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Well, not only that but Los Angeles annexed a large portion of its metropolitan area. Detroit by comparison remained a smaller city within it's overall metro area. Growth in the outer areas in either city could have very well masked whatever declines were present even when the overall population of the city was growing. I know for Detroit, the downtown area started to fall apart after the Great Depression.
Good point - helps when people fleeing the inner city still wind up in city limits. Though now you are seeing some of those areas in the SFV urbanize and/or decline.
[bAnother thing is that in most large cities, the streets and roads are typically narrow and thin, giving the sense of more density. Los Angeles on the other hand has wide streets and even a lot of open space in the form of parking lots or green space.
Basically, any neighborhood where sunlight can reach the street and there's grass and a front yard is considered suburban. Most urban environments aren't typically noted for open space and room to breathe.
Funny, the sun hits the streets of London and San Francisco quite easily. Sure you don't want to rethink this criteria?
There are far better density shots of Los Angeles, for example:
The central core of LA is as dense as San Francisco (17,000 residents per square mile). By central core I mean a 47 square mile area which is the same size as San Francisco. Roughly bounded by Fairfax (west), Downtown LA/LA River (east), Hollywood (north) and West Adams/10 Freeway (south).
And most of these parts of Los Angeles are very walkable..
Next time, if someone wants to argue that some of these smaller cities are more "big city" than Los Angeles, post this:
Popular living in census tracts of 20,000 ppsm or more:
New York: 8,133,721
London: 3,345,638
Los Angeles: 1,957,346
Chicago: 1,120,257
Toronto: 993,659
Montreal: 803,131
SF-Oakland: 746,826
Philadelphia: 743,549
Boston: 559,756
Washington DC: 318,232
Vancouver: 295,282
Miami: 272,074
Honolulu: 145,363
San Diego: 99,539
Baltimore: 77,946
Seattle: 58,192
Say what you want about ths LA urban form, any argument that it's not a real city is idiotic. We're talking about one of only a handful of first world megacities, people.
Next time, if someone wants to argue that some of these smaller cities are more "big city" than Los Angeles, post this:
Popular living in census tracts of 20,000 ppsm or more:
New York: 8,133,721
London: 3,345,638
Los Angeles: 1,957,346
Chicago: 1,120,257
Toronto: 993,659
Montreal: 803,131
SF-Oakland: 746,826
Philadelphia: 743,549
Boston: 559,756
Washington DC: 318,232
Vancouver: 295,282
Miami: 272,074
Honolulu: 145,363
San Diego: 99,539
Baltimore: 77,946
Seattle: 58,192
Say what you want about ths LA urban form, any argument that it's not a real city is idiotic. We're talking about one of only a handful of first world megacities, people.
Funny, the sun hits the streets of London and San Francisco quite easily. Sure you don't want to rethink this criteria?
There are far better density shots of Los Angeles, for example:
You've completely missed the point of that statement.
Even in the picture you've posted, there's quite a few noticeable parking lots. And then check out how wide this residential side street is. And it's not an outlier of streets within Los Angeles.
By comparison, streets in SF or London are usually more narrow with only a few major thoroughfares that are wide. Even if the buildings aren't as tall or there's not as much population density, it actually feels more dense and urban and even is probably a lot more pedestrian friendly and usually a lot less autocentric.
You've completely missed the point of that statement.
Even in the picture you've posted, there's quite a few noticeable parking lots. And then check out how wide this residential side street is. And it's not an outlier of streets within Los Angeles.
By comparison, streets in SF or London are usually more narrow with only a few major thoroughfares that are wide. Even if the buildings aren't as tall or there's not as much population density, it actually feels more dense and urban and even is probably a lot more pedestrian friendly and usually a lot less autocentric.
You've completely missed the point of that statement.
Even in the picture you've posted, there's quite a few noticeable parking lots. And then check out how wide this residential side street is. And it's not an outlier of streets within Los Angeles.
By comparison, streets in SF or London are usually more narrow with only a few major thoroughfares that are wide. Even if the buildings aren't as tall or there's not as much population density, it actually feels more dense and urban and even is probably a lot more pedestrian friendly and usually a lot less autocentric.
Dense yes, but pedestrian friendly or walkable? The London pic doesn't even have sidewalks.
There are very clearly sidewalks. Not that it's really a big deal for that street since it seems like a street with shared space. In many cases, once a road is narrow enough and traffic is low and has to travel at low speed, there's very little need for sidewalks.
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