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Come on Kidphilly. We have done this before. You know exactly what I think is urban and I know what you think is urban. You and myself probably know what each other's preferences are more than any other posters we know on city-data.com
But am still curious, there were two story buildings in these images, so are they urban?
Not to get too technical, but DC has so much parkland (Rock Creek Park, the National Mall, etc...), I would be willing to guess that it's a lot less in actual total square miles. Then again Boston would be smaller too but I think DC has one of the highest percentages of parkland in the U.S.
Boston has an airport within the 40 sq miles. I do love Rock Creek park though, great asset for DC
1. Tighter streets is not what I mean by fronting the street. 0 Lot development is what I mean by fronting the street which means the buildings come right up to the street. It has nothing to do with the width of the street. Actually Boston needs to widen their sidewalks to be more pedestrian friendly if you want to go from an urban planning standpoint.
Boston still wins. If the sidewalks aren't as wide, as you just stated, then that means the buildings are closer to the street. Duh!
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Originally Posted by MDAllstar
2. Boston doesn't really have any urban canyons because the streets turn too much. The buildings are close together but it's in a different category because the streets downtown in Boston are laid different than other cities.
I'm going to jump out of this rabbit hole right now. By your logic, DC would be more urban than Manhattan's Financial District (a.k.a. "Gotham") because the streets turn.
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Originally Posted by MDAllstar
3. Skyscraperpage.com focuses on buildings not population.
What does this have to do with it being wrong?
Quote:
Originally Posted by MDAllstar
4. Backbay buildings are fine but the whole neighborhood doesn't look like that. You were very selective when you showed Backbay...so I will be just as selective
Wow. So your counter to my assertion is a sparkling, prototypical example of urbanity in Boston's core. If I wanted to cherrypick, I would have chosen this location.
DC has the second highest percentage of parkland, behind NYC:
Park Acres as Percent of Land Area
1. New York City - 19.6% - [38,229 acres]
2. Washington DC -19.4% - [7,617 acres]
3. San Francisco -18% [5,384 acres]
4. Jersey City -17.3% [1,660 acres]
5. Boston -16.3% [5,040 acres]
6. Philadelphia -12.6% [10,886 acres]
7. Long Beach -10.1% [3,275 acres]
8. Baltimore -9.5% [5,905 acres]
9. Chicago -8.2% [11,860 acres]
10. Los Angeles -7.9% [23,761 acres]
So do buildings in Boston have a large set back? I must always miss that, maybe they can widen their sidewalks to be more like DC
And is then a break in the continuity from the continuous urban canyon perspective? washington dc - Google Maps
Not sure they fit as skyscrapers
All the Northeast cities have 0 lot development mainly. Urban canyons is something NYC and D.C. have a ton of, Philly has a few, and Boston doesn't really have any. Doesn't make Boston less urban, just different. I never said Boston wasn't urban, I said it's only urban over a small area with the difference being I'm mainly only talking about downtown commercial residential structures.
Last edited by MDAllstar; 10-19-2011 at 02:55 PM..
Are you trying to compare that tiny amount of land with the massive amount of unbuildable land in Washington D.C.? Right......
Funny that you would call this tiny, the airport covers an area 50% larger than the DC DT - is DT DC tiny? would assume so based on your description
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