What midwestern city seems most “urban” to you (except Chicago)?

[mrnyc]

^ ahh yeah thanks i was thinking of those pics or some like them but i couldnt find that.

[eschaton]

One thing I don't think people appreciate much is formal apartment buildings were to a large extent an early 20th century invention in the U.S. The only U.S. cities which had a substantive number of 19th century apartment buildings (otherwise known as tenements) were NYC, Boston, and Cincinnati. Everywhere else up until 1900, you were more apt to be a boarder or otherwise share space, live in a small rented single-family home (attached or detached) or have a medium-term stay at a hotel, SRO, or boarding house.

This is one of the reasons that that in the Great Lakes cities the big brick apartment buildings of the early 20th century seem to come from nowhere - they were more or less an entirely new housing. Even smaller-scale versions - like the two-flats, three-flats, six-flats, etc that dot Chicago - are mostly post-1900 inventions.

[MPLS_Const_Watch]

A lot of interesting discussions here.

My initial thought after reading the initial question and drawing from my experiences (note: I have never been to Columbus or Cincy, and have only spent limited time in Cleveland) was that St. Louis has the best collection of "complete" urban neighborhoods, from an urban design standpoint (with Pittsburgh or Milwaukee as runners-up), but that Minneapolis (with Detroit as runner-up) offers the best functional urban environment.

However, I was really shocked to see Steely Dan's chart (http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...&postcount=113). Milwaukee has nearly twice as many 15k+ ppsqm tracts as Minneapolis, and St. Louis has zero? Wow. I have spent a lot of time in both Milwaukee and St. Louis, and I would have definitely under-estimated Milwaukee and over-estimated St. Louis.

It's hard to say... maybe Milwaukee has the best combination of both traditional urban bones and functional urban living today? Although the first post specifically asked us to separate a city's "status" from its urban characteristics, I guess it is a bit difficult for me to compare cities that are on different planes as far as financial and cultural importance and to fully separate that from my thinking. But maybe Milwaukee does rise to the top in this metric despite being a smaller and less prominent metro. I think reasonable arguments can be made for Minneapolis or St. Louis as well, likely for Detroit (and Pittsburgh if you include it in the geography) too.

All of that being said, as some others observed upthread, if St. Louis hadn't suffered the intense urban renewal and long-term economic conditions that it has, it would unquestionably be at the top. I think there is tremendous potential in St. Louis and an amazing foundation to build upon, but I don't know what the solutions are to their economic woes.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

If only one other city in the midwest had had a rail transit system, the midwest could've easily had a preeminent "second" city like Boston or Philly.

However, many of you guys talk as if it's too late. It's never too late.

Mistakes have been made, but they are being remedied. Look at what's happening in Minneapolis (the clear front runner in urbanization). Look at what Detroit is doing.

it's not about being too late, it's about lamenting the loss of what we already had.

a st. louis that had built a subway and commuter rail system back in the day might have staved off some of the popualtion decline and almost certainly would have kept downtown more vital.

a st. louis in 2019 with 650,000 people and a fully healthy urban core radiating out from a vibrant downtown would have been really cool, almost like a midwest boston as goat314 said.


that said, yes, we can only go forward, not backward. minneapolis is making strides, and is the healthiest midwest city at the moment, it'll be fun to see where it goes over the next couple decades.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by MPLS_Const_Watch

However, I was really shocked to see Steely Dan's chart (http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...&postcount=113). Milwaukee has nearly twice as many 15k+ ppsqm tracts as Minneapolis, and St. Louis has zero? Wow. I have spent a lot of time in both Milwaukee and St. Louis, and I would have definitely under-estimated Milwaukee and over-estimated St. Louis.

the number of census tracts above a certain threshold is only an indication of density. because they can vary wildly in size, census tracts certainly don't make for a perfect apples to apples point of comparison.

but they are one of the few small-scale geographic units that we have, as imperfect as they are. a different, and perhaps better way to look at it is the total number of people living in census tracts above a certain density in different cities.

this is 9 years old now, but still gives a decent indication:

major midwest cities by total # of people in census tracts >10,000 ppsm (2010):

Chicago - 2,584,931
Milwaukee - 252,711
Minneapolis -183,441
Cleveland - 98,090
Detroit - 70,371
St. Louis - 64,143
Columbus - 38,613
Cincinnati - 34,703
Kansas City -2,998
Indianapolis - 0

Originally Posted by MPLS_Const_Watch

I think reasonable arguments can be made for Minneapolis or St. Louis as well, likely for Detroit (and Pittsburgh if you include it in the geography) too.

for sure, reasonable arguments can be made for a lot of different midwest cities for the question at hand.

there is no clear-cut winner for the No. 2 most urban city in the midwest like there is for the No. 1 spot (chicago).

[pj3000]

Minneapolis is the healthiest, but is it even really part of the same region as all of the other cities we’re talking about here?

I’m not familiar enough with the overall vast region of the Midwest to make that determination. But it just seems like an outlier to me, since it’s not rustbelt (and never faced the same type of massive decline) like the others are. I mean, to me, comparing St. Louis to Minneapolis almost seems like comparing St. Louis to Dallas.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by pj3000

Minneapolis is the healthiest, but is it even really part of the same region as all of the other cities we’re talking about here?

some of the more smug citizen of the twin cites would like to cast off the "midwest" label, feeling that they are not only literally above the rest of us, but also figuratively as well.

however, as a life-long chicagoan who spent several years in college up in the twin cities, i would absolutely place minneapolis within the greater midwest context.

"rust belt" might not fit so well, but "midwest" certainly does.


that said, these things are a little bit easier for me to see as a chicagoan because chicago is so close to the geographic center of the midwest, and straddles the line between the more industrial-focused areas of the eastern midwest (the "rustbelt") and the more hard-core agriculture-focused lands of the western midwest (the "corn/grain belt"). so it's not a big leap for me to see cleveland & omaha or cincinnati & minneapolis as being in the same region. however, people in omaha & cleveland or cincinnati & minneapolis probably have a harder time seeing that.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Row houses were not rare in Detroit. Attached row houses were built all over the city throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, and in varying styles. For example:

I don't know why you're pushing this so hard, nobody ever said Detroit never had row homes, Detroit did and continues to build them but it was never row home dominated the way STL and Cincy and Baltimore are/were. How is this controversial?

The renewal on the east side destroyed neighborhoods that looked like what's left in Corktown, again some row homes but not dominated.

BTW nobody has built Elmwood park style town homes in decades, new construction row home/town homes look like this.
https://detroit.curbed.com/2019/8/14...homes-for-sale
https://detroit.curbed.com/2019/5/8/...view-townhomes

[craigs]

Originally Posted by eschaton

It's not true however that San Francisco is a rowhouse city in its entirety. Lots of the older portions of the city have houses separated by a few inches to a few feet.

Pull up from Streetview into a low level aerial--many of those homes are actually attached. They are not flush for the entire property line like classic attached rows in Philadelphia or Baltimore are, but those that share walls are correctly categorized as attached units.

Some 12.5% of San Francisco homes are classified by the Census Bureau as single unit, attached--but almost none of them look like rowhouses back East. And it's hard to tease out information for buildings like these when they have been subdivided into flats, because the Census Bureau then just counts up how many units they have without reference to attachment.

Now, do understand you were intended to be confused about this--it's an illusion Victorian builders wanted to convey, and genteel buyers wanted to indulge. "Look how prosperous we are, all freestanding and shit!" But they are technically rows, womp womp.

[jpdivola]

There isn't an obvious answer. In a perfect world you would combine the historic core of DT Detroit, the neighborhoods of St. Louis and the infill and vitality of Minneapolis.

In the real world, I would go with Minneapolis. Particularly if urban leans more on walk-ability/vibrancy rather than architectural built environment. The city isn't the most impressive from an prewar architectural sense. But, it is the healthiest of the bigger cities. It's urban in the Seattle model: A streetcar suburb vernacular with clustered density in "in fill" urban villages.

But, the great thing is that pretty much every city is improving. Even the cities that continue to lose population have revitalizing areas that are attracting suburbanites/tourists for drinking/eating/entertainment and millennial/empty nesters residents.

[jtown,man]

Some examples around Norfolk where they have attached(or near attached) homes that mimic(to some extent) the NE. Actually, I don't know what the conversation was even about im responding to...I just saw Norfolk brought up so I wanted to show my city some love on here

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.8575...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.8638...7i16384!8i8192

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.8550...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.8520...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.8511...7i16384!8i8192

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by The North One

I'm sorry but Minneapolis's sterile downtown with little to no store fronts is a joke and the skyway isn't something you can just shrug off, it's street-vibrancy killing terrible urban planning. And it's boxy skyline is not the best outside of Chicago.

If we're talking just downtowns alone what makes Minneapolis so functional? It's just as dependent on the car as Cincy and Cleveland and I'd consider both of those much more fleshed out and walkable downtowns. How is a lack of dead/blight zones relevant when there's nothing really great to work with in the first place? Maybe if Minn still had it's gateway district but that's long gone and never to return.

Dude, you hate every city that is healthy and growing lol

[SFBruin]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

chicago is so close to the geographic center of the midwest, and straddles the line between the more industrial-focused areas of the eastern midwest (the "rustbelt") and the more hard-core agriculture-focused lands of the western midwest (the "corn/grain belt").

Totally off-topic, but I always felt that Chicago was the exact fusion between the great plains and the great lakes regions. Probably why it ended up being so big.

[benp]

Originally Posted by pj3000

Ok, I'll play. So "development pressures" is your thing?

Why then, for example, did Providence and Hartford and Springfield and Rochester and Buffalo, and then Cleveland and Detroit, not develop into "rowhouse cities"? These places were among the larger (and largest) cities in the nation (and rapidly developed) from the mid-1800s to early 1900s (the "rowhouse era", if you will).

And during this same era, why then did significantly smaller places (which didn't have nearly the population nor growth/development pressures) like Reading and Allentown and Bethlehem and Harrisburg and Lancaster and Frederick become "rowhouse cities"?

I'm not ignoring big cities and I'm not focusing on small cities. I'm talking about the bigger cities of the day... go ahead and look up population and growth numbers for places like Providence, Buffalo, Rochester, Cleveland, Detroit, etc. in the era.

And I've never suggested that this typology isn't primarily found in the Northeastern US. I agree with that, but the Northeast is also largely characterized by a detached housing typology.

Did the availability of lumber perhaps play the largest role in the development of wood framed homes versus brick row houses? By the early 19th century much of the East Coast had already been deforested. Ports on the Great Lakes had the greatest access to lumber, and a rapidly growing population in the 1800s thru early 1900s. There were wood row houses in Buffalo, for example, but most have not stood the test of time. Very few brick rows were built. Chicago was an exception, because of the fire.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by benp

Did the availability of lumber perhaps play the largest role in the development of wood framed homes versus brick row houses? By the early 19th century much of the East Coast had already been deforested. Ports on the Great Lakes had the greatest access to lumber, and a rapidly growing population in the 1800s thru early 1900s. There were wood row houses in Buffalo, for example, but most have not stood the test of time. Very few brick rows were built. Chicago was an exception, because of the fire.

Timber was freely available basically everywhere in America (as opposed to the UK, where trees had become so rare that wood was basically only used for support beams and the like - never for external cladding. But in some parts of the country though wood was seen as more of a cheap/low class material. I know here in Pittsburgh in the 19th century it was common for wood homes to be built first as an area urbanized, then later to be either torn down by the owners to replace with a grander brick home, or simply infilled with denser brick development.

I do think we take for granted the degree to which early disasters helped to make the unique vernaculars of many cities. San Francisco's earthquake basically ended masonry construction. Chicago's fire codes more or less banned wood-framed construction (with the exceptions noted above) along with attached homes. Philly had a notable fire early in the 19th century which resulted in a total ban on wood homes as well. And the unique style of the "French Quarter" of New Orleans was due to fire codes as well (all buildings stucco or brick, every building fronting directly on the sidewalk, etc).

[Centropolis]

chicagos fire and fire code was not unique.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by The North One

I don't know why you're pushing this so hard, nobody ever said Detroit never had row homes, Detroit did and continues to build them but it was never row home dominated the way STL and Cincy and Baltimore are/were. How is this controversial?

The renewal on the east side destroyed neighborhoods that looked like what's left in Corktown, again some row homes but not dominated.

BTW nobody has built Elmwood park style town homes in decades, new construction row home/town homes look like this.
https://detroit.curbed.com/2019/8/14...homes-for-sale
https://detroit.curbed.com/2019/5/8/...view-townhomes

If you think that's pedantic, wait until I point out that NYC and Philadelphia also don't really fit the "row house city" definition because they both have a ton of detached single family housing, and detached multi-family flats.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

some of the more smug citizen of the twin cites would like to cast off the "midwest" label, feeling that they are not only literally above the rest of us, but also figuratively as well.

however, as a life-long chicagoan who spent several years in college up in the twin cities, i would absolutely place minneapolis within the greater midwest context.

"rust belt" might not fit so well, but "midwest" certainly does.


that said, these things are a little bit easier for me to see as a chicagoan because chicago is so close to the geographic center of the midwest, and straddles the line between the more industrial-focused areas of the eastern midwest (the "rustbelt") and the more hard-core agriculture-focused lands of the western midwest (the "corn/grain belt"). so it's not a big leap for me to see cleveland & omaha or cincinnati & minneapolis as being in the same region. however, people in omaha & cleveland or cincinnati & minneapolis probably have a harder time seeing that.

As a person from Detroit, I never really thought of Detroit and Minneapolis as being in the region. After having visited there a few times I can easily see the similarities, but Minneapolis also feels a bit more quintessential Midwest than Detroit.

I've said before on this forum that I don't recall Detroiters strongly identifying as Midwesterners when I was growing up -- it was more like a technicality. But, my family, and many of the people I grew up around, didn't have deep roots in the region. My father moved to Detroit as a young child with his family, and my mother was born near Ann Arbor right after her parents relocated to Michigan.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

If you think that's pedantic, wait until I point out that NYC and Philadelphia also don't really fit the "row house city" definition because they both have a ton of detached single family housing, and detached multi-family flats.

Philly has a gigantic share of rowhouses. NYC is a multifamily city, not a rowhouse city. Detroit never had a large share of rowhouses (or multifamily, for that matter).

Even the destroyed areas like Black Bottom were never characterized by rowhouses or large apartment buildings.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Philly has a gigantic share of rowhouses. NYC is a multifamily city, not a rowhouse city. Detroit never had a large share of rowhouses (or multifamily, for that matter).

I don't agree. Detroit didn't have row house neighborhoods like areas of Brooklyn, Manhattan, or Philly, but it had quite a bit of architecture that we define as row housing. The difference is that Detroit's architectural styles were mixed within neighborhoods more than is the case on the east coast.

Also, up to half of the city's population lived in multi-family housing pre-1950.

Originally Posted by Crawford

Even the destroyed areas like Black Bottom were never characterized by rowhouses or large apartment buildings.

Almost everyone who lived in Black Bottom lived in multi-family dwellings.