Great Lakes Cities

[Crawford]

Buffalo, from street level, feels notably denser/more packed in than other Eastern Great Lakes cities.

But maybe the deeper lots even things out.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by jpdivola

I don't have the stats to prove it, but the Allentown/Elmwood area with its tightly packed doubles and apartment buildings probably has a density that approaches that of a less dense rowhouse area like you would find in mid-atlantic cities.

starting in allentown, and moving north along the elmwood corridor, census tracts in that part of buffalo are in the 10,000 - 17,000 ppsm range, and it probably represents the largest area of contiguous >10,000 ppsm urbanism in the US great lakes region, outside of chicago and milwaukee.

Originally Posted by Crawford

Buffalo, from street level, feels notably denser/more packed in than other Eastern Great Lakes cities.

But maybe the deeper lots even things out.

these stats are now getting pretty long in the tooth (census 2010), but FWIW:



US Great Lakes MSAs by total number of people living in census tracts >10,000 ppsm:

Chicago - 2,584,931
Milwaukee - 252,711
Buffalo - 131,147
Cleveland - 98,090
Detroit - 70,371

[benp]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

starting in allentown, and moving north along the elmwood corridor, census tracts in that part of buffalo are in the 10,000 - 17,000 ppsm range, and it probably represents the largest area of contiguous >10,000 ppsm urbanism in the US great lakes region, outside of chicago and milwaukee.






these stats are now getting pretty long in the tooth (census 2010), but FWIW:



US Great Lakes MSAs by total number of people living in census tracts >10,000 ppsm:

Chicago - 2,584,931
Milwaukee - 252,711
Buffalo - 131,147
Cleveland - 98,090
Detroit - 70,371

Even some of the low density census tracts are skewed by industrial land along parts of the tract, while the residential area may be tightly packed. Here are a couple of examples in Riverside and Black Rock, which are both significantly under 10k overall when looking at the whole tract. But on a block-by-block basis, some of the densest blocks in the city may be located here. I also think that this neighborhood has got to have the most corner delis per square mile than any other place in the city.
https://goo.gl/maps/bhA8sbQvowxheNVw6
https://goo.gl/maps/JmQZrHdAULFj6oDE9
https://goo.gl/maps/ZMDsc5mvkrAbPQ4E7

And also commercial strips in these same neighborhoods, with varying degrees of vitality.
https://goo.gl/maps/r7qDYbnY7VMQx5u46
https://goo.gl/maps/GDS4QdMmGETX2iN46
https://goo.gl/maps/2BvpJTQuedNyJAz38
https://goo.gl/maps/VZFX3coBgq4FTjDs5
https://goo.gl/maps/L48oWJUQmr2uWgvF9

[edale]

Originally Posted by The North One

Lol just ignore him, he's been like this for years. His google streetview games are always in bad faith. He's also from Ohio so I think that explains a lot.

Rather than label me a troll, after I was generous in my praise for a still developing Woodward, why not show streetviews that demonstrate the vibrant urban corridors of Detroit. Iheartthed posted some links to mostly abandoned, depressing street scenes, and tried to say it was not too far off from what High Street has. I (correctly) pointed out that those examples were nothing like High Street, and I get labeled a troll? You guys don't post these links because they don't exist. Period.

I have literally no reason to troll Detroit. I root for a Detroit comeback, even though I know the chances of it becoming a viable, vibrant urban place are slim. The devastation and abandonment and complete lack of urban features (outside of Downtown) in a once grand city is truly heart breaking. I think it's quite sad to think of how much of the city has been lost even since the 90s, as Crawford mentions. Iheartthed likes to compare Detroit to Berlin-- a city that was bombed into oblivion in a World War, and then divided up and occupied for decades. Detroit has no such reason for its decay. The racism of the people of Metro Detroit, and subsequent white flight and sprawl that occurred because of it, has left the city looking like a "before" shot of Berlin prior to its renaissance, and with much dimmer prospects for recovery.

I won't speak on Detroit any more here. Let the boosters continue to live in denial and label anyone who dares deviate from the dream narrative a troll. Good luck.


And say what you will about Ohio, but it has 3 cities that blow the pants off any urban experience Michigan has to offer. Even this (awful) joke of a promotional video for Cleveland ends with "at least we're not Detroit!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZzgAjjuqZM

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by edale

And say what you will about Ohio, but it has 3 cities that blow the pants off any urban experience Michigan has to offer. Even this (awful) joke of a promotional video for Cleveland ends with "at least we're not Detroit!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZzgAjjuqZM

"Delusional" Ohio booster finally provides motive for trolling thread.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by edale

If you don't want to accept that example, there have been several 4-5 story buildings erected in Over the Rhine with 0 parking spots in recent years. Here's one that's 5 stories, 32 units, 0 parking

Over-the-Rhine looks nice and I would have not expected a neighbourhood like that to exist in the Midwest US if not for SSP.

The 0 parking question was meant to get at car culture, which is particularly strong in the US Midwest and cities like Detroit. In my experience there aren't a lot of middle class families that live without a car in those areas and it seems like even younger people mostly own cars. Then on top of that there are zoning controls that tend to mandate even more parking than people want, and effectively make it impossible to build fine grained medium scale neighbourhoods.

[Crawford]

OTR in Cincy is world-class, but that's a few blocks. I wouldn't say there's anywhere in OH that has particularly good walking environment, outside of OTR.

[uaarkson]

Originally Posted by Crawford

OTR in Cincy is world-class, but that's a few blocks. I wouldn't say there's anywhere in OH that has particularly good walking environment, outside of OTR.

Columbus

[Camelback]

Playhouse Square area in Cleveland?

[suburbanite]

German Village in Columbus looks like as nice a residential neighbourhood walking environment as you can get in North America. Seems slightly weak on the commercial front though. If South 3rd Street was a bulky commercial corridor like High Street, Queen West, or some of the others mentioned in this thread, it would check all the boxes.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by The North One

Lol just ignore him, he's been like this for years. His google streetview games are always in bad faith. He's also from Ohio so I think that explains a lot.

Coming from the streetview cherry picker master of California, a place you've never been. I

It's why we never take you seriously.
I'm pretty sure I could cherry pick the fuck out of Detroit.
I don't though.

[dc_denizen]

Euclid ave in Cleveland is the best urban downtown street in the midwest outside of Chicago.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ke...92a50?hl=en-us

Columbus has high street , which has miles of walkability , but downtown itself is lacking and far less monumental or architecturally significant

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

Euclid ave in Cleveland is the best urban downtown street in the midwest outside of Chicago.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ke...92a50?hl=en-us

Columbus has high street , which has miles of walkability , but downtown itself is lacking and far less monumental or architecturally significant

Washington Ave in St Louis has one of the better mostly intact low early 20th century canyons (and has subway stations off the side) that stretches for many blocks but downtown takes a back seat to the CWE and Clayton (which looks like a sunbelt downtown) and has a pretty weak retail sector

https://goo.gl/maps/qLFdwsiqziepPs3r6

[Steely Dan]

woodward in detroit, from spirit of detroit plaza, through campus martius, and up to grand circus, is another great classic downtown street that's only gonna get better now that the old hudson's block is finally being redeveloped.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

"Delusional" Ohio booster finally provides motive for trolling thread.

He's having a straight up meltdown.

I'm not even reading his posts anymore. Maybe he'll catch on.

Originally Posted by Crawford

OTR in Cincy is world-class, but that's a few blocks. I wouldn't say there's anywhere in OH that has particularly good walking environment, outside of OTR.

Lol right?! Over The Rhine has been put on a pedestal here for years but its a very tiny area. It's not some kind of Brooklyn equivalent. It's a small enclave not even half the size of most Great Lakes cities downtowns. It's also got plenty of holes and parking, and its surrounded by urban renewal.

Is it a well preserved slice of unique Midwest urbanism? Sure. But it doesn't make Cincy blow away all other urban offerings in the Midwest by it's sheer existence.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

US Great Lakes MSAs by total number of people living in census tracts >10,000 ppsm:

Chicago - 2,584,931
Milwaukee - 252,711
Buffalo - 131,147
Cleveland - 98,090
Detroit - 70,371

Census tract density is a pretty terrible method to compare. It's essentially density gerrymandering.

The highest density census tract in the US is a random apartment high-rise in DC.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by The North One

Census tract density is a pretty terrible method to compare. It's essentially density gerrymandering.

then propose a better method.

[hipster duck]

The downtown stretch of Woodward is probably the best downtown street in the Great Lakes area outside of Chicago (and Toronto).

What’s funny is all the high end, chain retail on that strip. Who’s shopping there that doesn’t live closer to the exact same stores in the Somerset Collection? Throwing tax breaks can only get you so far. Eventually you need a stable population of tens of thousands of urban, upper middle class people living nearby to support those kinds of businesses.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by The North One

The highest density census tract in the US is a random apartment high-rise in DC.

i believe the densest US census tract is 307.02 up in chicago's edgewater community area with a density of ~500,000ppsm.

it is a weird little anomoly of a tract that is indeed very tiny and includes only two residential highrises.

my mom and dad live in one of them, pictured below (the tall black miesian one):


source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...tel_060325.jpg

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

then propose a better method.

Census tract seems to be the easiest way to get a good idea of how dense a city is at a point in time. But I don't think it's a great way to visualize how densely built an urban environment is, especially in the Great Lakes region which has gone through so much abandonment. I'm pretty sure that Detroit had the second highest count of people living in high density tracts in the Great Lakes as recently as the 1990s.