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But this is limited in scale and scope. And notice how this is a residential alley; you don't see little street-level businesses scattered around as you would in the old quarter of a European city.
For comparison, here is a street from the old quarter of Toulouse, which I picked because the metro area as a whole is one of the most suburbanized and car-centric in all of Western Europe:
But this is limited in scale and scope. And notice how this is a residential alley; you don't see little street-level businesses scattered around as you would in the old quarter of a European city.
For comparison, here is a street from the old quarter of Toulouse, which I picked because the metro area as a whole is one of the most suburbanized and car-centric in all of Western Europe:
But this is limited in scale and scope. And notice how this is a residential alley; you don't see little street-level businesses scattered around as you would in the old quarter of a European city.
For comparison, here is a street from the old quarter of Toulouse, which I picked because the metro area as a whole is one of the most suburbanized and car-centric in all of Western Europe:
Well these are streets in phildelphia, actually a 5 minute walk from all the skyscrapers, as narrow as what you show in images, though I agree there are some areas very narrow in Eurpose, some streets in rome and naples a rediculous. But there are block after block of these mazes, many can not fit a car
I can only speak for American cities I've been to.
The city that reminded me most of Vancouver was Miami. Climatically, culturally - no, but outside of Miami Beach, the sea of sleek highrises facing the water reminded me of Vancouver a lot in terms of how it's thought-out. Culturally I'd pair Vancouver with San Francisco.
The city that reminded me most of Montreal was Seattle. Blue-collar, working class vibe, with a slightly gritty but full of character downtown surrounded by sleepy, slightly drab suburbs, conifers, and water.
( As an aside, I really don't get the pairing of Seattle and Vancouver that's so often made - they feel completely different to me, aside from the backdrop. )
Toronto feels like any sprawly North-American city anywhere. I'm not saying it's all bad, I just don't get a patricularly distinctive feeling from it. Perhaps San Jose minus the good weather?
Calgary and Edmonton seem like brothers of Salt Lake City. Clean, new, car-culture sprawlathons.
Winnipeg and Mobile seem like an odd pairing, but there's something a little lost-feeling about both cities; like their core around a port or in Winnipeg's case, the railway, isn't enough to keep the city busy despite evident modernization.
Charlottetown, PEI is a northern, smaller, quieter sibling of Charleston, South Carolina. If you look at a map, there are a great deal of geographical similarities, too; both cities growing inland and over bridges from a historic wedge between two estuaries.
Victoria, BC is either a tiny, provincialized shred of San Francisco or oversized version of Santa Cruz, California.
Quebec city doesn't have counterpart.
I've never been to Ottawa.
Though there's much I like about living in Canadian cities, their planning and look don't really leave me in awe.
I nominate Portland OR. The State has an urban growth boundary that hems in development. However I heard one industry was unable to expand due to the boundary. It also has the ridiculous effect that land outside the boundary, even 100 m, is worth $5000 per acre when inside it is worth $100000.
Portland's dyed-in-the-wool western American, there's nothing European about it. There is a split in these responses between people who are naming U.S. cities that actually resemble European cities (Boston, D.C.) and people who equate European with lack of suburban sprawl (Portland, Calgary).
I never knew Lexington had a urban growth boundary- good post
I would plug Riverside, IL for being designed similar to an English Garden Suburb.
Riverside is probably the first, or one of the first, master-planned cities. But it was designed as a suburb, Chicago was already a thriving city just ten miles away by rail. I understand that originally it was acceptable to keep livestock, but most industry was forbidden. It's "long common" is an attractive feature not often seen in modern places.
The city that reminded me most of Montreal was Seattle. Blue-collar, working class vibe, with a slightly gritty but full of character downtown surrounded by sleepy, slightly drab suburbs, conifers, and water.
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Seattle does not strike me as "working class". The downtown looks like "Yuppieville, USA". The vibe is Microsoft geeks.
Seattle does not strike me as "working class". The downtown looks like "Yuppieville, USA". The vibe is Microsoft geeks.
Did you notice the giant multimodal port immediately south of downtown? Or the Boeing plant? Or the long-haul fishing fleets off of Magnolia and Ballard? Or the commodity terminals along the sound? The BNSF railyard?
There is lots of tech in Seattle itself but Microsoft HQ is across the lake in Belleview. Seattle is a very nice with a good downtown and that is not unrelated to its physical constraints for sprawl, good regional transit and solid land-use decisions ... NOT because it's filled with yuppies. There are plenty of yuppies, but if that's all you saw, you must not have looked around too hard.
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