What suburb is the best destination?
What suburb would you consider the best or greatest destination?
Most suburbs are not destinations for tourists or travelers. Ever hear of someone who was going to New York City and was excited to see Jersey City? How many people make sure to spend some time in Rockville when visiting Washington DC? Know of any tourist who decided to just go to Mississauga and not set foot in Toronto? |
Santa Monica.
South Orange county. |
Two stand out to me. Scottsdale, AZ, and Miami Beach, FL, are both destinations in their own rights. Many people fly to Phoenix and spend all their time in Scottsdale golfing. Most people that go to Miami actually go to Miami Beach to the point that many people may think of Miami Beach as part of the City of Miami.
Cambridge, MA, is probably right below Miami Beach or Scottsdale. The Harvard and MIT campuses are destinations in their own right to a degree. Santa Monica is probably a good choice, too, with tourists who visit the pier. Clearwater and St. Petersburg are also good candidates, although the Tampa Bay Area seems truly multi-nodal like the Twin Cities or Bay Area. |
Jersey City is not a suburb. Highly dwarfed satellite/anchor maybe but definitely not a suburb.
Usually college towns and places with amusement parks are destinations. I'd add sports but many bland suburbs have or do host major sports. |
Yeah, St. Pete is its own city. Great glass art museum there.
|
Miami Beach is just about the furthest thing from a suburb as a place can possibly be.
|
Quote:
|
Oak park Il
|
I think the worst suburb destination might just be Lake Buena Vista, FL
|
Quote:
|
NY has the Hamptons if you count that.
For LA, only Santa Monica Chicago none San Francisco has Sausalito and the Napa valley. Philadelphia has AC and Cape May if you count those. |
Paradise, NV
|
How about Arlington, TX?
Location of Cowboys and Rangers stadia and Six Flags amusement park. It actually fits the definition of a suburb and is a destination. |
Anaheim, CA, if that's your thing...
I personally hate Disney Land. |
Is Palm Springs considered a suburb or its own town? And Santa Monica should just be a neighborhood in LA, same with Beverly Hills and Hollywood.
|
Yokohama.
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Anaheim is a good choice for this, actually. There's a million hotels over there.
|
Quote:
https://scontent-lax3-2.xx.fbcdn.net...b8&oe=5E37D989 Photo by me |
Quote:
|
For the LA area (If we consider these separate cities to be suburbs)
Pasadena - Rose Bowl, Museums, Food, etc Santa Monica - Beach, Pier, 3rd Street, Food Beverly Hills Anaheim |
Daly City, California
One of the most densely populated suburban environments in the country. https://s.hdnux.com/photos/07/61/16/.../5/920x920.jpg https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=...71163193054576 http://kaprizhardwoodfloors.com/wp-c.../Daly-City.jpg https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=...71163193054576 https://c8.alamy.com/comp/BP114R/aer...nia-BP114R.jpg https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&rct=...71163193054576 |
Quote:
|
Quote:
It's actually the place to be now, really blossoming into something special. |
Vaughan is Toronto's destination suburb thanks to Canada's Wonderland.
|
Quote:
|
All of Marin County.
|
Paradise, NV
People think theyre in Vegas proper but they aint |
Quote:
|
Probably better to stay in West Hartford instead of Hartford.
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Cambridge doesn't count, it's as core as they come. For Boston, it would probably be Salem. Definitely during this time of the year.
I don't count Santa Monica or Jersey City for the same reason I don't count Cambridge. Paradise NV jumped out in my mind, also Lake Buena Vista outside Orlando (Disney World). |
Quote:
|
Quote:
I folly you on Cambridge, because of its proximity to the core and comparative density to Boston's. In Santa Monica's case, its distance from downtown is a giveaway suburban trait. Jersey City is an urban node on its own, IMO. |
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
Sure, downtown Santa Monica is urban https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0173...7i16384!8i8192 But is this? https://www.google.com/maps/@34.0372...7i16384!8i8192 |
Quote:
Most of Santa Monica is pretty dense, with walkable commercial strips througout. Wilshire, Main, Santa Monica, Ocean Park, Colorado, Broadway, Montana, Pico etc. You're never more than a few blocks from retail/restaurants and there's solid transit. Even the numerous office buildings have street facing retail everywhere in the neighborhoods. |
Quote:
|
Quote:
But lots (for SFHs) are pretty small and packed close together, and literally almost every buildable parcel in the entire LA basin is built out. So you end up with a suburban-ish looking environment that is deceptively dense. It's walkable in the sense that you can walk to a variety of things, but it wasn't built with the pedestrian in mind. That's why it can be somewhat tough to determine suburban areas from the City of LA. The suburbs are dense, and the city, while dense, is largely suburban in its built form. It's a totally different paradigm than the rest of the country. |
I'm from DC burbs, and I was amazed how much street retail there was in LA suburbs, especially places like Santa Monica. You don't really see that much in Fairfax County and the like.
Santa Monica just looked very different than what I was used too. |
Quote:
----- Anybody mention Anaheim? Population 359,000. 25 million visitors annually. |
Quote:
https://goo.gl/maps/AK6Gw44XmQajFwaX6 |
ha. yeah, if we are going to criticize a random weak point in a residential street in santa monica.
|
It's true for any city. Even NYC (queens/staten Island)
Santa Monica isn't just urban in downtown. That's a false statement. For a "suburb" it's walkable in several areas. It's funny that people on this forum call north east/midweest suburbs walkable, even when many of them are small areas around a train station (much smaller than downtown santa monica) and the rest is usually single family homes too. They don't have a Wilshire, Montana, ocean park blvd etc in addition to that. They're pretty standard and generic. You can't have it both ways. |
Santa Monica isn't so much a "suburb" but rather a logical extension of the city, defined merely by municipal boundaries. . .
. . . |
All times are GMT. The time now is 3:30 AM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.