New Census data: Americans are returning to the far-flung suburbs

[fflint]

Originally Posted by SHiRO

Off course it is bullshit that everyone suddenly leaves town because of three days off. But that was kind of the point of my post in the first place wasn't it? People NOT leaving town every chance they get, because there are activities IN town, especially during holidays!

It doesn't matter what you think Americans "should" do with our Labor Day national holiday. That particular three day holiday is a time when Americans traditionally leave town and go out into the great outdoors--the beaches, mountains, vacation houses, camping, etc., because it is widely seen as the last gasp of Summer and usually is the last weekend before children go back to school.

When visiting the United States, it should be clear Labor Day is an outlier, not an ordinary day or weekend. And since an outlier is not representative of the whole, you cannot rationally judge what any American city is normally like based on how many people you observed hanging out downtown on Labor Day, doing what they could do the other 362 days of the year.

[SHiRO]

You are purposely missing the point. This isn't about Baltimore and this isn't about Labor Day although it is a good example of how many American cities don't attract enough people to their centers for a big enough variety of reasons besides work. As I mentioned before and something that should be obvious, I've not just spend one day in one city in the US, but this is an observation after visiting dozens of cities for weeks on end and three decades of studying (American) cities.

Yes, when I was there I knew it was Labor Day and I knew what activities many Americans like to undertake, that still doesn't excuse the absolutely desertedness of such a beautiful city with such potential and it certainly doesn't excuse the relative lack of people in certain other places on other days.

I do hope and certainly am under the impression that many American cities are succeeding in getting people to their centers in greater numbers, either as residents or visitors, all I was saying is that there need to be a great variety of reasons for people to do so. Not just work or retail.

[mhays]

Originally Posted by fflint

Labor Day, the first Monday in September, is wholly unrepresentative of an ordinary day in any US city. It cannot be used as representative of what any US city is normally like.

Americans uniformly take advantage of rare three-day national holidays like Labor Day to get out of town, and unlike cold-weather holidays like Christmas (which is very much an 'urban' oriented holiday in many urban centers), Labor Day is widely held as the last gasp of "Summer," with a very strong emphasis on being in the great outdoors--the vacation house, the mountains, the beaches, etc.

But then, you must have known all that, because otherwise you surely wouldn't have done exactly the thing you most denounce in others--posting about things you don't understand.

Labor Day is a very busy day in some cities. Some go to the beach, but others go to festivals, or just spend time in the nearest big city. Further, while it's a popular vacation weekend a lot of people stay in town in any city. I agree with Shiro on this one.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by SHiRO

You are purposely missing the point. This isn't about Baltimore and this isn't about Labor Day although it is a good example of how many American cities don't attract enough people to their centers for a big enough variety of reasons besides work. As I mentioned before and something that should be obvious, I've not just spend one day in one city in the US, but this is an observation after visiting dozens of cities for weeks on end and three decades of studying (American) cities.

Yes, when I was there I knew it was Labor Day and I knew what activities many Americans like to undertake, that still doesn't excuse the absolutely desertedness of such a beautiful city with such potential and it certainly doesn't excuse the relative lack of people in certain other places on other days.

I do hope and certainly am under the impression that many American cities are succeeding in getting people to their centers in greater numbers, either as residents or visitors, all I was saying is that there need to be a great variety of reasons for people to do so. Not just work or retail.

The City of London is similarly deserted on a weekend (except for tourist areas like St Pauls). This is a financial district with plenty of jobs, residential and retail starts a few blocks away. I don't see anyone lamenting the dearth of weekend or holiday pedestrian in la Defense or the City.

Look, due east and west of downtown are large low-income neighborhoods with high gun crime and high drug rates. A growing corridor of wealth surrounds downtown and the harbor and extends into the northern part of the city. See below:



Given the circumstances Baltimore is doing a great job redeveloping and attracting residents. Retail is probably the next step, but more gentrification/redevelopment is needed for critical mass and to attract chains.

[chris08876]

Nice one.

Its also those Zombies that flood downtown sometimes.

Causes everybody to go to Route 1 where they do meth , and run to California, hence the reason why downtown was not populated in Shiros pic.

[SHiRO]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

The City of London is similarly deserted on a weekend (except for tourist areas like St Pauls). This is a financial district with plenty of jobs, residential and retail starts a few blocks away. I don't see anyone lamenting the dearth of weekend or holiday pedestrian in la Defense or the City.

Amusing that you think this is even remotely comparable. It isn't even true. An office district being less than vibrant in the off hours versus a whole downtown plus surrounding neighbourhoods and including the tourist "hotspots"...

Given the circumstances Baltimore is doing a great job redeveloping and attracting residents. Retail is probably the next step, but more gentrification/redevelopment is needed for critical mass and to attract chains.

If you know this, why are you trying so hard to prove me wrong? Because this was exactely what I was saying (plus I think it is going to take more than just retail, most certainly more than "chains" that are already present in each suburban mall).

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by SHiRO

Amusing that you think this is even remotely comparable. It isn't even true. An office district being less than vibrant in the off hours versus a whole downtown plus surrounding neighbourhoods and including the tourist "hotspots"...

As several people have saying, as a suburbanite or tourist, I would be far more likely to visit Fells Point, Mt Vernon, and other areas immediately adjacent to downtown than the inner Harbor itself. the 'surrounding neighborhoods' are more vibrant. The inner harbor is a partially failed 1980-style redevelopment (stadiums, convention centers, hard rock cafe, aquariums). The other areas I mentioned have residential, restaurants, retail, etc. These, NOT downtown are the tourist/residential hotspots.

In the US, the core of the downtown is usually the office district. DC is the same way. Downtown DC is mostly dead on the weekends, but for the tourists. This doesn't mean the the city lacks vibrancy, just that the most populated and vibrant areas are elsewhere in the core of the city. You can also look at Geneva, same issue - pretty boring and empty downtown taken over by bank offices/ high end retail catering to rich Russians and w/ few restaurants, more lively areas elsewhere.

[10023]

I'm not sure I see ShiRo's point.

There's plenty to do in New York City, and New Yorkers leave on the weekends in droves. So do Londoners every bank holiday weekend. So do Parisians. So do Müncheners.

[SHiRO]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

As several people have saying, as a suburbanite or tourist, I would be far more likely to visit Fells Point, Mt Vernon, and other areas immediately adjacent to downtown than the inner Harbor itself. the 'surrounding neighborhoods' are more vibrant. The inner harbor is a partially failed 1980-style redevelopment (stadiums, convention centers, hard rock cafe, aquariums). The other areas I mentioned have residential, restaurants, retail, etc. These, NOT downtown are the tourist/residential hotspots.

In the US, the core of the downtown is usually the office district. DC is the same way. Downtown DC is mostly dead on the weekends, but for the tourists. This doesn't mean the the city lacks vibrancy, just that the most populated and vibrant areas are elsewhere in the core of the city. You can also look at Geneva, same issue - pretty boring and empty downtown taken over by bank offices/ high end retail catering to rich Russians and w/ few restaurants, more lively areas elsewhere.

So what you are telling me is that when we were running around in Downtown and yes Mt Vernon (and we drove through much of the rest of the city including the "The Wire" parts) in other parts of the city things like this were going on?

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...4&postcount=38
( Minato)

I saw enough of the city to form an accurate impression and I saw enough of other cities on other days to support my opinion that many cities could use a greater variety of reasons for people to visit. I don't see what's so controversial about that statement in the first place.

I hope that Baltimore has succeeded in that since I was there and that it is going to succeed to expand on it even more, because as I stated before, first and foremost I see Baltimore as a city with great potential for doing just that!

So you can continue to beat this dead horse, but what you are doing is highlighting exactely what the problem is. If the downtown and the main tourist attractions are less than vibrant, then that's exactely what we are talking about here!



And Geneva most definately does not have the same issues as Baltimore or other US cities. Don't know why it has to be dragged into the discussion again by you!

[SHiRO]

Originally Posted by 10023

I'm not sure I see ShiRo's point.

There's plenty to do in New York City, and New Yorkers leave on the weekends in droves. So do Londoners every bank holiday weekend. So do Parisians. So do Müncheners.

And even more people VISIT those cities on the weekends (or ANY day of the week). Like 2 to 1 if not 4 to 1! Not really hard to understand...

[pip]

I'm with SHiRO on this one. Basically American cites aside from a select few cannot compare. They are violent, empty and the cute areas small - like a few square blocks.

Get a grip people, America is not about their cities mostly.

[mhays]

I'd say several, not a few. Add my own city to that list. The office core gets quiet but the Pike Place Market is like the concourse of a stadium when the game lets out, the retail district is busy, the waterfront, the Space Needle area....

[Jasonhouse]

Originally Posted by SHiRO

You are purposely missing the point. This isn't about Baltimore and this isn't about Labor Day although it is a good example of how many American cities don't attract enough people to their centers for a big enough variety of reasons besides work.

???

I swear you say shit just to argue with people sometimes. Try hanging out in Any Downtown USA amongst towers of glass and concrete when it's 90°F or more.

Damn, I'm as enthusiastically urban as someone can get and I have spent most of my adult Labor Days in the mountains of Colorado, at the beach, at an amusement park, in the GA/TN mountains, and one time to Puerto Rico.

By the time September rolls around, I'm personally beyond disgusted with the endless heat of summer in the city, and desperately need to get the fuck out of town and recharge and refresh. Going by how many Americans plan trips around that same exact time of year, I suspect I'm typical in this regard, not exceptional.

Originally Posted by SHiRO

So you can continue to beat this dead horse

Says SSP's all time record holder for Dead Horse Beating™

[10023]

Originally Posted by SHiRO

And even more people VISIT those cities on the weekends (or ANY day of the week). Like 2 to 1 if not 4 to 1! Not really hard to understand...

Originally Posted by SHiRO

Off course it is bullshit that everyone suddenly leaves town because of three days off. But that was kind of the point of my post in the first place wasn't it? People NOT leaving town every chance they get, because there are activities IN town, especially during holidays!

It still makes no sense to think that locals wouldn't want to leave town if only there was more to do. People like to travel, and they like going to the country.

And that's actually a huge part of why Americans have moved to suburbia/exurbia. If you can afford to leave town on the weekends, especially in the summer, then city living is great. If you're living on the median income and can't afford a second home, or regular stays in hotels, and you've got to choose between the city and greenery, most Americans will pick the latter.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by 10023

If you're living on the median income and can't afford a second home, or regular stays in hotels, and you've got to choose between the city and greenery, most Americans will pick the latter.

well, they will sort of pick something that is both yet neither, but america remains an absolute behemoth in terms of marketing. selling fridges to eskimos (or however the old saying went) is nothing compared to selling a two-hour commute on a six-lane interstate and a house made out of paper to someone who secretly desires a country manor.

[10023]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

well, they will sort of pick something that is both yet neither, but america remains an absolute behemoth in terms of marketing. selling fridges to eskimos (or however the old saying went) is nothing compared to selling a two-hour commute on a six-lane interstate and a house made out of paper to someone who secretly desires a country manor.

That's my personal opinion of suburbia, but I suppose some people must find it to be the best rather than worst of both worlds.

[Rusty van Reddick]

SHiRO, Crawford makes asinine comments about Canadian cities too. He's insufferable.

Essen is a magnificent city- I grew up in a similarly steel-mill and industry choked part of the US (Hammond, Indiana) and was shocked going through it in high school- this was more than 30 years ago- to see house-proud people living in apartments virtually across the street from mills with carefully arranged flowers on their balconies. Compare that to what you see "across the street" from mills in East Chicago, Gary, or the far reaches of the south side of Chicago- no humans whatsoever.

This idea that European cities clear out on weekends is absolute nonsense- nothing can compare to the ghost towns that are weekends in many US cities, and even in cities like Duesseldorf or Leipzig, which aren't tourist hotspots, you can scarcely MOVE in the pedestrian zones, which go for blocks and blocks- nothing comes close in ANY US city than, say, the clusterfuck of bodies crammed into the various Fussgaengerzonen in Cologne on just a normal, non-holiday Saturday. Even SUNDAY is a wall of people and almost everything is closed on Sundays. It is insane; every Saturday felt like Toronto's gay pride on Church Street- you could barely move. No festival, just how life is there.

That pic of Memphis? That's not Paris, not Cologne, that's not even fucking Stralsund, a city of barely 50,000 in the most economically depressed part of Germany that has more street life than Seattle.

Speaking of Seattle- anybody who says it doesn't have exurban growth is wilfully ignorant. Seattle sprawls FOREVER.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Rusty van Reddick

Essen is a magnificent city

And readers with the slightest shred of objectivity, logic and global perspective can just stop reading your post right there.

[destroycreate]

Originally Posted by Rusty van Reddick

... has more street life than Seattle.

Speaking of Seattle- anybody who says it doesn't have exurban growth is wilfully ignorant. Seattle sprawls FOREVER.

You sound like such a douche, and clearly don't know Seattle well. There are tons of super vibrant, walkable parts of Seattle that would equal some industrial town in German's center. Your comment could seriously not sound more ignorant.

[mhays]

Seattle is both.

It sprawls for 80 miles north-south because there are other urban cores in those directions, and those county plans don't clamp down on sprawl as much as they should. We sprawl less within King County (the core county) because the rules are tighter. But even in King the rules were different until the 1990s, and a lot of growth into the 2000s occurred under the old rules.

But we also have busy areas in the core on summer weekends. Not the office core, but the Market, waterfront, retail district, etc. Jasonhouses' point about weather doesn't fly here...our weather is nearly perfect in the summer assuming you like 65-80 highs and dry. People don't need to flee.