Does LA feel like the 2nd biggest city in America to you? (San Francisco: condominium, purchase)

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by BitofEndearment

Los Angeles feels enormous to me, even if it is in a different way from other cities. I'm from the east coast, Boston, and cities out there are just different. And I've been to NYC a dozen times before and if you're comparing LA to NYC, while LA isn't teeny in comparison it does, I get what you're saying, feel a lot tamer and smaller. NYC is NYC, it feels like the center of all gravitational pull, it's ancient, if all has everything, NYC is everything.

Anyway, LA, like people have mentioned, goes on for-EVER. And it's not all just suburban sprawl, it's plenty dense. LA is also very diverse architecturally/planning-wise. Unlike metro areas like, say, Ft. Lauderdale/West Palm Beach that feel so lazy and monotone IMO, LA's metro area has a lot of variation, from the victorians of West Adams, to the art deco of DTLA, to the 50s style that covers much of the city from Hollywood to Long Beach and most of the ghettos, to the Spanish style homes, to the strange oasis that is San Fernando, to the pre-fab ugliness that is Santa Clarita.

If anyone has ever rode the Blue Line from 7th Street all the way to Long Beach, they are never ever ever going to say LA feels small. NYC feels like a jungle but LA feels like an ocean. You can get lost in it so easily and it's quite overwhelming. Just take my parents, they just felt disarmed with how big LA is, but it almost it worse than NYC or Boston because it's a giant grid and everything is seamless, there is less delineation between towns and neighborhoods except for the mountains and hills, so the places just seems to go on forever and forever without cease.

DTLA is pretty small, even compared to Boston. Someone said 5 miles, but that would include the warehouse district and skid row. If you only include the historic core, little tokyo, the civic center, and la live area, it still feels even smaller, plus everything is "emptier" than Boston or NYC, both the buildings and the streets. It does not have the bustle of even San Fran. However, it just has endles ammounts of neighborhoods and cities with some degree of foot and car traffic, heavier in places like Hollywood or Santa Monica.

Interesting, I find DTLA to be just as busy as downtown Boston was. It also seems like it is larger to me. Though both depend on what you count as downtown in Boston.

I agree that LA just feels like an ocean, especially the way it packs everything into the flatlands right up to the hills.

[PA Born]

Originally Posted by RaymondChandlerLives

How are apartments "suburban-style" anyway. Multi-unit dwellings, regardless of their aesthetics, are the antithesis of quaint, leafy suburban living.

Uh, I don't think so.

Multfamily can definitely be super-suburban. There's dense multifamily all over OC, but no one would mistake Irvine for urban living.

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by PA Born

Uh, I don't think so.

Multfamily can definitely be super-suburban. There's dense multifamily all over OC, but no one would mistake Irvine for urban living.

Agreed I have lived in a very suburban apartment complex in Thousand Oaks: http://goo.gl/maps/yEb0c
My friend lives in a different style apartment complex in TO but suburban all the same: http://goo.gl/maps/zhtsl (good luck walking anywhere through that maze)

However LA doesn't really have those "complexes" even in places like the Valley (as far as I know) - the multifamily housing is overwhelmingly large apartment buildings that take up a great deal of the lot they are on. If they have a setback it probably means the back of the building goes right up to the lot-line (or on either side). LA has some suburban aesthetics but at the same time the vast majority of the city feels very urban to me - you can definitely tell the difference between a main arterial in LA and one in OC.

[PA Born]

Originally Posted by lastonestanding

Like one poster said, LA is more spread out, Chicago is more similar to New York as far as density is concerned (Don't show me no damn stats neither, I had the luxury of actually residing in all three cities). However, I liked being able to catch the blue line from DTLA to Long Beach or riding a bus into Culver City for a casting call. New York is similar to Chicago to me except more high rise buildings and its more spread out. New York actually has small tract houses too similar to Chicago with tree lined streets that you would think would be in a suburb. There's more to NYC than just Manhattan. LA being more spread out actually works in its favor. It doesn't need a condense downtown like NYC or Chicago. If you want that, take a trip up to San Francisco.

This is pretty much all wrong. I have lived in all three cities.

NYC, Chicago, and LA are all totally different. And, yeah, obviously I will show you stats, because they're a lot more precise than some poster's opinions.

NYC has far higher density than the other two, and is nothing whatseover like Chicago or LA in built form. LA and Chicago have very similar density, but in LA, the density is flat, over a huge area, while in Chicago there's a high density core and everything else is super low-density.

NYC has relatively few small tract homes within city limits. The entire city is only like 15% single family homes, and, outside of Staten Island (which has a small population), there are almost no tract homes. Chicago is very different in that it has a huge bungalow belt. LA is unique too, with a different style of bungalow.

[BitofEndearment]

Originally Posted by munchitup

Interesting, I find DTLA to be just as busy as downtown Boston was. It also seems like it is larger to me. Though both depend on what you count as downtown in Boston.

I agree that LA just feels like an ocean, especially the way it packs everything into the flatlands right up to the hills.

I don't know. I'm in DTLA four or five times a week and no matter which part I'm in it just doesn't have the same crowd size. The closest it gets I think it Broadway on a Sunday, Sunday farmers markets, and art walks. Sometimes the area around Pershing Square as well.

I guess it does depend on where you're thinking in Boston. I'm thinking Copley Square then Newbury Street to the Common and Downtown Crossing, and Dewey Square whenever I think of Downtown Boston, and I used to pass through Dewey every day on my way to and from school, and I worked in Downtown Crossing all throughout high school, and while sometimes the foot traffic in DTLA matches Boston's, it's not with the same consistency and isn't as widespread.

[PA Born]

Originally Posted by BarcelonaFan

Am I the only one that's stumbled on Pico Blvd? It was like a scene out of Blade Runner the night I went. It was packed with people in the streets, neon lights and hustle and bustle unlike I've ever seen. It went all the way to MacArthur Park and Wilshire. I know it's not downtown but it's close enough and it felt really dense and urban. Almost like Canal St. times two.

Canal Street has massive pedestrian traffic 24/7; so much that you're practically pushed into the street traffic. Canal probably has 20-30 times the pedestrian volume on Pico.

Where on Pico is there heavy pedestrian traffic? I have been on Pico a million times, and the part near downtown is basically Latino coin laundry outlets, discount furniture stores, etc. it doesn't seem that different from any major Mexican/Central American corridor in LA. There's also a decent Korean presence as you get further from downtown.

[munchitup]

Originally Posted by BitofEndearment

I don't know. I'm in DTLA four or five times a week and no matter which part I'm in it just doesn't have the same crowd size. The closest it gets I think it Broadway on a Sunday, Sunday farmers markets, and art walks. Sometimes the area around Pershing Square as well.

I guess it does depend on where you're thinking in Boston. I'm thinking Copley Square then Newbury Street to the Common and Downtown Crossing, and Dewey Square whenever I think of Downtown Boston, and I used to pass through Dewey every day on my way to and from school, and I worked in Downtown Crossing all throughout high school, and while sometimes the foot traffic in DTLA matches Boston's, it's not with the same consistency and isn't as widespread.

Yeah I guess I wasn't considering anything past the Public Garden - I'll defer to the Boston native on that one. If you are counting neighborhoods like the North End and Beacon Hill then I definitely agree, LA needs to build those inner-downtown neighborhoods up - Chinatown, Historic Core, City-West - their maturation will do a lot for the street life in DTLA.

I'm not in DTLA as much as you are, only about 3 times a week and I am usually in the same general area near the 7th Street / Metro Center stop.

[taydigga]

Originally Posted by BarcelonaFan

Not that there is no talent in LA but there is just a lot more people with a dollar and a dream here than actual skills, education and drive.

LOL, B you're really serious about this huh? I hear you say that a lot. I've lived here 14 years and I think a little differently. Not dissing on your opinion btw, just think it's a little tainted by your own experience. I think you're jaded in this regards. This city attracts the most talented people in the world. Only NYC rivals it. Sure Boston, Chicago and etc., have some talented and smart people, but a lot of those people move here. I know a lot of people apply to the same job and a lot don't have talent and etc., but that's mostly in a select few fields, I wouldn't say LA is any different than the other big cities in regards to the over saturation of applicants applying to jobs.

[taydigga]

I think i know what people mean by it not being dense. they just mean how you can hit a street in LA and no one is there while in NYC, it's never like that. Don't get me wrong...I don't think that's what makes a city a city. I'm not a "it has to be a ton of people everywhere" to be urban. But I know what people mean when they say that. Some parts of LA are really dense while others aren't...I like it like that. LA has soo much variety.

[taydigga]

Originally Posted by JohnSoCal

In reality it is pointless to compare the 2 because each city is very unique in its own way.

Then everything is pointless...

Most points are made by the people that make them...(think about that one) as is those who miss or don't see a point are those that think things are pointless. To each his own...