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Baltimore is more structurally dense but it’s much lower to the ground. Typical building is 2 stories as opposed to ~4 in Boston. Everyone lives in top of each other in Boston and lots are very small. Boston also has far more large, ore-war brick tenements in areas of all social classes. Finding 2-3 block of 6 story tenement is not uncommon in Boston.
In Boston streets are narrower and every bit of land is residential. Much less fast good, much less off street parking.
Baltimore has gridded wider streets with more areas dedicated to industrial land use. Many abandoned municipal facilities Many dead ends or disconnects in the city. Everything in Boston follows together. Boston has high density apartments near all its train stops.
The core of Boston is much more developed. It’s more commercial, more residential, more modern, more dense and high rise than Baltimore. Boston has more skyways, underground tunnels, pedestrian malls, bridges, overpassed etc.
Baltimore’s northwest section is sort of like southern Boston architecturally. Many large Victorians chopped into apartments, single family homes, and even some triple decker apartments. Baltimore has rowhomes Boston has 2 family wooden flats. Both are Very green.
Baltimroe is grittier, with fewer city planted stress and more brick with more strip plazas. Boston has far more old, mixed use squares, with mom and pop shops. More fences especially chainring fences in Boston. It’s a much more colorful city .
Baltimore has more street art but Boston is rapidly catching up.
Boston is fully occupied and nowadays it is brilliantly maintained and slightly worn, Baltimore can look grim and hollow with far more vacant lots. Generally homes are closer to the street in Boston, no alleys-trash is put out in front of the house. Porch culture is far less, minimal corner drug dealing activity even in the worst neighborhoods.
Boston’s rowhomes and Brownstones are generally of much higher quality, much more desirable and far more rare.
Urbanity pretty much stops at city boundaries in Baltimore while it follows seamlessly out of Boston in all directions except southwest.
Interesting - yeah, that all makes sense. But where in Northwest Baltimore can you find environments like this one in South Boston?
In Boston notice how close the horns are to the streets, blocks are much more narrower as are the streets. Also even vacant lots are more tidy. You can also tell many vacant slots have been filled in with affordable housing since the 1990s in Boston-the architecture stands out as bland cheap and generic but better than empty lots.
I was about to say. That street looks nothing like Southie.
I always forget that South Boston refers to a very specific neighborhood with clear cut boundaries as opposed to a general area of the city. West Seattle is similar in that regard.
DC/Baltimore are never going to have the peak residential densities the way Vancouver/Seattle do as they lack the forest of glass apartment/condo towers where you can cram 2000 people in 2-3 acres, nor are they building them (in Baltimore's case) anywhere near fast enough to close the gap.
On the inverse Vancouver/Seattle are never going to have the urban reach or structural density DC/Baltimore have due to their rowhomes, narrower streets & more linear spread/density of urban development which allows them to have uninterrupted intense urban form +3 miles outside there downtowns.
Their apple to oranges cities in terms of built form.
This is incorrect. You need to research what is happening in DC. This is just one example of the massive concentration of highrise buildings being built in DC neighborhoods. This is happening all over the city. DC will have over 1 million people in the future. Please see below:
Quote:
Originally Posted by revitalizer
DC's Census Tract 72 is set to show massive population growth in Census 2020 and beyond.
In 2010, Census Tract 72, representing .53 square miles of land area in the Navy Yard neighborhood of DC, had 2,800 residents.
Between 2010 and April 2020, I estimate about 7,000 new residential units will have been built in this census tract. There were 2,370 existing units built before 2010.
The April 2020 Census-count population for this census tract should be about 14,000 residents, which assumes 95% occupancy in the residential buildings and 1.6 persons per household.
The Census Bureau suggests census tracts range in population from 1,200 to 8,000, with an optimum size of 4,000 people.
Because Census Tract 72 will be over 3x the optimum size in 2020, I suggest the census tract be split into 3 separate tracts as shown in the map I created below:
If the tract were to be split in this arrangement, DC would have a census tract (Proposed Census Tract 72.01) of about 135,000+ people per square mile by the 2030 census and would join a small list of cities in the U.S. with census tracts that dense.
In 2030, when the neighborhood will be at or near full buildout, I estimate about 24,000+ residents.
That would be tremendous growth of over 750% for an area that is just over a half square-mile.
I always forget that South Boston refers to a very specific neighborhood with clear cut boundaries as opposed to a general area of the city. West Seattle is similar in that regard.
Bostons got some weird antiquated names for its neighborhoods. South Boston (Southie) is technically in the northern half of Boston pretty much directly east of the South End.
West Roxbury doesn’t even touch Roxbury.
Charlestown
Central Boston
Back Bay
Beacon Hill
Allston/Brighton (recognized s one neighborhood, although Allston is closer in and more urban)
West End (not sure if this is a residential neighborhood)
North End
South End
Chinatown
South Boston (Seaport is becoming recognized as a separate neighborhood)
Roxbury ( disputed borders on all sides as this is the geographical heart fo Boston)
Mission Hill (technically Roxbury)
Fenway-Kenmore
Longwood Medical Area
Dorchester ( Home to 1/6th of Bostonians North Dorchester and South Dorchester are often split up)
Roslindale (old timers might say it’s West Roxbury, ’Roslindale’ is for the post office)
Jamaica Plain
Mattapan (old timers will say its a part of Dorchester)
Hyde Park (contains Readville)
West Roxbury
It's more urban than Seattle's single family home zones, for sure, but not more urban than Seattle's urban core and the "urban villages" and nodes throughout the city. Seattle has a very inconsistent urban fabric outside of its core but you do get plenty of areas like this throughout the city:
(These were posted by BlaserBrad earlier)
5 ish mile drive from Downtown (unsure exact because of recent detour)
Bostons got some weird antiquated names for its neighborhoods. South Boston (Southie) is technically in the northern half of Boston pretty much directly east of the South End.
West Roxbury doesn’t even touch Roxbury.
South Boston used to be the northern-most neighborhood of Dorchester before it was annexed. I think it was called “South Boston” cuz it was “just south of Boston”. Per wiki, it looks like Southie split from Dorchester in order to be annexed by Boston a few decades before Dorchester was annexed, so that probably also influenced the name.
Likewise, West Roxbury was once a neighborhood of Roxbury before annexation.
Anyway, I wouldn’t say that either are really part of Boston’s “urban core”?
Last edited by Boston Shudra; 04-04-2020 at 05:19 AM..
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