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Doing a 50 contiguous square mile for Chicago via community areas which is focused mostly on the North Side and the Loop with a bit of West Side and South Loop included. This isn't the densest contiguous tract possible, but it's one that's more or less an elongated blob rather than strongly gerrymandered. It counts out to, using 2020 numbers, 1,077,493 people in 51.15 square miles. I think you can technically get another 50 contiguous square mile Chicago entry on the list by doing a strongly north side one with no west loop or Loop in this, but then it gets kinda funny without including the Loop since Chicago is highly downtown-centric.
Baltimore supposedly had a net loss of 3,436 housing units. Obviously, units don't tell you the size, but I think there's a good chance that a good proportion of it was rowhomes and more so than detached SFH. I also take this to mean that vacant housing units in varying conditions are not counted as loss units, but it don't know if that's actually the case. I'm also not sure how conversions work in these numbers. Like, do single family rowhomes converted to multiple units mean that the same structure adds more housing units though the structure is essentially the same? Do conversions of other buildings to housing also mean a raw addition? I think if what I'm saying is accurate in that detached SFH have for the most part escaped destruction, then the overall balance of people living in detached SFH within Baltimore has grown though I also reckon much of that would not be included in the most urban contiguous 50 square miles. We can also go back to 2000 census and see that there was a net loss of housing units then (and a growth in vacant housing units between 2000 and 2010 despite a net loss of housing units): https://planning.baltimorecity.gov/s...02000-2010.pdf
This breaks down the cities 2020 vs. 2010 population, occupied/vacant houses by neighborhood, so it’s an excellent guide on how specific neighborhoods are doing.
The vast majority demoed buildings are are rowhomes and I’m 99.5% sure vacant units are not counted as lost. No idea how conversions are counted so that could throw off metrics as well. SFH escape destruction by and large but less than 5% of the city by housing stock is comprised of them so they are pretty inconsequential in the context of this thread.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
Regardless, I think it's accurate to say that Baltimore over the last decade for at least a 50 square mile contiguous area and likely the city overall has gotten structurally less dense, though is still among the structurally and population-wise densest contiguous 50 square miles in the US.
Agreed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OyCrumbler
Going back to the ranking where I was a bit iffy on where Seattle and Baltimore are in relation to each other, it appears Seattle on net added over 50,000 units to the city for a total of around 368,000 units with minimal vacancy and higher number of residents per housing units. What's more, the additions were disproportionately to the core districts (especially district 3 and 7) more than the outer ones. If my guess about Baltimore is correct, then the core most urban 50 square miles netted the highest proportion of losses in housing units than the city overall while the core most urban 50 square miles of Seattle netted higher proportion of gains in housing units than the city overall which I think is part of a pretty decent argument for putting Seattle over Baltimore in structural density (I believe Seattle also has significantly more hotel rooms and office square footage than Baltimore as well as now greater number of housing units) to go along with what are already higher population and job densities.
I think we all agree that on paper Seattle has long passed Baltimore in urban metrics. The Baltimore vs Seattle debate really comes down to inherent feel vs metrics.
I can see that, and I don't think there's much of a special exception for Detroit because at 50 square miles you'll necessarily have to start including some very torn up parts of Detroit. However, I'm not yet ready to call it yet because 50 square miles get you way out in to winding cul-de-sac territory for Atlanta and Houston as well.
That may be true. I’d actually say Downtown Detroit is more marked up by vacant lots/Parking lots thank the centers of smaller cities. Even Cleveland has filled in significantly since the 1990s.
More streets in St Louis have consistent street walks than Detroit as well.
I think there actually is a solid argument *Buffalo* is the 3rd most urban rust belt city after Chicago and Minneapolis at 50 sq miles. Pittsburgh certainly wins at 20 sq miles but beyond that it gets suburban faster than Buffalo unless you really gerrymander your and down valleys and such.
That may be true. I’d actually say Downtown Detroit is more marked up by vacant lots/Parking lots thank the centers of smaller cities. Even Cleveland has filled in significantly since the 1990s.
More streets in St Louis have consistent street walks than Detroit as well.
I think there actually is a solid argument *Buffalo* is the 3rd most urban rust belt city after Chicago and Minneapolis at 50 sq miles. Pittsburgh certainly wins at 20 sq miles but beyond that it gets suburban faster than Buffalo unless you really gerrymander your and down valleys and such.
Minneapolis "Rust Belt"?
I didn't think the Rust Belt stretched all the way to the Grain Belt.
Yes, it's on the Mississippi, and so is St. Louis, but I think the latter is industrial in a way Minneapolis isn't. (That's not to say Minneapolis has no industry; it does. But like Kansas City, it's better known for its role in the nation's food chain. Nor is it known for having lost either industry or population since 1950, while most Rust Belt cities, including Chicago, lost one or both.)
I didn't think the Rust Belt stretched all the way to the Grain Belt.
Yes, it's on the Mississippi, and so is St. Louis, but I think the latter is industrial in a way Minneapolis isn't. (That's not to say Minneapolis has no industry; it does. But like Kansas City, it's better known for its role in the nation's food chain.)
I don’t really know where else to put it? It’s pretty much the only big city between Milwaukee and Seattle.
To the south you need to reach all the way to Kansas City or St Louis . Which is quite far away
I don’t really know where else to put it? It’s pretty much the only big city between Milwaukee and Seattle.
To the south you need to reach all the way to Kansas City or St Louis . Which is quite far away
True, but it's the nation's leading grain-handling and milling center (Kansas City ranks second in both).
Its best-known companies are a firm that makes adhesives (3M), a department-store operator (Target) and the nation's largest producer of flour, cereals and baking products (General Mills, which swallowed crosstown rival Pillsbury about a decade or so ago). I wouldn't call any of these "Rust Belt" industries or companies.
Distances between large cities are also greater in the Grain Belt* and Plains. (In fact, all of the largest cities of the Great Plains sit on its edges: Denver, Omaha, Kansas City, Minneapolis/St. Paul.)
*"Grain Belt" is also the name of one of two well-known beers brewed in the Twin Cities, and unlike Hamm's (which was brewed in St. Paul), it's still local to Minnesota. (Both breweries faltered, closed and reopened elsewhere under other owners.)
This breaks down the cities 2020 vs. 2010 population, occupied/vacant houses by neighborhood, so it’s an excellent guide on how specific neighborhoods are doing.
The vast majority demoed buildings are are rowhomes and I’m 99.5% sure vacant units are not counted as lost. No idea how conversions are counted so that could throw off metrics as well. SFH escape destruction by and large but less than 5% of the city by housing stock is comprised of them so they are pretty inconsequential in the context of this thread.
Agreed.
I think we all agree that on paper Seattle has long passed Baltimore in urban metrics. The Baltimore vs Seattle debate really comes down to inherent feel vs metrics.
It's promising that occupied housing units went up even though total housing units went down from 2010 to 2020. Where did you get stats for percentage of SFH units in Baltimore?
Seattle inherently feels much more urban to me in the sense of there being being bustling commerce and people going about doing things and much more so than Baltimore. It's not just the metrics of more housing units, greater population density, more office space, etc. It feels like a more bustling city overall. I feel like Baltimore seemed noticeably less lively and more desolate this past summer than it did ten years ago.
Quote:
Originally Posted by btownboss4
That may be true. I’d actually say Downtown Detroit is more marked up by vacant lots/Parking lots thank the centers of smaller cities. Even Cleveland has filled in significantly since the 1990s.
More streets in St Louis have consistent street walks than Detroit as well.
I think there actually is a solid argument *Buffalo* is the 3rd most urban rust belt city after Chicago and Minneapolis at 50 sq miles. Pittsburgh certainly wins at 20 sq miles but beyond that it gets suburban faster than Buffalo unless you really gerrymander your and down valleys and such.
I think Milwaukee might also be an interesting contender as relatively intact compared to many others. agreed on Pittsburgh for 20 sq miles being very good, though I think 50 square miles is tough for a whole lot of cities without dipping into very suburban, industrial, or derelict. Pittsburgh also interesting in that you might take some of the neighboring municipalities and jettison parts of the city proper to form the most urban contiguous 50 square miles.
Last edited by OyCrumbler; 02-02-2023 at 09:07 PM..
It's promising that occupied housing units went up even though total housing units went down from 2010 to 2020. Where did you get stats for percentage of SFH units in Baltimore?
Seattle inherently feels much more urban to me in the sense of there being being bustling commerce and people going about doing things and much more so than Baltimore. It's not just the metrics of more housing units, greater population density, more office space, etc. It feels like a more bustling city overall. I feel like Baltimore seemed noticeably less lively and more desolate this past summer than it did ten years ago.
Housing type by city in 2015 from a Washington Post article.
Baltimore was hovering around 7% SFH back then. While overall housing units have marginally decreased since, the acceleration multi-family unit construction is are rapidly taking up more and more of the pie proportionally..
I was in Seattle over Christmas. Don’t disagree in it feeling like a more bustling city than Baltimore in feel, but physical built environment plays a *huge* roll in how people interact and view with a city.
Manila is denser and more bustling than Manhattan, it would be a reallll stretch to say it’s more urban.
It's promising that occupied housing units went up even though total housing units went down from 2010 to 2020. Where did you get stats for percentage of SFH units in Baltimore?
Seattle inherently feels much more urban to me in the sense of there being being bustling commerce and people going about doing things and much more so than Baltimore. It's not just the metrics of more housing units, greater population density, more office space, etc. It feels like a more bustling city overall. I feel like Baltimore seemed noticeably less lively and more desolate this past summer than it did ten years ago.
Baltimore is under *15% SFH (excuse the typo)
Housing type by city in 2015 from a Washington Post article.
Baltimore was hovering around ~13% SFH in ‘15. While overall housing units have marginally decreased since, the acceleration multi-family unit construction is rapidly taking up more and more of the pie proportionally..
I was in Seattle over Christmas visiting family. I don’t disagree in it feeling like a busier more bustling city than Baltimore, but physical built environment plays a *huge* roll in how people interact and view a city.
LA feels busier than Chicago & Toronto, but I’d hard argue it’s more urban than them over 50 sq/mi.
Dheli, Karachi & Manila are denser and more bustling than Manhattan, it would be a reallll stretch to say any are more urban however.
Housing type by city in 2015 from a Washington Post article.
Baltimore was hovering around ~13% SFH in ‘15. While overall housing units have marginally decreased since, the acceleration multi-family unit construction is rapidly taking up more and more of the pie proportionally..
I was in Seattle over Christmas visiting family. I don’t disagree in it feeling like a busier more bustling city than Baltimore, but physical built environment plays a *huge* roll in how people interact and view a city.
LA feels busier than Chicago & Toronto, but I’d hard argue it’s more urban than them over 50 sq/mi.
Dheli, Karachi & Manila are denser and more bustling than Manhattan, it would be a reallll stretch to say any are more urban however.
Yea, that sounds pretty accurate. Just to reiterate, I wasn't thinking that detached SFHs were having a boom within Baltimore. Rather, I was saying that their numbers are *proportionally* increasing in housing units and especially in proportion of developed land (since they also take up more space), albeit modestly because they seemingly have mostly or entirely escaping the brunt of demolitions into empty lots while overall housing units in Baltimore have gone down.
I think there's also a question I have about structural density as I believe there are significantly more empty plots in Baltimore now than at the beginning of the 2000s. I'd like to get at least an opinion, but even better, a reliable source, on whether some of the following observations are accurate.
The neighborhoods that have had the most demolished structures given to empty lands (though some have been converted to formal greenspace or parking) were some of the most densely built up in Baltimore, and as Baltimore is very much a rowhome city, a lot of those were rowhomes. This isn't to say that *all* or even most densely built up neighborhoods in Baltimore saw significant structural demolition to empty lots, only that the ones that did see such were almost exclusively densely built up neighborhoods.
Densely built up neighborhoods are also the sort that can more easily support intensively mixed-use neighborhoods where there can be enough localized foot traffic to support these businesses. The densely built up neighborhoods thus also meant a commensurate erosion of localized commerce in those neighborhoods.
Conversely, the proportion, but not necessarily overall number, of less densely built up neighborhoods now make up a larger proportion of the city and where the population resides than before. This does mean detached SFHs which can vary greatly in lot size, but this can also be inclusive of rowhome neighborhoods as there is certainly a fairly wide variation in structural and population density among rowhome neighborhoods as well. For example, these rowhomes in Ednor Gardens - Lakeside that seem to be all completely intact and were built with fairly deep setbacks and with breaks intentionally built between every few houses. It also doesn't have the same kind of back to back tightness the denser blocks have as the front yard of a rowhome from one side of the block to that of the other side is about 200 ft whereas some blocks elsewhere with rowhomes back to back have it at about 150 ft. It also doesn't economize on that frontage by having the "top" or "bottom" of the block built with homes at a perpendicular orientation. In effect, some of these (again, not all) rowhome neighborhoods that are the most intact are significantly less structurally dense and population dense than the neighborhoods that saw a lot of demolished were / used to be. These less dense and oftentimes less mixed-use neighborhoods be it detached SFH or less intensely developed rowhome neighborhoods have generally been unscathed or less "scathed" by demolitions into empty lots and so now make up a somewhat larger proportion of the structures of the city itself.
As a corollary to this, I think at least some of the units added in Baltimore do not actually increase structural density in their respective neighborhoods. I am certain there are at least a few conversions downtown of what were probably vacant or at least under utilized buildings into residential housing units which would certainly create a more vibrant area and streets and be able to support more commercial operations nearby than if this did not otherwise happen, but it does not increase the structural density. I am less certain of how rowhomes, especially those that are still very much intact, have been converted from single family units into multiple units. I know that has happened to a massive extent in Brooklyn where I live, and I know people in Baltimore who are living in units that were once single family homes (which I think in the stats would mean that one unit has turned into three with no structural density increase), but I'm not certain to what extent that has occurred though I'd welcome some source that can list the amount. This means that this potentially hides larger structural density losses since these would contribute to additional housing units against the net loss, but do not actually result in greater structural density.
Ultimately, given that the presence of not just vacant structures, but actually empty lots in some of what were formerly among the most structurally, residentially, and commercially dense neighborhoods in the city over the last several decades means that it's not just less bustle, but a real tangible drop in structural density in parts of Baltimore. Those losses are to some extent actually deeper than the net loss because at least some portion of the additional housing units did not contribute additional structural density increases while essentially "hiding" some significant structural density losses given that the losses were likely mostly in single family rowhomes that each constituted a single housing unit.
Now in relation to Seattle, there is actual substantial structural density increases, because many structures were demolished for redevelopment or augmented to add more people. Certainly there are conversions as well, but there are also a lot of completely new buildings and sometimes in place of smaller buildings on larger lots that were not as developed and sometimes on formerly surface parking lots. The greater downtown area of Seattle has grown a lot and these are visibly structurally denser than before. This even happens among detached SFHs where larger buildings are now interspersed among them with some blocks almost or totally overtaken by larger structures. This is not just growth in population numbers or number of housing units, but actually visible denser build outs. Even some detached SFHs that were cleared or added on to for even larger square footage homes on the same sized lots move the needle a little bit, though the vast majority of the greater urbanization of Seattle is the building up of surface parking lots or removal of smaller structures on a given lot size for larger structures be it mixed-use with multifamily units, straight multifamily unit additions, mixed commercial and office space, straight office space, or some other usage.
I understand that the "feel" and specifics of street frontage and wall to wall building and such are also important in defining how urban a place is as is the actual level of population and residential density. I argue, and I think fairly reasonably so, that the physical structural footprint of Baltimore has gone down alongside the actual population and residential density losses while Seattle has had its structural density go up even though population density has gone up further than the structural density has (which is probably a significant part of the housing crunch, low vacancies, and thus high prices that Seattle has been dealing with). I think it was a tough, but reasonable argument in 2010 where the population density of Seattle was about the same as Baltimore's but Seattle also had a lot more commuters of the greater area coming in than Baltimore so that was a difficult argument in favor of Seattle especially as there was a very strong case for Baltimore being structurally more dense. I think by 2020, the case for Seattle in terms of population and job density was overwhelming while that for greater structural density in favor of Baltimore over Seattle has changed considerably mostly due to increase in structural density of Seattle, but also to some degree continued structural density loss in Baltimore. I think it's still arguable to some extent in regards to structural density for Baltimore over Seattle and excluding the actual bustle and activity and residential, job and commercial density today, but it's a far harder argument to make today than it was in 2010 and it's likely an increasingly harder argument to make with each passing year for at least the near term future. That being said, I think it'd be interesting to see people try to make, with data sources if possible, reasonable most urban contiguous 50 square miles for Baltimore and Seattle, respectively.
I also disagree that LA in its most urban contiguous 50 square miles is more bustling than Chicago or Toronto in their most urban contiguous 50 square miles. I do not think anywhere in LA has the kind of structural density or bustle of the Loop, River North, Steeterville, Lake View East and a couple of other North Side neighborhoods. Koreatown to some extent matches some of those a peg lower and parts of downtown LA is getting there, but it's not the same as the fairly large contiguous expanse that Chicago has and does not reach the same peaks and is also quite splotchy so you really need to gerrymander the hell out of the LA contiguous 50 square miles to come even close. That splotchiness for LA matters a lot if we're talking about contiguous 50 square miles. However, I do think this may be a different story by 2030 as LA has made some very large zoning shifts especially tied to transit and transit is undergoing a fairly large (in the context of US cities) expansion.
I haven't been to Delhi or Karachi, but I have spent time in Manila, both the municipality and the larger Metro Manila area. The impression I got was that it is very urban, including as urban as large parts of Manhattan for fairly large stretches. There are very narrow streets with a lot of mid-rise and high-rise buildings and you basically never see detached single story single family structures with yards aside from the very surreal Chinese cemetery. Instead, you see a lot more wall-to-wall multi-story buildings, sometimes quite tall, built up completely to the street and the streets are usually quite narrow. The terrible poverty and poor state of infrastructure was pretty illustrative of how structural and population density can exacerbate some pretty bad things. Of course, there are some pretty new and glammed out parts of the area with shiny new or newish skyscrapers, but those are usually outside of Manila proper which is pretty small, but rather in other parts of Metro Manila.
Last edited by OyCrumbler; 02-03-2023 at 09:59 AM..
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