The US Census Bureau thread

[edale]

Originally Posted by LA21st

Did I say any different? I can say the same thing for most of NYC and Chicago too. I just find it funny that certain posters "showcase" these two neighborhoods and they pick the same exact blocks , every single time. Alvarado is the crappiest looking street outside of skid row. It's alive and urban, but it's crappy. But it's not a represenative area, at all.

I get that you're super defensive about LA, but I live here too, so you don't have to tell me what's true and false. Lots of central LA looks super dumpy. Homeless encampments, trash, ugly cheap 1 story buildings, street vendors selling any and everything on the sidewalks...it is what it is. There are, of course, nice buildings and blocks mixed in. On average, I'd say residential neighborhoods seem to be better than the commercial districts, but it's actually a pretty common reaction of visitors to remark that central LA is way shittier looking than they anticipated.

People who've never been here tend to think all of LA looks like Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, when in reality, large portions are just pretty hideous. We have amazingly beautiful neighborhoods and natural features, but the Ktown area and its surroundings are few people's idea of beautiful.

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0527...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0549...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0777...7i13312!8i6656

If you think these are attractive streetscapes, then we just have different definitions of attractive. I know not everywhere in central LA is like these scenes, but if a visitor is driving through, they would surely see many scenes just like these. A visitor from Seoul or Tokyo would absolutely see these as slum scenes that look like a major step down from what they're used to in their home cities. I still like LA and enjoy living here. My neighborhood doesn't look like this crap. But a lot of LA does. It is what it is.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by edale

I get that you're super defensive about LA, but I live here too, so you don't have to tell me what's true and false. Lots of central LA looks super dumpy. Homeless encampments, trash, ugly cheap 1 story buildings, street vendors selling any and everything on the sidewalks...it is what it is. There are, of course, nice buildings and blocks mixed in. On average, I'd say residential neighborhoods seem to be better than the commercial districts, but it's actually a pretty common reaction of visitors to remark that central LA is way shittier looking than they anticipated.

People who've never been here tend to think all of LA looks like Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, when in reality, large portions are just pretty hideous. We have amazingly beautiful neighborhoods and natural features, but the Ktown area and its surroundings are few people's idea of beautiful.

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0527...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0549...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0777...7i13312!8i6656

If you think these are attractive streetscapes, then we just have different definitions of attractive. I know not everywhere in central LA is like these scenes, but if a visitor is driving through, they would surely see many scenes just like these. A visitor from Seoul or Tokyo would absolutely see these as slum scenes that look like a major step down from what they're used to in their home cities. I still like LA and enjoy living here. My neighborhood doesn't look like this crap. But a lot of LA does. It is what it is.

Again, I posted what my neighborhood in Koreatown looked like. Many of Koreatown's resdiential streets look typical city neighborhoods, and not trash everywhere.

Does some of Koreatown and Westlake look bad? Sure. It's a poor part of the city, for the most part. But most of it does not. And compared to Tokyo or Seoul, most U.S. cities older neighborhoods will not look great either. I will mention them anymore, because others get defensive, but it's odd you think LA is some kind of outlier there.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by edale

I get that you're super defensive about LA, but I live here too, so you don't have to tell me what's true and false. Lots of central LA looks super dumpy. Homeless encampments, trash, ugly cheap 1 story buildings, street vendors selling any and everything on the sidewalks...it is what it is. There are, of course, nice buildings and blocks mixed in. On average, I'd say residential neighborhoods seem to be better than the commercial districts, but it's actually a pretty common reaction of visitors to remark that central LA is way shittier looking than they anticipated.

People who've never been here tend to think all of LA looks like Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, when in reality, large portions are just pretty hideous. We have amazingly beautiful neighborhoods and natural features, but the Ktown area and its surroundings are few people's idea of beautiful.

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0527...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0549...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0777...7i13312!8i6656

If you think these are attractive streetscapes, then we just have different definitions of attractive. I know not everywhere in central LA is like these scenes, but if a visitor is driving through, they would surely see many scenes just like these. A visitor from Seoul or Tokyo would absolutely see these as slum scenes that look like a major step down from what they're used to in their home cities. I still like LA and enjoy living here. My neighborhood doesn't look like this crap. But a lot of LA does. It is what it is.

I think this is an attractive streetscape: https://goo.gl/maps/STQeB2PK2fMx1ci1A

Even on dumpy Alvarado street

Honestly, I've seen much much worse than those streets. Even your cherrypicked streetviews are more appealing than similar run down areas in other cities I've been to. It sounds like you're the one who thought all of LA looked like Beverly Hills before you came here.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by LA21st

\
Westlake is far from my favorite part of LA, but to post this like eveything looks like that is false.
Alvarado is considered pretty ratty even for Westlake. Koreatown doesn't have any street like Alvarado. Then you found one resdiential street with some tents like that's on every corner. Come on dude. Seriously. I could easily find countless snap shots in these areas they look nothing like this.

This is like taking snapshots of crappy Bronx streets and saying thats representative of NYC.

Is central LA dumpy compared to Korean cities? Probably, but that's true for Chicago, NYC, Philly etc too.

Westlake isn't even that bad anymore, believe it or not. Alvarado and MacArthur park used to be notorious for drugs and gangs. It's going to be a great area someday, right on Wilshire, right on top of a subway station, centrally located. It's really a prime location with great old bones.

[edale]

Originally Posted by badrunner

I think this is an attractive streetscape: https://goo.gl/maps/STQeB2PK2fMx1ci1A

Even on dumpy Alvarado street

Honestly, I've seen much much worse than those streets. Even your cherrypicked streetviews are more appealing than similar run down areas in other cities I've been to. It sounds like you're the one who thought all of LA looked like Beverly Hills before you came here.

Lol, that super zoomed in shot of the beautiful theater turned dumpy swap meet is an individual building, not a streetscape.

Nope, not at all.

The defensiveness of LA boosters on this forum is so annoying. LA is a great city. It's huge and sprawling and diverse and awesome in so many ways. But you point out one thing that I think is pretty objectively true, like that our commercial corridors are too auto-oriented to encourage pedestrian activity, and the LA boosters come out swinging. I have no problem critiquing the places I live.

BTW, I encounter foreign tourists to LA very often at work, and have been told these reactions many times. I'm not just making this stuff up. Many people come here, especially from Europe, thinking LA is some super glamorous, ritzy place. In reality, it's pretty blue collar, gritty, and yes, ugly in many places. Tourists go to NYC and Chicago and basically get what they were expecting. LA? Not always the case. They find the distances between attractions strange. The decentralized nature of LA is genuinely perplexing to many people. They find it oddly suburban outside of Downtown. Doesn't seem to stop many people from visiting, tho! Tourism numbers continue to rise.

[LA21st]

We're annoying because we're annoyed by opinions of the place.
You decided to pick the crappiest street outside of skid row to represent Westlake and Koreatown, and a residential street with tents on it.
Those are not typical scenes there. If everything looked like Alvrado st, you'd have a point.
If I were to do the same other cities, there would be similar blowback..
And who visits Alvarado st? Or Hoover? And why?

Visitors/tourists go to the LINE Hotel

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0616...7i16384!8i8192

and the Wiltern Theatre:

https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0616...7i16384!8i8192

[IrishIllini]

Albany Park is neither dumpy nor gritty, lol. LA21st, when did you leave the holy land? Has it been a while? Some of your posts make it seem like you haven’t visited any of these neighborhoods since the early 00s.

[LA21st]

Yes, I lived in Albany Park in 04. Maybe it was grittier back then, idk. I remember seeing some boarded up houses near Kimball and Kedzie and Larwrence defintely had some gritty parts to it. It's not gritty like lawndale or something, but it was there. I didn't mind it though.

Again, my comment was referencing Edale's comment that Koreatown is old and what not, like other American cities Asian enclaves are different. THEY"RE NOT.

[park123]

I dunno, I've been to Seoul and a much smaller regional city in South Korea, with a train ride through most of the country in between, and overall the country looked pretty dumpy to me. Quasi 3rd-world outside of the ritziest parts of Seoul. The nice parts of LA are like a dream resort compared to anything in Korea (or Asia for that matter).

Not only did Korea look pretty dumpy to me (certainly in the daytime), their salaries are nothing to brag about either. A Bangladeshi immigrant in NYC who doesn't speak English will make more money than a white collar college grad in Seoul. And it's not like they have a booming economy anymore.

Japan is definitely more polished but even there they reached an income peak in the late 80s and 90s when they made considerably more than Americans, so you kind of looked past the concrete box cities and small living spaces. Now after decades of a weak yen, their salaries are more like those in Southern Europe, and the cities, while very clean, are not exactly beautiful or especially wealthy looking.

[RST500]

Chinese:
Los Angeles: 90,874
San Francisco: 69,104
San Jose: 46,705
New York: 44,419
Seattle: 41,130
Boston: 35,733
Houston: 27,456
Riverside: 15,959
Phoenix: 11,807
Atlanta: 11,436
Philadelphia: 11,419
Washington DC: 10,930
San Diego: 9,919
Portland: 9,220
Sacramento: 9,025
Chicago: 8,516
Dallas/Fort Worth: 7,824
Denver: 7,008
Las Vegas: 6,725
Charlotte: 6,179
Minneapolis/St.Paul : 5,726
Detroit: 4,308
Austin: -1,008

India:
Dallas/Fort Worth: 80,799
San Francisco: 67,900
New York: 65,705
Chicago: 52,504
Washington DC: 52,439
Seattle: 40,968
Los Angeles: 40,680
Houston: 39,135
Atlanta: 39,008
San Jose: 35,998
Boston: 33,724
Philadelphia: 31,213
Austin: 27,281
Detroit: 24,183
Sacramento: 19,630
Charlotte: 17,647
San Diego: 15,273
Phoenix: 12,613
Denver: 12,216
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 10,859
Portland: 7,961
Las Vegas: 1,475
Riverside: 632

Korea:
Dallas/Fort Worth: 11,556
New York: 9,695
San Jose: 5,747
Washington DC: 3,046
Houston: 2,510
San Diego: 2,498
Portland: 1,952
Detroit: 1,947
San Francisco: 1,553
Austin: 1,471
Atlanta: 1,384
Phoenix: 850
Riverside: 795
Sacramento: 550
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 275
Charlotte: 234
Seattle: -308
Las Vegas: -1,106
Boston: -1,897
Denver: -2,683
Philadelphia: -7,038
Chicago: -9,094
Los Angeles: -15,834

Vietnam:
Houston: 24,884
Los Angeles: 13,688
Dallas/Fort Worth: 13,610
San Francisco: 11,807
Seattle: 9,709
Chicago: 9,667
Atlanta: 7,740
Boston: 6,027
San Diego: 5,854
Sacramento: 4,926
Portland: 4,846
Las Vegas: 3,185
Austin: 2,712
Washington DC: 1,724
San Jose: 1,722
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 786
Phoenix: -575
Denver: -1,232
Charlotte: -1,403
New York: -1,470
Detroit: -2,576
Philadelphia: -2,938
Riverside: -3,158

Philippines:
Riverside: 25,804
Los Angeles: 21,204
Las Vegas: 17,825
Sacramento: 9,488
Phoenix: 8,494
Seattle: 8,282
New York: 7,978
San Diego: 7,622
Denver: 4,267
Atlanta: 3,938
Washington DC: 3,803
Portland: 3,136
Houston: 2,875
Dallas/Fort Worth: 2,428
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 2,100
Boston: 1,311
Austin: 737
Detroit: 576
Charlotte: 96
San Francisco: 73
San Jose: -1,011
Chicago: -1,930
Philadelphia: -4,279

Other Asia:
Dallas/Fort Worth: 28,351
New York: 21,165
Houston: 17,781
San Francisco: 17,700
Philadelphia: 16,218
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 14,016
Seattle: 13,908
Atlanta: 12,962
Chicago: 12,704
Charlotte: 8,855
San Jose: 8,138
Detroit: 7,369
Portland: 7,183
Los Angeles: 5,228
Phoenix: 4,354
Denver: 2,656
Las Vegas: 2,196
Austin: 1,258
Riverside: 1,055
Boston: 289
Sacramento: -1,037
San Diego: -1,205
Washington DC: -12,333

[homebucket]

^ Interesting. This confirms that for the 3rd largest metro, Chicago really doesn't do well with Asian immigration. The only Asian population it's gaining 10K+ are Indians and "Other".

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by LA21st

Yes, I lived in Albany Park in 04. Maybe it was grittier back then, idk. I remember seeing some boarded up houses near Kimball and Kedzie and Larwrence defintely had some gritty parts to it. It's not gritty like lawndale or something, but it was there.

considering that renovated SFH's in albany park now routinely fetch $500,000+, you're not gonna find much boarded-up housing there these days.

hell, over in the eastern section of albany park (ravenswood manor) it's not uncommon to see renovated move-in ready SFH's go for seven figures.

i know those prices are practically free from a californian perspective, but they're towards the upper-middle end in terms of chicago neighborhoods.

anyone who is currently sitting on a boarded-up property in albany park in 2019 is a complete moron who enjoys being poor for some crazy reason.

[LA21st]

Lol
That's cool. That was the first neighborhood I lived in outside of NOVA, so I'll always be rooting for it. Great Seas's chicken wings alone are a reason to go back, just didn't have time
on my last couple of visits.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by edale

Lol, that super zoomed in shot of the beautiful theater turned dumpy swap meet is an individual building, not a streetscape.

Nope, not at all.

The defensiveness of LA boosters on this forum is so annoying. LA is a great city. It's huge and sprawling and diverse and awesome in so many ways. But you point out one thing that I think is pretty objectively true, like that our commercial corridors are too auto-oriented to encourage pedestrian activity, and the LA boosters come out swinging. I have no problem critiquing the places I live.

BTW, I encounter foreign tourists to LA very often at work, and have been told these reactions many times. I'm not just making this stuff up. Many people come here, especially from Europe, thinking LA is some super glamorous, ritzy place. In reality, it's pretty blue collar, gritty, and yes, ugly in many places. Tourists go to NYC and Chicago and basically get what they were expecting. LA? Not always the case. They find the distances between attractions strange. The decentralized nature of LA is genuinely perplexing to many people. They find it oddly suburban outside of Downtown. Doesn't seem to stop many people from visiting, tho! Tourism numbers continue to rise.

You just sound a little bit sheltered that's all.

"Millennial hipster transplant shocked to find blue collar grit in nation's second largest city" could be an Onion headline

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by badrunner

You just sound a little bit sheltered that's all.

"Millennial hipster transplant shocked to find blue collar grit in nation's second largest city" could be an Onion headline

Edale sounds to me like somebody who understands and appreciates LA for what it is. I am a Boomer former transplant resident of LA and a life-long visitor who truly does love and hate the place in equal measure. I can't count the number of times I've found myself defending LA to people who have only visited there maybe one or two times and were overwhelmed by the scale of the place and underwhelmed by the aesthetics. It takes some patience and determination to unravel the mysteries of LA, but it is certainly worth the effort.

[dktshb]

Originally Posted by austlar1

Edale sounds to me like somebody who understands and appreciates LA for what it is. I am a Boomer former transplant resident of LA and a life-long visitor who truly does love and hate the place in equal measure. I can't count the number of times I've found myself defending LA to people who have only visited there maybe one or two times and were overwhelmed by the scale of the place and underwhelmed by the aesthetics. It takes some patience and determination to unravel the mysteries of LA, but it is certainly worth the effort.

LA is a great place to live but not so great place to be a tourist. If you do your homework a tourist trip to LA can be amazing but it is a better trip very well planned first.

Although crime is not as bad as many major cities in the US the blight, poverty and "third world" characteristics of big parts of the city are like nowhere else in the US. I can see how a tourist caught up in this can be blown away and shocked by this.

[dktshb]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Since we are on the subject of Korea, I thought it'd re-organize the data for Korean growth from 2013-2018 by metro area:

Dallas/Fort Worth: 11,556
New York City: 9,695
San Jose: 5,747
Washington DC: 3,046
Houston: 2,510
Portland: 1,952
Detroit: 1,947
San Francisco: 1,553
Austin: 1,471
Atlanta: 1,384
Phoenix: 850
Riverside: 795
Sacramento: 550
Minneapolis/St. Paul: 275
Charlotte: 234

Seattle/Tacoma: -308
Las Vegas: -1,106
Boston: -1,897
Denver: -2,683
Philadelphia: -7,038
Chicago: -9,094
Los Angeles: -15,834

Damn, seems like South Korean's are fleeing Koreatown. High costs of housing among other things driving people out. Probably responsible for the big increase in Dallas.

[Capsicum]

Originally Posted by homebucket

^ Interesting. This confirms that for the 3rd largest metro, Chicago really doesn't do well with Asian immigration. The only Asian population it's gaining 10K+ are Indians and "Other".

Is it different if we're counting growth by immigration or growth in general?

Surely, suburban Asian Chicagoans are raising families right, so there's gotta be some contribution from say, there being some Asians born in Naperville or something, not born in Pakistan or Korea or wherever. Or are the birth rates too low?

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by austlar1

Edale sounds to me like somebody who understands and appreciates LA for what it is. I am a Boomer former transplant resident of LA and a life-long visitor who truly does love and hate the place in equal measure. I can't count the number of times I've found myself defending LA to people who have only visited there maybe one or two times and were overwhelmed by the scale of the place and underwhelmed by the aesthetics. It takes some patience and determination to unravel the mysteries of LA, but it is certainly worth the effort.

It's just the blatant dishonesty and cherrypicking that I and others take issue with. Hell, I've posted plenty of unflattering streetviews of run down areas in LA like the Fashion District and Compton, so I don't mind showing the ugly side, in its proper context.

We could do a little experiment. Here is Central LA, more or less. Drop the pin at various locations at random a few dozen times and let me know how many places resemble Alvarado street, much less "slummy parts of Mexican cities." If you have some real life experience, seen the world a bit, there's no way you would make those kinds of comparisons, so I can't help but think that some people are sheltered and/or not very well traveled.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Capsicum

Is it different if we're counting growth by immigration or growth in general?

Surely, suburban Asian Chicagoans are raising families right, so there's gotta be some contribution from say, there being some Asians born in Naperville or something, not born in Pakistan or Korea or wherever. Or are the birth rates too low?

I believe it is growth in general. RST500 can correct me if I'm wrong.