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And there are plenty more where these came from. Downtown Baltimore is built on a basic grid, but there are a lot of quick curves like the ones shown.
The best Baltimore example IMO is Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd, making irregular curves around the western/northern border of downtown. Most of those links provided are just short transitions from grid to grid (or in the case of the Mulberry/Orleans links, a viaduct to surface street transition), given that downtown Baltimore has several small grids before joining the main Poppelton grid further out. Gay St. curves from the downtown grid to become a diagonal just before it passes under the JFX (I-83). Ensor St. between where Gay crosses Orleans has several curves before it separates from itself, with the main roadway becoming Harford Ave. Even Lombard St. downtown has a couple of short curves, but of course when I think of "Lombard St." and curves, another city out west comes to mind.
Basically the entire borough of Manhattan below 96th St qualifies.
More like 14th St, although there are some exceptions, such as Broadway, 12th Ave, Riverside Drive, St. Nicholas Ave, Morningside Drive, Edgecombe Ave, Ft. Washington Ave, and a few more in Upper Manhattan. 14th to 110th streets, outside of Central Park is pretty strictly just a rectilinear grid full of straight canyons, although there are a couple streets in the west 20s that curve for a block. Central Park's roads are curvy, but they're not quite what the OP is looking for.
Last edited by Borntoolate85; 12-01-2022 at 12:21 PM..
This thread actually forced me to do a little reflection. And while Boston definitely has some curving streets in the urban core, they're not nearly as dramatic as some of my favorites elsewhere like Victoria St. in Edinburgh, Regent St. in London, or any narrow street in any number of medieval European city and town centers.
In Boston, my favorites are probably Salem St. in the North End, Franklin St. in the Financial District, Main St. in Charlestown, etc. Honorable mention to Bow St. in Somerville and several streets in Harvard Square.
The more right angles the better though. I like for a city to have a planned look and feel.
Interesting. I tend to take the middle ground--some planning is good, but the best cities have a strong organic and romantic element to them. Too much monotony and predictability is awful for vibrancy.
Good examples all around in this thread though.
Haven't seen any Philly examples yet, which--despite being known for its super old tight grid--does have a number of idiosyncrasies:
The best Baltimore example IMO is Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd, making irregular curves around the western/northern border of downtown. Most of those links provided are just short transitions from grid to grid (or in the case of the Mulberry/Orleans links, a viaduct to surface street transition), given that downtown Baltimore has several small grids before joining the main Poppelton grid further out. Gay St. curves from the downtown grid to become a diagonal just before it passes under the JFX (I-83). Ensor St. between where Gay crosses Orleans has several curves before it separates from itself, with the main roadway becoming Harford Ave. Even Lombard St. downtown has a couple of short curves, but of course when I think of "Lombard St." and curves, another city out west comes to mind.
More like 14th St, although there are some exceptions, such as Broadway, 12th Ave, Riverside Drive, St. Nicholas Ave, Morningside Drive, Edgecombe Ave, Ft. Washington Ave, and a few more in Upper Manhattan. 14th to 110th streets, outside of Central Park is pretty strictly just a rectilinear grid full of straight canyons, although there are a couple streets in the west 20s that curve for a block. Central Park's roads are curvy, but they're not quite what the OP is looking for.
That's a ****load of exceptions you list on pretty large roadways so clearly it's a lot more than below 14th St. as you said.
It's actually Baltimore Avenue; don't know why the map lists it as National Pike. Bonus points for the single-width rowhouse wedged between the two streets.
This thread actually forced me to do a little reflection. And while Boston definitely has some curving streets in the urban core, they're not nearly as dramatic as some of my favorites elsewhere like Regent St. in London
I dunno, I feel that would look an awful lot like Center Plaza if you bulldozed everything on the right.
Eh, I think that's a reach. Beyond the curve, I don't think they have very much in common at all and it would take a lot of really negative changes to make this look like this. You'd need to bulldoze one entire side of the street and turn it into a windswept pedestrian wasteland, eliminate anything architecturally interesting or varied about the remaining facades, hide the remaining retail underneath a dark, cavernous overhang, widen the street by about 2-3x and add on-street parking spaces for cars to both sides. But that's a ton of "ifs" and all of those things have a pretty dramatic impact on the street level experience. Regent St. is an interesting area to walk. Center Plaza is a pretty crappy one and all of those differences are the reason why.
Those South End crescents are great, though. Some of my favorite pockets of the city.
By the way, that second one is Main Street, not Frederick Road. They're both the same road (a.k.a. MD 144), and it's Frederick Road for most of its length, but it's Main Street within the Ellicott City historic district, as shown here.
I feel like Atlanta is cheating though because unlike most American cities, the grid is an elaborate hoax. Atlanta attempted it in a couple areas of Downtown and Midtown but for the most part said sayonara to it, leaving lots of opportunities for this. For me it was more of a matter of "is the area dense enough?"
Also notice how most of them have the same street name, that should indicate that going through that corridor means it winds with density over and over again, which I think the OP is asking for. I just divided it up by neighborhood
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