Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
It was built for the streetcars first. Then accommodated for automobiles. Koreatown is walkable but is not very pedestrian friendly - it may sound like a contradiction but it does make sense as Ktown is high in amenities but does have pedestrian-hostile form in places (especially south of Wilshire, which seems to be the part of the neighborhood you are focusing on).
Wait, so you understand this? For many of us being pedestrian friendly is a minimal consideration for calling a place walkable, they are insperable. You need a) places to walk to b) pedestrian friendly design. For my own personal preference, I'd take pedestrian friendly design and weight it far higher.
It was built for the streetcars first. Then accommodated for automobiles. Koreatown is walkable but is not very pedestrian friendly - it may sound like a contradiction but it does make sense as Ktown is high in amenities but does have pedestrian-hostile form in places (especially south of Wilshire, which seems to be the part of the neighborhood you are focusing on).
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.
I think another way to think about this is what is the primary mode. Can you walk in Koreatown - absolutely. Is it the same type of environement as some others being discussed, probably not but has many aspects similar.
And that's a fair point to make. I just don't really agree with it. You could have a neighborhood loaded with amenities where the majority of people drive to them. And you could have a neighborhood that doesn't have many amenities where you see many more pedestrians. And that can be true because the average Baltimorean becomes a pedestrian virtually anytime they walk out of the door whereas someone living in an auto-centric city often walks to the off-street parking either under or behind the building they live in.
Moreover, it's a much easier task to gentrify a neighborhood and then open up new businesses in previously shelled out buildings (as what's happening in DC) than it is to (a) have to gentrify a neighborhood and then (b) work on structural/design issues.
Well to each their own. If you prefer semi-abandoned neighborhoods with few amenities but quaint walkability over somewhere dense, amenity rich but lacks that quaint urban form then that's certainly understandable. But realize to others amenities are important, even one's in two story strip malls.
Wait, so you understand this? For many of us being pedestrian friendly is a minimal consideration for calling a place walkable, they are insperable. You need a) places to walk to b) pedestrian friendly design. For my own personal preference, I'd take pedestrian friendly design and weight it far higher.
I think we need better semantics here.
Yes I understand this and personally don't care all that much. Maybe it is because the part of the city I really got into walking (Allston / Brighton) does not have excellent urban design either. I do have a baseline standard too - I am not going to want to walk around a bunch on a street that is straight-up pedestrian hostile (just as an example say Jamboree Road in Irvine). I have friends that live in Lakewood, CA and while there are a few big-box malls within walking distance from their place, I doubt I would walk there all that much, maybe just to go out to eat and for some exercise.
However I find that the parts of Los Angeles I have lived in offer more than that baseline as far as urban design (and there is a reason I have picked Pasadena and Hollywood as my LA neighborhoods). Yes there are holes in the fabric (on a very micro level - it is very common to have street-facing street-wall retail through the middle of the block with a strip mall or gas station on the corner), but it is not so egregious that it stops me from walking a few blocks. Add in the fact that parking in Los Angeles is not as easy as some make it out to be, and there is quite a bit of incentive to walk for my errands. Also, this is a little bit silly, but pulling my car out of our garage is such a pain that it really stops me from driving places. Those garages are designed to fit the maximum number of cars into a tiny footprint - it often forces the users to make 20 point turns just to get out of the garage.
But yes I do think there are a lot of people in LA who have the default thinking to drive everywhere. This is changing at a decent rate though.
Well to each their own. If you prefer semi-abandoned neighborhoods with few amenities but quaint walkability over somewhere dense, amenity rich but lacks that quaint urban form then that's certainly understandable. But realize to others amenities are important, even one's in two story strip malls.
It's not about "quaint" walkability. There's nothing really "quaint" about Baltimore. And I never said anything about my preference. I said that amenities don't really matter as far as walkability is concerned because you can have a high concentration of amenities with relatively weak pedestrian life and high(er) car usage. In other words, you can have a place like Koreatown that has a higher population density than Bay Ridge, more "amenities" than Bay Ridge, but yet feel completely different walking down the street. Bay Ridge only has 819 restaurants, bars and coffeeshops compared to Koreatown's 2,020, but there is a dramatic difference in pedestrian culture.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
