't have tons of commuters coming in from outside the core, whether it be by car or transit. Even though we have iconic pictures of our wide Downtown Connector freeway, the core itself has a great deal going on off the freeway. I'd also note that there are highly walkable neighborhoods where people can get to a pub, restaurants, a store or two, bank, etc... but people still commute for work opportunities. (Not every walkable neighborhood can have a large Fortune 500 company with lots of high paying jobs)
Ok.. KC-centric... Just look at the overhead aerial photo. KC's downtown is surrounded by a freeway 360 degrees cutting off most of the urban residential neighborhoods around it. Then there is a fairly sizable circle of open ground parking lots between the CBD and the freeway. To me this is a glaring thing KC needs to overcome in the future, but you guys have some good bones to work off of. I'm not saying KC doesn't have great spaces and great opportunities for the future... but maybe you're holding other cities to too high of a standard.
All I'm saying is Atlanta is not Midtown Manhattan like some seem to think. You can take some pretty impressive photos of Atlanta condensing those towers in midtown/downtown/buckhead etc, but the city at ground level has a lot of gaps and dead zones, even where there are highrises. I think some of Atlanta's most walkable areas are not even in midtown, but the single family neighborhoods around them.
I'm not your typical Atlanta basher. I actually think the city is pretty dense and built up even though the metro has a lot of sprawl and honestly it's so much larger than KC that it's not even a fair comparison because Atlanta has walkable areas with more people than all of the urban core of KC.
My point as always it to show that KC is no pushover either, but even so, it does have a long way to go. KC has more gaps between its walkable areas than Atlanta does as you mentioned.
All I'm saying is Atlanta is not Midtown Manhattan like some seem to think. You can take some pretty impressive photos of Atlanta condensing those towers in midtown/downtown/buckhead etc, but the city at ground level has a lot of gaps and dead zones, even where there are highrises. I think some of Atlanta's most walkable areas are not even in midtown, but the single family neighborhoods around them.
I'm not your typical Atlanta basher. I actually think the city is pretty dense and built up even though the metro has a lot of sprawl and honestly it's so much larger than KC that it's not even a fair comparison because Atlanta has walkable areas with more people than all of the urban core of KC.
My point as always it to show that KC is no pushover either, but even so, it does have a long way to go. KC has more gaps between its walkable areas than Atlanta does as you mentioned.
I understand...
Note, that I didn't post the Atlanta pictures the others did, I'm basing most of my arguments from the overhead aerials and looking at undeveloped blocks and how the neighborhoods interconnect.
I could probably ramble for hours about each place, but I think Atlanta's high demand has caused many of our "urban renewal" parking lots of the 70s and 80s to be rebuilt over again.
Kansas City still has large swaths of theirs.
But I do seem to see small tidbits of neighborhoods that would be nice. Like the center of the CBD looks like it would be nice, even if it is disconnected from other neighborhoods. Their looks to be an area called Wesport that might be different to live around. There are a few blocks around the city market that could be nice.
For Atlanta Southwestern Downtown is our big problem area for parking lots. There is just no demand there to build new.
All I'm saying is Atlanta is not Midtown Manhattan like some seem to think. You can take some pretty impressive photos of Atlanta condensing those towers in midtown/downtown/buckhead etc, but the city at ground level has a lot of gaps and dead zones, even where there are highrises. I think some of Atlanta's most walkable areas are not even in midtown, but the single family neighborhoods around them.
I'm not your typical Atlanta basher. I actually think the city is pretty dense and built up even though the metro has a lot of sprawl and honestly it's so much larger than KC that it's not even a fair comparison because Atlanta has walkable areas with more people than all of the urban core of KC.
My point as always it to show that KC is no pushover either, but even so, it does have a long way to go. KC has more gaps between its walkable areas than Atlanta does as you mentioned.
I haven't heard anyone on this site ever say Atlanta was Midtown Manhattan...ever. All I see is people pretty much bashing Atlanta for being too spread out and 'dead'. Midtown is the most walkable area in the city. There's no doubt about that. It has the most consistent foot traffic every day and almost anytime of the day. It is the only urban neighborhood in the city with a 20,000+ psm census tract(which is not that impressive at all, but it's going up because of the new apartment towers constantly being built) so it's the densest part of the city in terms of population.
But yes, Atlanta does have gaps and dead zones in parts of the city, even in Midtown. Downtown is still at this point the most structurally built part of the city.
While midtown Atlanta is vibrant, Downtown Atlanta seems to need more residential. Unless there is activity around the convention center or something, it's dead down there after business hours. I understand the same can be said about Financial districts in NYC, Chicago etc, but it seems like prices would be cheaper to build more residential in downtown vs pretty much only in Midtown and other areas. I can't say I follow Atl development closely though, so that could already be changing.
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
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Originally Posted by kcmo
I think it's obvious that Atlanta is more built up than kc. It's in a different league as far as that goes. All I said was that having more highrises does not equate to walkable areas. Some parts of Atlanta are very walkable though.
KC is not Atlanta, but it's not the country city people think it is either.
For the record, I don't view KC as a "country" city. It's one of the great cities of the Midwest. Some of the opinions on this thread though show a lack of information on what the big cities (and a bunch of the small and medium sized ones too) are like.
While midtown Atlanta is vibrant, Downtown Atlanta seems to need more residential. Unless there is activity around the convention center or something, it's dead down there after business hours. I understand the same can be said about Financial districts in NYC, Chicago etc, but it seems like prices would be cheaper to build more residential in downtown vs pretty much only in Midtown and other areas. I can't say I follow Atl development closely though, so that could already be changing.
Yep! That's just it, whenever you have a major financial district with limited areas to build, it prices out most of the residential.
The whole downtown Atlanta, which goes beyond the financial district constrained by the Grady Curve has a decent amount of people. Like other posters mentioned Sweet Auburbn should be included, as should Castleberry Hill, parts of the Old 4th Ward, Summer Hill, Grant Park, the Atlanta University Center, Vine City and Centennial.
Kansas City's financial district is the same way. Inside those freeways that surround it there are only about 3,700 people (albeit I'm using walk score, they don't include 2-3 blocks within the freeway to the west).
Atlanta, mostly bordered by the freeway and the convention center has about 13,000 people. The Downtown Atlanta CID, a 4 square mile self-taxing district and includes the outlying downtown neighborhoods from the financial district, has 26,000 people.
I think the deadness is from most locals going to Buckhead, Midtown, Perimeter Center, and outlying neighborhoods like Virginia-Highland for nightlife.
Where as I've noticed some small metros live and die mostly through their downtown.
I also think Downtown Atlanta is often passed over for urban residential for Midtown, because there is no congestion from the convention center business and it has the large Piedmont Park. The event traffic there can be brutal sometimes.
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