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It's interesting it's such a beautiful and overlooked part of the country. Northern California, Oregon and Washington coasts. Maybe Eureka is the largest coastal city I guess.
Still if you put a major city somewhere along there I think it would be immensely popular, I don't know if the US has just caught up to that part of the country quite yet. Thoughts.
It's interesting it's such a beautiful and overlooked part of the country. Northern California, Oregon and Washington coasts. Maybe Eureka is the largest coastal city I guess.
Still if you put a major city somewhere along there I think it would be immensely popular, I don't know if the US has just caught up to that part of the country quite yet. Thoughts.
There are no natural harbors up there. That's also why Seattle and Portland aren't on the coast, they are on inlets to the sea.
As already mentioned, lack of natural harbors. But also topography. The Coast Ranges are very rugged and push right up to the Pacific Ocean, leaving little land for development w/o great cost. Take a drive up highway 1/101 from SF and you'll get a sense for how long it takes to drive this route. It's a 3 hr drive on narrow highways from the nearest Interstate (I-5) to Eureka.
There are no natural harbors up there. That's also why Seattle and Portland aren't on the coast, they are on inlets to the sea.
There are a few harbors, like Grays Harbor (the Aberdeen / Hoquiam / Cosmopolis, WA area). But the areas around them are mountainous enough that it'd be hard to develop a large city on any of them. Also, the relatively flat valley between the Coast Ranges and Cascades --- the I-5 corridor, where agriculture and rail lines are actually viable --- is over an hour away from any of these harbors. The I-5 corridor is where the vast majority of the PNW's population lives.
I am still surprised they're so unpopulated, even if there are no major cities. Seems like there should be a ~200k pop. PNW coastal metro, at least.
There are a few harbors, like Grays Harbor (the Aberdeen / Hoquiam / Cosmopolis, WA area). But the areas around them are mountainous enough that it'd be hard to develop a large city on any of them. Also, the relatively flat valley between the Coast Ranges and Cascades --- the I-5 corridor, where agriculture and rail lines are actually viable --- is over an hour away from any of these harbors. The I-5 corridor is where the vast majority of the PNW's population lives.
I am still surprised they're so unpopulated, even if there are no major cities. Seems like there should be a ~200k pop. PNW coastal metro, at least.
The interstate highways grew up inland because of Portland and Seattle as well as the topography as you say.
The bigger issue with Aberdeen is not just the mountainous surrounds, it's that the flat part along the river floods.
Another big factor is climate, Seattle and Portland get a bad reputation for being cold rainy cities outside of Summer, but they are miles better compared to the coast. Seattle and Portland are protected by the coast and Olympic Mountains but the coast is completely exposed to the massive storms that come one right after the other. Also it’s a pretty good thing that those areas are under populated as they are in danger of being hit by a massive tsunami whenever the Cascadia subduction zone triggers the next 9.0+ earthquake. Also those coastal towns economically have depended on the logging industry which doesn’t employ as many people as it once did so most of those places are pretty depressed.
That’s probably right. It seems like Astoria should be bigger than it is by that logic, but there’s probably another reason.
Most cities are placed as far inland as possible a ship can go, that is why Portland sits on the Willamette and not the Columbia, and just a bit further south are the massive Willamette falls in Oregon city. Astoria is just too far away from the economic and population center that is the Willamette valley. The only thing Astoria had going for it was its fishing and lumber industries which got both decimated after the Dams were built up and the salmon population collapsed, and the spotted owl was placed on the endangered list preventing loggers from clear cutting as much forests as they once did.
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