Southern cities with a "big city" feel?

[Handro]

Originally Posted by eschaton

[IMG]https://3kpnuxym9k04c8ilz2quku1czd-wpengine.netdna-ssl.

Overall San Francisco's unit mix is most similar to Boston and Chicago, although a bit more in the way of attached houses. A plurality of units appear to be in medium-scale (2-19 unit) apartments.

Wow this is super interesting. That similarity in built environment/housing might be why I've felt a sense of similarity between Chicago and San Francisco despite their obvious differences.

Also goes a long way towards answering this thread titular questions--looks like Atlanta by far is the closest to traditional northern cities in this regard.

[The North One]

Housing typology percentages says nothing about the context or the form they're built in, so you can have similar shares but look totally different. So this says little about built environment, Atlanta being the most obvious example.

Would also like some kind of source for the graphic because we have no idea how old the data is or if this is metro or city proper.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by The North One

Housing typology percentages says nothing about the context or the form they're built in, so you can have similar shares but look totally different. So this says little about built environment, Atlanta being the most obvious example.

Would also like some kind of source for the graphic because we have no idea how old the data is or if this is metro or city proper.

IIRC that's 2015 data, and it's city limits only. You can find metro data if you look around.

It all comes from data tracked by the U.S. census.

[Handro]

Originally Posted by The North One

Housing typology percentages says nothing about the context or the form they're built in, so you can have similar shares but look totally different. So this says little about built environment, Atlanta being the most obvious example.

Would also like some kind of source for the graphic because we have no idea how old the data is or if this is metro or city proper.

It certainly doesn't say everything, but it says more than nothing.

Also the source is right in the graphic: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...-city-charted/

[Crawford]

Yeah, it's city proper data. So the multifamily share data for DC, Boston and SF are arguably somewhat "overrepresented".

And, yeah, the typology share is quite informative, but doesn't give the full picture. LA has a higher share of large multifamily units than Chicago, but lots of these buildings aren't what we're talking about.

You can have very large garden apartment complexes, but they aren't traditionally urban, and often aren't even particularly dense. The SFV and the Westside of LA have tons of postwar garden complexes everywhere, but with the carports and the like.

[jd3189]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Overall San Francisco's unit mix is most similar to Boston and Chicago, although a bit more in the way of attached houses. A plurality of units appear to be in medium-scale (2-19 unit) apartments.

Where's Miami? Would be curious to see where it stands, especially with a surplus of condos and a modest amount of garden apartments that also characterizes LA.

[Labtec]

Originally Posted by JMKeynes

Chicago is a very nice city, but I think that SF is significantly better.

Also, no Southern City feels urban. I think that Charleston and Savannah feel more urban than Charlotte or Atlanta. Charlotte and Atlanta remind me of large versions of White Plains or Stamford, Ct.

Where in White Plains or Stamford would you find areas like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a13fng4a7bI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMZyQOaPdTg
https://youtu.be/1fTQYkrj1yA?t=90

[cabasse]

Originally Posted by JMKeynes

Chicago is a very nice city, but I think that SF is significantly better.

Also, no Southern City feels urban. I think that Charleston and Savannah feel more urban than Charlotte or Atlanta. Charlotte and Atlanta remind me of large versions of White Plains or Stamford, Ct.

white plains and stamford remind me of the scale of buckhead village.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by jd3189

Where's Miami? Would be curious to see where it stands, especially with a surplus of condos and a modest amount of garden apartments that also characterizes LA.

Here is the 2015 ACS data for Miami (so it's apples-to-apples with the chart).

UNITS IN STRUCTURE
1, detached 26.5%
1, attached 11.2%
2 apartments 5.4%
3 or 4 apartments 5.3%
5 to 9 apartments 7.3%
10 or more apartments 43.8%
Mobile home or other type of housing 0.5%

It's from here: https://data.census.gov/cedsci/table...dePreview=true (you can select other years there, and look at other things).

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by eschaton

But yeah to summarize:

NYC - city of large apartments
Chicago, San Francisco, and Boston - cities of small apartments
Philly, Baltimore - cities of rowhouses
DC - close to an even split between rowhouses, small apartments, and large apartments.
Everywhere else - close to, or absolutely, SFH dominant.

Yep, of the 8 buildings I've lived in over the decades in Chicago, 75% of them have been in that smaller-scale apartment building range.

Building #1: 6 units (front & back 6-flat)
Building #2: 12 units (traditional 6-flat chopped into 1-beds)
Building #3: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)
Building #4: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)
Building #5: 500 units (downtown highrise)
Building #6: 220 units (downtown high-rise)
Building #7: 6 units (traditional 6-flat)
Building #8: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)


To the extent that Chicago does have housing stock in the 20+ unit category, I have to imagine that a significant percentage of it is in very large residential highrises downtown and up and down the lakefront. Out in the neighborhoods, the "flat" buildings reign supreme, as the chart shows, until you get way out into the bungalow belt where SFH's start to take over. In fact, Chicago's higher percentage of detached SFH compared to its peers on the list is directly a function of its rather large 227 sq. mile city limits. If you chopped off the outer 100 sq. miles of bungalow belt from the city, Chicago's SFH % would plummet.

[streetscaper]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

Here is the 2015 ACS data for Miami (so it's apples-to-apples with the chart).

UNITS IN STRUCTURE
1, detached 26.5%
1, attached 11.2%
2 apartments 5.4%
3 or 4 apartments 5.3%
5 to 9 apartments 7.3%
10 or more apartments 43.8%
Mobile home or other type of housing 0.5%

It's from here: https://data.census.gov/cedsci/table...dePreview=true (you can select other years there, and look at other things).

So that would put it 4th on the list, between Washington and Boston.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by streetscaper

So that would put it 4th on the list, between Washington and Boston.

The chart is actually ranked by % of SFH, detached, from lowest to highest. So with 26.5% SFH, detached, Miami would slot in between Chicago and LA.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by cabasse

white plains and stamford remind me of the scale of buckhead village.

Yeah, White Plains does feel a little like Buckhead to me, but WP is still way more walkable.

[Tom In Chicago]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Yep, of the 8 buildings I've lived in over the decades in Chicago, 75% of them have been in that smaller-scale apartment building range.

Building #1: 6 units (front & back 6-flat)
Building #2: 12 units (traditional 6-flat chopped into 1-beds)
Building #3: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)
Building #4: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)
Building #5: 500 units (downtown highrise)
Building #6: 220 units (downtown high-rise)
Building #7: 6 units (traditional 6-flat)
Building #8: 3 units (traditional 3-flat)

Interesting. . . never thought about it that way. . . here's my Chicago history. . .

Building #1 (1992-1993): 6 units (front & back 6-flat)
Building #2 (1993-1999): 2 units (converted 3-flat)
Building #3 (1999-2003): 355 units (downtown high-rise)
Building #4 (2003-2005): 38 units (multi-unit courtyard building)
Building #5 (2005-2020): 955 units (downtown high-rise)

. . .

[JManc]

Originally Posted by Tom In Chicago

Building #5 (2005-2020): 955 units (downtown high-rise)

. . .

Your current digs are very cool. Don't change a thing.

[bobdreamz]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

The chart is actually ranked by % of SFH, detached, from lowest to highest. So with 26.5% SFH, detached, Miami would slot in between Chicago and LA.

Miami does have a lot of low to mid-rise apartments though like in Little Havana or like this in Edgewater north of downtown:


http://cdn1.media.zp-cdn.com/23320/M...46b-a7a44e.jpg

[wwmiv]

What I would really love is if the census bureau broke down each category by occupant relationship:

1. All related occupants
2. Some related occupants
3. All unrelated occupants

Do they?

In addition, does the census bureau code each unit as being:

1. owner occupied
2. non-owner occupied
3. vacant

?

[jd3189]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

Here is the 2015 ACS data for Miami (so it's apples-to-apples with the chart).

UNITS IN STRUCTURE
1, detached 26.5%
1, attached 11.2%
2 apartments 5.4%
3 or 4 apartments 5.3%
5 to 9 apartments 7.3%
10 or more apartments 43.8%
Mobile home or other type of housing 0.5%

It's from here: https://data.census.gov/cedsci/table...dePreview=true (you can select other years there, and look at other things).

So, after NY, Miami seems to be one of the most large apartment-heavy cities in the US. I would also expect Chicago to be up there too. Those 3 cities are the closest we have in America to the sky-cities in East Asia and the Arabian Peninsula.

[Shawn]

Jesus Christ, there are a lot of mobile homes in Mesa. That chart also puts to rest the notion that Boston is a row house city like the other Northeastern big boys. Back Bay may be qualitatively the best stretch of rows in the country, but it's not representative of Boston at all. We're a triple-decker city, which is what all those "three or four unit" apartments actually are.

[Shawn]

Originally Posted by JAYNYC

Thank you for providing an oversized, worthless graphic that no one asked for or needed. Much appreciated.

Can you not be such a dick? Mods - including me - have sent you private messages before about this. So now let's try publicly calling you out. Stop being so combative and confrontational with people who you disagree with over frivolities on the internet. Is this how you behave face to face with other adults?