Next 24 hour American city?

[AviationGuy]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

You guys are making the mistake of equating nightlife with being "24 hours". That's a part of it, of course, but the bigger driver of 24-hour business is having large numbers of night-time shift workers. Nobody's stopping for a grocery shop on their way home from the club at 4am - but someone coming home from a night shift at the factory might.

The other factor that makes Southeast Asian and Middle Eastern cities so busy at night is the climate - it's so hot all day that the only pleasant time to go out is at night. For more northerly cities, daytime is the most pleasant time for most of the year.




The West Coast in general is very early-to-bed, early-to-rise - Los Angeles excepted; it's big enough to have a critical mass of late-night activity.

Interesting what you mentioned about the West Coast. When I lived in Santa Barbara for a while in the mid 80s, I was amazed that there was almost no activity anywhere after dark. It seemed so strange to me. It may have been different in Isla Vista where the college kids were.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

You guys are making the mistake of equating nightlife with being "24 hours". That's a part of it, of course, but the bigger driver of 24-hour business is having large numbers of night-time shift workers.

I noted that very thing in the second post in this thread. Las Vegas has the highest proportion of night-shift workers in the US. Second place? Riverside–San Bernardino–Ontario (the "Inland Empire").

Nobody's stopping for a grocery shop on their way home from the club at 4 am - but someone coming home from a night shift at the factory might.

There was enough business overnight to keep the local supermarket in my old SF neighborhood open all night for decades, and that city never had a lot of night-shift workers. But as of 2020, it closes at 9:00 p.m. I shopped there probably twice a week after 9:00 p.m. in the many years I lived nearby. That wasn't considered "late night" just a few years ago.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by AviationGuy

The Katz's I was mentioning was in downtown Austin. I wonder if the Katz's in Houston is the same owner that closed the Austin deli.

They were. Probably closed to focus on Houston. They have four locations here now. They were always pretty expensive.

[Antares41]

As far as NYC is concern, as long as the subways are still running 24/7 its a 24hr city. Although, I agree its not to the extent it was pre-pandemic for multiple reasons.

[Steely Dan]

^ are all/most lines on the NYC subway 24/7?

Surprisingly to me, two of Chicago's L lines are also still on 24/7 ops, the red and blue lines, which are the two busiest main trunk lines of the whole system. The other six lines all have short service gaps in the middle of the night, roughly from around 1:00/2:00am to 4:00/5:00am.

How many other US cities have some level of 24/7 rail transit service?

[EastSideHBG]

Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan

Philly used to be more like a 24 hour city before the pandemic, much more so than Boston. I turned 21 in 2016 and was fully immersed in the party scene by 2018. I miss being able to pregame, find a nightclub to stay at until 2AM (some nightclubs could even stay open until 3AM), grab something hot from the 24/7 Wawa on Broad and Walnut, and take the El/BSL, which had 24 hour service on the weekends, home. On the Regional Rail side, SEPTA also used to have Friday and Saturday service that would see the last trains on the Manayunk/Norristown Line reach Manayunk just before last call at 2AM. Partying in Manayunk and returning to Temple's campus late at night used to be a breeze.

Even outside of partying, it seems like less places are open 24/7. For example, the Fresh Grocer on Broad and Oxford was open 24/7 and always buzzing with students when I was attending Temple University. I used to go there at 3AM to pick up a meal or snack after a long study session at Paley or the Tech. Now it closes at 11PM.

Originally Posted by PhillyRising

Center City lost almost all of it's 24 hour diners too.

Little Pete's...gone.

The Savoy at 11th and Locust was the absolute best. You would go in there in the middle of the night...order your food and I kid you not the waitress was putting it in front of you within 5 minutes....even when it was packed full of half drunk gays at 2 in the morning after a night partying in the Gayborhood.

I'd say Philadelphia is a 20 hour city...it takes a nap from 2am to 6am.

Agreed, and I factored these aspects in when I was thinking about it. Even in the immediate 'burbs there were a lot of things open late e.g. grocery stores, restaurants that can close insanely early now. Being able to have enough staffing is a big part of this equation too now, though.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ are all/most lines on the NYC subway 24/7?

Surprisingly to me, two of Chicago's L lines are also still on 24/7 ops, the red and blue lines, which are the two busiest main trunk lines of the whole system. The other six lines all have short service gaps in the middle of the night, roughly from around 1:00/2:00am to 4:00/5:00am.

How many other US cities have some level of 24/7 rail transit service?

Express service isn't 24/7 but all subway lines and stations have 24 hour service.

[giallo]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

You guys are making the mistake of equating nightlife with being "24 hours". That's a part of it, of course, but the bigger driver of 24-hour business is having large numbers of night-time shift workers. Nobody's stopping for a grocery shop on their way home from the club at 4am - but someone coming home from a night shift at the factory might.

The other factor that makes Southeast Asian and Middle Eastern cities so busy at night is the climate - it's so hot all day that the only pleasant time to go out is at night. For more northerly cities, daytime is the most pleasant time for most of the year.

Not just Southeast Asia, but East Asia in general. Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong and Taipei are all very vibrant day and night despite not being hot year round. In Taiwan, there are restaurants that all open at 3am to serve breakfast to the late night workers and partiers.

Surprisingly, Chinese cities aren't really 24h. Shanghai, outside of a couple of entertainment nodes, goes to bed early. By 11am, you can hear a pin drop in many of the districts around the city.

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by craigs

There's a lot to do in LA overnight, as recounted in this article I linked to previously, but I personally have little to no interest in being out that late anymore. Once in a while we go out and hit some WeHo bars with friends, but we usually call it a night by midnight or so and I don't think they stay out much later.

Same. My partner is still a night owl though and always stays up later than I do; he often doesn't even go to bed until 1 or 2am. We haven't hit the WeHo bars in a long time, not since 2018-2019 when a Dutch friend of ours visited us from Utrecht. We're so not into that scene. We're more into day drinking now, you know, like going out for weekend brunches and wine or cocktails with dinner in the evening.

[dave8721]

Miami is more of a 12 hour than a 24 hour city but those 12 hours are the nighttime ones. Like the Southeast Asia cities, its just too hot during a good part of the year to be all out an active on the streets during the day but at night the city comes alive more.

There are a lot of late-night walking videos around Miami, here is the Wynwood neighborhood on a typical night at 2am:
• Video Link

The same neighborhood during the daylight hours with the clubs and bars all closed, a lot more dead: https://www.google.com/maps/@25.8014...5409&entry=ttu

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Express service isn't 24/7 but all subway lines and stations have 24 hour service.

Wow, every single station gets 24/7 service, that's impressive!

But I suppose not too surprising for the nation's great big urban outlier.


As mentioned before, in Chicago only the red and blue lines get 24/7 service, but together they serve 66 of the L's 146 stations, so by station count, that's still 45%, not too shabby.

Doing a quick google search, it seems as though Philly's train lines once had some 24 hour service, but apparently not since the pandemic.

That's all I could find in the US beyond NYC and Chicago. 24 hour transit everywhere else in the US (where it even exists) is apparently handled exclusively by buses.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Express service isn't 24/7 but all subway lines and stations have 24 hour service.

And SIRT, PATH, LIRR and SI Ferry. That's part of the city's identity. It would be really weird to not have 24/7 service on the main rail, bus and ferry routes.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Wow, every single station gets 24/7 service, that's impressive!

But I suppose not too surprising for the nation's great big urban outlier.


As mentioned before, in Chicago only the red and blue lines get 24/7 service, but together they serve 66 of the L's 146 stations, so by station count, that's still 45%, not too shabby.

Doing a quick google search, it seems as though Philly's train lines once had some 24 hour service, but apparently not since the pandemic.

That's all I could find in the US beyond NYC and Chicago. 24 hour transit everywhere else in the US (where it even exists) is apparently handled exclusively by buses.

The orange line is more or less completely served by the N62 bus too.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Wow, every single station gets 24/7 service, that's impressive!

But I suppose not too surprising for the nation's great big urban outlier.


As mentioned before, in Chicago only the red and blue lines get 24/7 service, but together they serve 66 of the L's 146 stations, so by station count, that's still 45%, not too shabby.

Doing a quick google search, it seems as though Philly's train lines once had some 24 hour service, but apparently not since the pandemic.

That's all I could find in the US beyond NYC and Chicago. 24 hour transit everywhere else in the US (where it even exists) is apparently handled exclusively by buses.

According to CNN only NYC, Chicago, and Copenhagen have any type of 24 hour rail service: https://www.cnn.com/travel/worlds-be...ros/index.html

[dave8721]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Wow, every single station gets 24/7 service, that's impressive!

But I suppose not too surprising for the nation's great big urban outlier.


As mentioned before, in Chicago only the red and blue lines get 24/7 service, but together they serve 66 of the L's 146 stations, so by station count, that's still 45%, not too shabby.

Doing a quick google search, it seems as though Philly's train lines once had some 24 hour service, but apparently not since the pandemic.

That's all I could find in the US beyond NYC and Chicago. 24 hour transit everywhere else in the US (where it even exists) is apparently handled exclusively by buses.

In Miami, trails only run until midnight. What's strange though is that the Metromover only runs until midnight considering its an automated system so they don't have to worry about paying drivers or anything.

Either way, its a huge driver of Uber's business. I've known a few drivers and they make the bulk of their income from 1-4 AM. Especially on the weekends.

[Crawford]

In recent years, every single time I'm in Miami (always downtown or Miami Beach) I have trouble sleeping due to nonstop modified motorcycles & cars. All freaking night. And living in NYC, it's not like I'm unaccustomed to noise and nighttime activity.

And you hear the same noise patterns, presumably from the same vehicles. Apparently some d-bags riding around in circles all night.

[ColDayMan]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Wow, every single station gets 24/7 service, that's impressive!

But I suppose not too surprising for the nation's great big urban outlier.


As mentioned before, in Chicago only the red and blue lines get 24/7 service, but together they serve 66 of the L's 146 stations, so by station count, that's still 45%, not too shabby.

Doing a quick google search, it seems as though Philly's train lines once had some 24 hour service, but apparently not since the pandemic.

That's all I could find in the US beyond NYC and Chicago. 24 hour transit everywhere else in the US (where it even exists) is apparently handled exclusively by buses.

Isn't PATCO still 24 hours?

[Chisouthside]

theres still some 24 hour diners sprinkled throughout chicago that originally used to cater to third shift factory workers.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

According to CNN only NYC, Chicago, and Copenhagen have any type of 24 hour rail service: https://www.cnn.com/travel/worlds-be...ros/index.html

That can't be right.

Surely some of those ultra 24/7 Asian mega-cities run their trains all night long too, right?

Originally Posted by Chisouthside

theres still some 24 hour diners sprinkled throughout chicago that originally used to cater to third shift factory workers.

Yeah, some are still hanging on, along with the 24 hour taquerias, but there seems to be a lot fewer of them today than back when I was a 20-something drunken idiot decades ago.

I think they're getting pinched from 3 sides, fewer 3rd shifters, fewer middle of the night revelers looking for drunk food, and fewer people willing to work such shitty shifts.

[SIGSEGV]

Don't forget about shitty landlords:
https://chicago.suntimes.com/busines...c-cites-crimes