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It doesn't have that far to go. LA doesn't do all that much in terms of historic preservation (there's no history to preserve har har har) and there were A LOT of parking lots so the pace of development has been extreme and doesn't have any signs of abating.
Central LA does vie for the title with many more economic centers, but it's a far, far larger city and metro so even that smaller relative ranking within still means its huge and Wilshire coming out of LA is an extension of the CBD as one giant linear CBD. There's a probably a pretty good way to draw that contiguous 47 square mile park with 20% parkland (Elysian Park, Echo Park, Griffith Park) and including the massive industrial/manufacturing sections in and near downtown. One thing you'd definitely get at this point would be a lot of diversity and a pretty good transit system (for those 47 square miles focused on downtown).
I think you can probably take the time to look up all those stats. The only thing to keep in mind is that Central Los Angeles's rate of change is pretty remarkable so it has to be pretty new stats.
I've been paying attention to the boom happening in L.A. Do you think L.A. is booming more than D.C. in urban intense construction at this point in the core?
Location: East Central Pennsylvania/ Chicago for 6yrs.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BajanYankee
As of the most recent ACS estimate, it was 924,499 for Philadelphia. This calculation was admittedly a bit more crude than it was for L.A. because I didn't take painstaking care to drop every low density census tract I came across.
The transit share, I believe, was just north of 30%.
I didn't calculate density for Chicago, but I did look at transit share. Outside of NYC, there is no city that has a transit share as high as DC's in its core. I didn't finish for Chicago but it was becoming obvious after a while that I couldn't get to 40%.
When you start figuring out DENSITY FOR CHICAGO? Make sure you remove MILLENNIUM PARK and the Larger part, GRANT PARK through the Lakefront Museum Campus. Philly for example.... has nothing like it in its core. Its huge Fairmont park is outside it Center City Core and University City. Same for Chicago's densest North Shore neighborhoods ... REMOVE LARGE LINCOLN PARK THERE TOO
No need to say I butted in.... you clearly ended your conversation or they did. You clearly lessen Chicago and clearly NYC is you city to boast for. No one denies NYC's stature. Merely have others cities value, warrant and aspects ...PEURHAPS? Comparable to some things in NYC too.
I've been paying attention to the boom happening in L.A. Do you think L.A. is booming more than D.C. in urban intense construction at this point in the core?
Cittywide, DC is booming to a much higher degree than LA. DC's been building about 4,000 new units per year, which translates to 160 city residents per new unit. LA's building about 10,000 new units per year, which is only 353 city residents per new unit. About one-fifth of LAs new residential units have been in DTLA though, so in that small area that pace of new development is probably higher than in DC.
That yields a total of 855,029 and a total land area of 49.33 square miles. This excludes zip code 90027, which includes Hollywood, but also low density Grffith Park. Adding that to the total would bring it up to 901,021, but it would also add an additional 8 square miles.
I think the L.A. Times and Joe Lipton got it right. The figure I got using Census tracts wasn't too different from what they got. And I basically shopped for the densest tracts I could find.
Last edited by BajanYankee; 06-25-2015 at 12:31 PM..
Idk what exactly your boundries are, but mine are a little different than the LA Times one
I got rid of Chinatown, Elysian Park, Silver Lake/EP, all of the hills, the Fairfax District, and eastern DTLA and instead added Palms, much more of South Central, part of the Eastside, and Huntington Park
Your numbers are off. For one, there are multiple office buildings in Capital Riverfront that have already switched over to residential. The neighborhood will have much higher residential numbers and much lower office numbers which is a really good thing.
Hey MD, I think I recall you saying DC needs to reach 675,000-something in population to reach the 11,000 density ppsm mark. What year would that occur given the current growth rate? I think it was somewhere between 2018 to 2021. It definitely seems to be trending towards the density it had back in 1954, which saw The City at peak population.
Idk what exactly your boundries are, but mine are a little different than the LA Times one
I got rid of Chinatown, Elysian Park, Silver Lake/EP, all of the hills, the Fairfax District, and eastern DTLA and instead added Palms, much more of South Central, part of the Eastside, and Huntington Park
In that Central 47 sq miles of LA, is 20% set aside for parks? How much is industrial wasteland/waterfront/port (what is the weighted average density...because we often compare central LA to SF, but SF is a full and complete city while Central LA is very arguably not even the most economically important part of LA, or it's very diluted across a broad area and doesn't pack all the features of a world class city into those 47 sq mil)? Is there 83 million sf of office space? (possibly yes to the last question, but possibly no) What's the median income? Are these areas middle income to lower income, predominantly? What's the demographic make up (I think the last two matter because you could easily get an impoverished 47 sq mi area with predominantly 1-2 minority groups and it won't be apples to apples with a wealthy global city)? Are there any wealthy people that choose to live in this dense central area (matters because any elite global city has a large extreme wealth base right in its core...does LA)? What are transit options? What's the walkscore? What are the shares of people using transit, walking, etc?
Density alone is but one statistic. The central 47 square miles of LA has a long way to go to feel and function like the well rounded central cities/urban cores of the others (Chicago, SF, Boston, Philly, DC). It'll get there, but it's not there yet.
Just curious, what are the 47 sq mi figures for Chicago and Philadelphia and Boston?
I thought I'd answer these questions piece by piece, because they are good questions.
In that Central 47 sq miles of LA, is 20% set aside for parks?
Between Griffith Park, Elysian Park, Silver Lake Reservoir, Runyon Canyon, Grand Park, and Pan Pacific Park it would be close to 20%.
How much is industrial wasteland/waterfront/port (what is the weighted average density?)
Mostly just on the edge of downtown. Not sure how it would compare to a place like SF, probably not a huge gap. Compared to a place like Chicago I think it does give LA an advantage. Also, there is a reason that LA is considered a gross, polluted city by some, and that is because industrial uses butt right up against residential areas (take the southern parts of Hollywood, or Chinatown for two examples).
But overall I agree most of LA's industrial use is to the southeast of Central LA, so its exclusion may give it an unfair boost compared to some cities.
I think the weighted density is fairly comparable to the top 5 excluding NYC.
Doesn't pack all the features of a world class city into those 47 sq mil?
This is a pretty fair point; there is quite a bit about Los Angeles' prestige that arises from the Westside, SFV, SGV, and even South LA. I'd say the majority of the cultural amenities are located within Central LA, but USC / CA Science Center / Natural History Museum, UCLA / Westwood Village / The Getty, Cal Tech / JPL / Huntington Library / Rose Bowl, Rodeo Drive / Downtown BH / Century City, Santa Monica / Venice / Malibu are all outside of this district. I would say it is enough to consider Central LA an "important city" on its own, but not a world class city.
All of the good music venues are within Central LA, the Westside is really lacking in that department.
Is there 83 million sf of office space?
I don't think so. A quick search shows 27 million in the Central Business District. I don't think Hollywood, Mid-Wilshire and the Miracle Mile can make up that difference, or really even come close.
What's the median income? Are these areas middle income to lower income, predominantly? What's the demographic make up?
There are plenty of very poor areas (Pico Union, Westlake, East Hollywood, Echo Park) and plenty of very wealthy areas (Hollywood Hills, Hancock Park, Silver Lake, Beverly Grove) and areas that are average for Los Angeles (Elysian Valley, Mid City, Los Feliz, West Hollywood). I think it is a pretty normal mix, probably comparable to a Chicago (as long as you don't cherry pick up the north side) or Philadelphia - SF is kind of an anomaly considering how expensive and uber-gentrified it has become.
What's the demographic make up?
Super-Hispanic everywhere, with a few Asian enclaves in K-Town, East Hollywood, Westlake, and Chinatown, and white neighborhoods along the periphery and in the hills. Probably more diverse than most other parts of the city.
Are there any wealthy people that choose to live in this dense central area?
Obviously not a lot because of the allure of the hills and beach, but yes there are wealthy people in Los Feliz, Beverly Grove and in DTLA there are many wealthy people on the west end (Financial District, South Park, Historic Core, Bunker Hill) and then a few wealthy people in the Arts District.
Clearly not a place Central LA excels, but like District Dirt said up-thread, can you blame the super wealthy for wanting to live up in the Hills or along the beach? The whole not being able to walk thing is much less a big deal with the advent of Uber (or if they are really rich, a personal driver).
What are transit options? What's the walkscore? What are the shares of people using transit, walking, etc?
Transit is not bad for the area. You have some of the country's busiest bus lines along Wilshire and Vermont, with the Santa Monica Blvd and Venice Blvd buses putting up pretty good ridership numbers too; cutting through Central LA the entire stretch of Wilshire has rush hour bus-only lanes.
The Expo Line has a single stop within Central LA and then heads just south of its border towards Santa Monica. The Gold Line has two stops inside Central LA before heading northeast to Pasadena. The Purple Line currently goes about halfway through Central LA to the western border of Koreatown. The Red Line connects Hollywood to DTLA via Los Feliz and Hollywood before heading north to the Valley.
In addition to Metro service, there is LADOT's local DASH bus service, as well as regional agencies' commuter buses that head to DTLA. Metrolink also connects Central LA to the rest of the greater region.
All in all the transit is fairly decent in Central LA, and will see some big improvements with the Purple Line extension, Regional Connector, and expansion of bus-only lanes onto more major corridors. However, transit use in the area falls short of most other big urban cities in the United States, and does skew towards lower incomes. There are several reasons for this, which have been discussed quite a bit.
Walkscore is excellent for the majority of the area with zip codes scores ranging from 77 (Mid-City) - 96 (Northern DTLA). There really are few places in Central LA that could be classified as not walking-friendly.
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