I was in San Diego over Christmas. Here are some pictures.
My tour started and ended here. I was staying with family members in the suburbs, so I drove in, parked under that skyscraper, and then used the Santa Fe station to hop on and off transit around the central city.
Santa Fe station from the front. You can see a light rail train at right, but covered in shadow.
There will be a second thread focusing on transit. For now let's move on, into the commercial heart of downtown.
From the depot I walked east along Broadway.
Downtown seemed quite healthy overall, but I was dismayed that it does not have any significant squares. I only found one, which took up about 1/3 of a block and was mostly fenced off.
After 9 or 10 blocks I turned south to find Horton Plaza, San Diego's famous retail pavilion.
This is apparently a plastic mock-up of ice. With weather in the 70s they don't get real ice.
East and south of Horton Plaza is the Gaslamp District. Older, shorter, but more fine-grained and probably denser than anywhere else in the city.
I like this building very much. Clearly contemporary, but plenty to look at. Unique, but fits snugly and unpretentiously into its urban context. Excellent filler. The historic building in the background isn't bad either.
I am a fan of color.
I'm surprised we don't see more of this in our cities. It's hard to tell from the picture, but each panel has part of a large printed picture of a tree. If we're going to have flat glass buildings anyway, why not use them as a canvas?
At some point I turned east again to catch the light rail.
Oh hai, baseball stadium.
At this point I caught the light rail, went back to Santa Fe station, and met up with the family for a tour of the USS Midway (no pictures from that here; maybe another time). While on the deck of the Midway I saw this interesting building. I think it may be city hall, but am not sure. Anyone know?
My sister lives in Escondido. I didn't get much look at the city, but she took me to city hall. It's pretty interesting.
Parks in Escondido:
The next day we went to Balboa Park in San Diego. It was gorgeous; I fear pictures don't do it justice.
That's all for now. Watch for the transportation thread later.
. sd seems to have a well developed urban area in it's central city, despite the lack of parks...which i find surprising for a city like sd which is great yearround for being outside and about. definitely no -30°C in sd.
Linear Mode
