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Originally Posted by hauntedheadnc
Another advantage the older/colder places tend to have is a street grid. Boston is an outlier in that respect, but even Boston functions better with its dense development patterns than does a place like Charlotte or Atlanta, where the roads, like those of Boston, are basically paved historic cow paths.
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So, so true. In our case, some of the older farm to market roads and Cherokee paths are now serving as major arterials but remain two lanes. Most traverse beautiful residential areas where the homeowners are loathe to allow any widening, and band together and sue at the slightest hint of any plan to do so. This is a huge factor in inside the Perimeter gridlock here. But I can't say I blame them, either. The common feeling among many is that they are willing to put up with it to not destroy the tree cover.
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It's even worse in multi-nodal urban areas like the Triangle, Hampton Roads, and Greenville-Spartanburg, where you have multiple clumps of paved cow paths or, in the case of Hampton Roads, cow paths and all sorts of bays and rivers to add that extra-special touch of mayhem to any attempt at a comprehensive urban area.
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So true, especially re: Hampton Roads!
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What it comes down to is the fact that older/colder cities had the good fortune to develop at a time when dense development was coupled with an intelligent transportation plan. Newer/warmer cities either developed late and ended up with cow paths, or else those that were smart enough to build a grid still ended up too sprawled to make utmost use of it.
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As did Atlanta. The core is on a grid, and we had a wonderful and comprehensive network of streetcars in the city and interurbans to outlaying areas such as Marietta & Stone Mountain. There were also passenger trains to nearby towns that were heavily utilized. These old railroad suburbs are the ones with the charming Downtowns like Norcross, for instance. Now we are finally trying to rebuild an intown streetcar network that will connect with the BeltLine. We'll see how it goes, but we are pretty excited about it (most are anyway, inside I-285).
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Then again, I've never been to Houston, Miami, Los Angeles, or Phoenix, so I wouldn't have personal knowledge of how they use their grids, or how much of each urban area is grid versus cow paths. I just know what I read and see on here.
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I have been to all multiple times, with the exception of Houston. Yes, they are all on giant grids for the most part, including the suburbs. Miami/South Florida has rail ridership that is a fraction of ours, even though they are larger. And traffic is just as bad as here.
Phoenix and L.A. are trying. The LRT in Phoenix is very successful so far, but doesn't hit enough areas yet. The metro there is HUGE geographically, and they also have the heat issue to deal with.
L.A. is making great strides, and is the place I'm most excited about. I go there often, and some of my best friends live there. There has been a total sea-change in attitude there over the past several years regarding transit - but the area is so huge, populated and multi-nodal it will always have bad traffic. If only they had never ripped out the Red Cars.