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North Beach, near Fisherman's Wharf, to Outer Sunset.
That drive is very similar (in distance and time) to going from North End to Jamaica Plain in Boston.
I think San Francisco has more consistent density than Boston. San Francisco needed to be built that way because of the topography. However, that drive is pretty short compared to what you could do in Chicago, let alone New York City.
I still think you're reading too much into this. LA is a major influence on it's region, it's known for beaches, rich people, flashy lifestyle, famous people, taco trucks, hispanic culture, etc. Miami is also known for beaches, rich people, flashy lifestyle, moreso a Caribbean culture than central American, but still very similar in my opinion.
You can point out many differences bwtween the two cities but many cultural similarities.
LA is definitely the west coast version of Miami.
I don't know. I still stand by my old opinion. I really don't think I'm overthinking it that much at all. Having been to both LA and Miami, they are completely different experiences. Even just the beaches alone are very different.
We'll just have to agree to disagree on this I guess.
I've visited each of the cities mentioned and lived in LA before.
Honestly I have heard people compare LA to NYC. I know LA has tried to be on par with NYC with LA Live trying to mimic Times Square, but I still don't see it as the west coast NYC. I think that title still belongs to SF.
I feel LA if you cut out the San Fernando Valley is still more like Miami. A warmer, spread out and party culture city. Both have origins from Latin America. Miami having Cuban immigrant routes and LA once being a Spanish town.
I also feel that SF and NYC are older cities. SF dating to being a lively city during the gold rush era and NYC being one of the first estabilished cities in this nation.
Miami and LA, have been around, but didn't see their growth until around the WW2 era.
LA, though, is almost in it's own category because it's economy is larger and more diverse than Miami.
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Orange County in CA and Orlando, FL seem to be both be fiscally conservative, but morally progressive. Anaheim-Santa Ana compared to Orlando are both sprawled out. Super sunny weather. Both have several amusement parks.
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Thoughts?
Disagree completely.
Some webzine did an article a while back showing how you could basically cut out an area in central LA from the river to West Hollywood that would have nearly identical area, population, and density as all of San Francisco. When people try to compare "San Francisco" to NYC, they typically do this by lumping in other cities that are over an hour away in different counties. Los Angeles, on the other hand, pretty much has the size and population of Chicago just in the basin without the valley. When all the metro upgrades are in place (which could include a subway through the Sepulveda pass and a rail from Van Nuys to Sylmar) imagine how that comparison would look, when the LA Metro has already surpassed the idle BART.
Los Angeles became a major city by 1910...by this time the railroad had been connected, oil discovered, and the movie studios had consolidated there. By 1925 the interurban rail system in Los Angeles had more miles of track then NYC has right now. Olympics in 1932, global aviation hub in the 40's, etc.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the port of Long Beach and Los Angeles do more business than all of the ports in Florida combined. L.A. is a HUGE deal, and San Francisco will never even come close to matching it. If San Diego was little savvier in luring business here, we could catch up to SF.
I don't know. I still stand by my old opinion. I really don't think I'm overthinking it that much at all. Having been to both LA and Miami, they are completely different experiences. Even just the beaches alone are very different.
We'll just have to agree to disagree on this I guess.
Well yeah they are different, they are different cities. LOL Miami still has the most cultural similarities to LA on the east coast.
Those numbers are part of why I was expecting San Francisco to remind me more of Boston, but numbers don't tell the whole story -- when I was actually in San Francisco, it just struck me as significantly larger than Boston in feel. Here's an example for you: The last morning I was there, I drove from my hotel across the city to get some designer donuts. The drive took me about half an hour. There was no traffic to speak of. In all this time, I never left dense neighborhoods full of multi-family housing and drove down endless walkable streets packed wall to wall with shops, with the exception of cutting through a big-city park. I think if I'd set out from the edge of Boston and didn't hit traffic, I'd be well into the suburbs after half an hour.
The scale reminded me of Chicago because if I'd left a hotel in Lake View and driven half an hour, I think I might have a similar experience of density and probably land in the South Loop at the end.
I agree San Francisco feels a bit bigger and denser than Boston but they still feel similar to each other in some ways. If I had to pick; I'd say San Francisco is a west coast Boston, certainly not NYC.
Living in SF, I've visited Boston, NYC (twice), Chicago and DC all within the last year or so. Not to mention that I've been to all 4 in the past on multiple occasions. In my personal utterly biased opinion, these days the closest in feel to San Francisco is Washington. Boston just does not have the same kind of street life or energy. NYC is on another scale altogether. Chicago is just so very different. DC, on the other hand, reminded me of San Francisco. It's not just the scale, the multitude of lively neighborhoods, but also the trajectory. It seems that DC has enjoyed quite an expansion since I visited a decade or so ago. All this made it feel similar to the we-are-in-yet-another-gold-rush town, which is now SF.
Some webzine did an article a while back showing how you could basically cut out an area in central LA from the river to West Hollywood that would have nearly identical area, population, and density as all of San Francisco. When people try to compare "San Francisco" to NYC, they typically do this by lumping in other cities that are over an hour away in different counties. Los Angeles, on the other hand, pretty much has the size and population of Chicago just in the basin without the valley. When all the metro upgrades are in place (which could include a subway through the Sepulveda pass and a rail from Van Nuys to Sylmar) imagine how that comparison would look, when the LA Metro has already surpassed the idle BART.
Los Angeles became a major city by 1910...by this time the railroad had been connected, oil discovered, and the movie studios had consolidated there. By 1925 the interurban rail system in Los Angeles had more miles of track then NYC has right now. Olympics in 1932, global aviation hub in the 40's, etc.
Another thing to keep in mind is that the port of Long Beach and Los Angeles do more business than all of the ports in Florida combined. L.A. is a HUGE deal, and San Francisco will never even come close to matching it. If San Diego was little savvier in luring business here, we could catch up to SF.
I think it's important to keep in mind that the Bay Area's population has been kept artificially low relative to demand by restrictive zoning laws - were the region as wide-open as Southern California in terms of construction, I would expect their population numbers to be much closer. Even as things stand, though, the Bay Area's status as the leader of technological innovation in the U.S. makes it arguably as relevant nationally, if not more so, than L.A. (As for San Diego... I doubt that savvy in "luring business" would make, say, La Jolla home to a Google or Intel. There are factors of economic agglomeration at work that would make that extremely unlikely.)
SF is a small city of 800,000 thousand, LA is a large city of over 4 million. I don't see how anyone can compare SF to NY, a city of over 8 million. A better comparison is LA to NY. Greater Metro LA is 18 million, while greater metro NY is 20 million. Both are very racially diverse cities with very big city problems.
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