Does LA feel like the 2nd biggest city in America to you? (Los Angeles: apartment complex, stores)

[Chicano3000X]

Originally Posted by BarcelonaFan

Chicano, I just drove down a street in DTLA I beliece it was Figueroa. It was before you get to LA Live and Wilshire. It was an amazing sight that looked straight out of NYC. The spotlights near Staples and LA Live just made it look very Times Sq like.

Trip planned. Thanks Barcelona.

[yamota]

You know what place looks exactly like Times Square? Times Square

[Chicano3000X]

Originally Posted by yamota

You know what place looks exactly like Times Square? Times Square

We will beat it. We wont have a jumbo tron on a building, we'll have a jumbo tron for a building..

[MB8abovetherim]

Originally Posted by Chicano3000X

We will beat it. We wont have a jumbo tron on a building, we'll have a jumbo tron for a building..

lol Oh God! I like that LA and NYC are totally different. I'm glad America isn't a country with New York and then a bunch of wannabe New Yorks. Ever been to Japan? visit just about ANY city there and you'll think it's Tokyo. Look at China, there are megacities, MEGACITIES that we never hear about because they are all just like the rest! There's no substance in that at all man. Even Canadian cities all seem super clean and boring. At least in LA I can still watch a hobo take a s**t on a sidewalk in broad daylight downtown or watch Spiderman and Darth Vader fist fight over a piece of sidewalk in Hollywood. We seem to take LA's peculiararity for granted or we twist it into a bad thing and wish it were like NYC. Trying to be New York?...what are we, Chicago?

[Chicano3000X]

Originally Posted by MB8abovetherim

lol Oh God! I like that LA and NYC are totally different. I'm glad America isn't a country with New York and then a bunch of wannabe New Yorks. Ever been to Japan? visit just about ANY city there and you'll think it's Tokyo. Look at China, there are megacities, MEGACITIES that we never hear about because they are all just like the rest! There's no substance in that at all man. Even Canadian cities all seem super clean and boring. At least in LA I can still watch a hobo take a s**t on a sidewalk in broad daylight downtown or watch Spiderman and Darth Vader fist fight over a piece of sidewalk in Hollywood. We seem to take LA's peculiararity for granted or we twist it into a bad thing and wish it were like NYC. Trying to be New York?...what are we, Chicago?

Nah, L.A. is doing it's own thing.
But NYC has it right with time square. And it is a common thing, just like how we have L.A. live. Every city has it's own neon/billboard section where people crowd to.

I'm just saying we got so many years to do it the best. So many years to look forward to since L.A. is already changing, we can imagine the possibilities.

[BarcelonaFan]

At least in LA I can still watch a hobo take a s**t on a sidewalk in broad daylight downtown or watch Spiderman and Darth Vader fist fight over a piece of sidewalk in Hollywood.

Extreme poverty is entertaining to you?

[RaymondChandlerLives]

Chicano is single-handedly giving L.A. an inferiority complex it never had, lol.

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by Chicano3000X

True, i like LA architecture, but the thing that weirds me out is a line of detached apartment buildings. I think if they were built side by side, it would give the city a larger feeling while your on street level. But too late for that. But still you get some good density.

For the life of me I'll never understand why attached housing is so important to some people on this site. IMO the alleys that detached apartments create are way more "big city" looking.

[Carlite]

Originally Posted by munchitup

For the life of me I'll never understand why attached housing is so important to some people on this site. IMO the alleys that detached apartments create are way more "big city" looking.

The older cities in the U.S.--New York, Boston, Philadelphia, even San Francisco--are characterized by attached rows of buildings, apartment buildings and/or rowhouses (there's a nice rowhouse thread on General U.S.). Those rows make a strong impression--from the street you look at a full block of housing.

But they aren't necessary for density, especially moderate density. A lot of LA neighborhoods don't look particularly dense, and many wouldn't find them especially attractive. But the cool surprise is there are a lot of people in them, and in a lot of places they even support good commercial streets.

[PA Born]

Originally Posted by RaymondChandlerLives

Let's see if I have this straight.

Your rowhouse = urban
Our massive apartment buildings = suburban

Where do you guys get this logic from? Because our housing is actually modern and comes with dedicated parking? You guys out there really need to stop acting like you're the authority on urbanity and city living. You're really not.

Yes, this is correct. A 19th century rowhouse is much more urban than some 50's era garden apartment complex.

Urbanity isn't only about density. You can have dense suburban environment, which is 80%-90% of the LA Metro. Stuffing tons of people into suburban-style apartment complexes will create high density, but not urbanity.

And it had little to do with dediacated parking. It's creating a totally autocentric environment. Places like the SFV are quite dense, but you would have to be crazy to consider that a solid urban environment. It's mostly the same strip malls and garden apartment complexes as anywhere else, except you have more people per unit because of immigration and higher housing costs.