Great Lakes Cities

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by edale

And before anyone counters this with "but, San Francisco!", the soil conditions in Pittsburgh and Cincy are much different than SF, making SF style density impossible in those cities. Landslides are a huge issue in Cincinnati even with somewhat limited hillside construction.

The main thing is that San Francisco is quite flat in comparison to Pittsburgh.

The fact that San Francisco is mainly composed of a very large GRID tells us everything we need to know about its relative uniform topography in comparison to the insanely-irregular topography of Pittsburgh.

And I imagine that the same holds true for Cincinnati (to a lesser extent than the case with Pittsburgh), but I don't know Cincinnati well enough from on-the-ground experience to make the same assertion.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Wigs

Steely, these maps you posted make Detroit and Cleveland look like they are still bleeding population.

that's because they are, relatively speaking, at least in terms of city proper.

detroit and cleveland were among the worst performing major cities last census for city proper growth.


GL cities by 2010 - 2020 city proper growth:

buffalo: +6.5%
chicago: +1.9%
milwaukee: −3.0%
cleveland: −6.1%
detroit: −10.5%

those percentages align very closely with the "vision test" of the 5 maps i made.




the driving force behind most of it was black flight:


GL cities by % loss of NH-blacks from 2010 - 2020:

detroit: -15.9%
cleveland: -15.1%
chicago: -9.7%
milwaukee: -6.5%

buffalo mamaged to buck the trend by experincing a slight growth in its city proper black population.

and chicago overcame its substantial black flight with strong growth in latinos, asians, and others to more than offset it into slight growth.

[benp]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

that's because they are, relatively speaking, at least in terms of city proper.

detroit and cleveland were among the worst major cities last census for city proper growth.


GL cities by 2010 - 2020 city proper growth:

buffalo: +6.5%
chicago: +1.9%
milwaukee: −3.0%
cleveland: −6.1%
detroit: −10.5%

those percentages align very closely with the "vision test" of the 5 maps i made.




the driving force behind most of it was black flight:


GL cities by % loss of NH-blacks from 2010 - 2020:

detroit: -15.9%
cleveland: -15.1%
chicago: -9.7%
milwaukee: -6.5%

buffalo mamaged to buck the trend by experincing a slight growth in its city proper black population.

and chicago overcame its substantial black flight with strong growth in latinos, asians, and others to more than offset it into slight growth.

Chicago and Milwaukee lost a much higher percentage of white population than black.

milwaukee: -21.8%
chicago: -18.7%
cleveland: -13.2%
detroit: -9.7%

[Crawford]

That can't be right. No way did Chicago lose 1/5 of its white population from 2010-2020. I'd bet roughly flat white population.

Generally speaking, the white flight era, at least for center cities, is over, or much reduced. And Chicago doesn't have many old school white ethnic areas anymore. You have the gentrified core areas and the copland city worker areas, and those aren't disappearing.

[iheartthed]

Chicago's white population increased slightly from 2010 to 2020:

854,505 (2010) - > 862,366 (2020)

[benp]

Originally Posted by Crawford

That can't be right. No way did Chicago lose 1/5 of its white population from 2010-2020. I'd bet roughly flat white population.

Generally speaking, the white flight era, at least for center cities, is over, or much reduced. And Chicago doesn't have many old school white ethnic areas anymore. You have the gentrified core areas and the copland city worker areas, and those aren't disappearing.

my source: https://data.dispatch.com/census/tot...60-1703114000/

White on this source included hispanic and non-hispanic whites. Likely more people self identified as "Two or more" in 2020 vs 2010, resulting in a decrease of total white population on the 2020 census.

Kind of shows how self-identification can mess with numbers and assumptions, especially in a melting pot. Also, all sources use different assumptions.

[Steely Dan]

^ that site's data is all kinds of janky.

Here is 2010 - 2020 numerical population change for the 5 main macro demos in Chicago and Detroit showing how black flight, not white flight, knee-capped both cities last decade.

city of chicago 2010 - 2020:

NH black: -84,735
NH white: +8,905
NH asian: +44,926
NH other: +41,038
hispanic: +40,656

total: +50,790

(if you take away the black flight number, the others add up to a +135,525)




city of detroit 2010 - 2020:

NH black: -93,361
NH white: +5,166
NH asian: +2,678
NH other: +8,261
hispanic: +2,590

total: -74,666

(if you take away the black flight number, the others add up to a +21,790)


After 6 decades in a row, the unrelenting white flight that crippled both Chicago and Detroit finally came to a fucking end in the 2010s, praise Pizza God!!!

The next major demographic challenges for these two cities:

1. Find a way to attract more imigrants.

2. Convince black people to stick around.

That second item might already be changing as both cities roughly halved their black flight numbers from the '00s.

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by benp

my source: https://data.dispatch.com/census/tot...60-1703114000/

White included hispanic and non-hispanic whites. Likely more people self identified as "Two or more" in 2020 vs 2010, resulting in a decrease of total white population on the 2020 census.

Kind of shows how self-identification can mess with numbers and assumptions, especially in a melting pot.

That’s why you go with the standard NH White, NH Black, Hispanic, Asian, Other categories that were also calculated in 2010 and can be compared directly.

Sorry, but a quarter of the city is not actually “other” or “2 or more”. That’s just Hispanics who mostly don’t identify as black or Caucasian.

2010 White: 854,717
2020 White: 863,622
Net: +8,905

2010 Black: 872,286
2020 Black: 787,551
Net: -84735

2010 Hispanic: 778,058
2020 Hispanic: 819,518
Net: +40,656

2010 Asian: 144,903
2020 Asian: 189,857
Net: +44,992

2010 Other: 44,830
2020 Other: 85,840
Net:+ 41,010

[edale]

Originally Posted by pj3000

The main thing is that San Francisco is quite flat in comparison to Pittsburgh.

The fact that San Francisco is mainly composed of a very large GRID tells us everything we need to know about its relative uniform topography in comparison to the insanely-irregular topography of Pittsburgh.

And I imagine that the same holds true for Cincinnati (to a lesser extent than the case with Pittsburgh), but I don't know Cincinnati well enough from on-the-ground experience to make the same assertion.

Hm, well there are certainly flat portions of SF. The Sunset and Richmond Districts, as well as land closest to the bay (much of which is built on fill) are flat. But a large portion of SF's grid is overlayed on its hillside communities. And the hills are famously very steep. Whereas Pittsburgh and Cincinnati's road network is largely built around the topography, it seems like SF built the road network as a grid, topography be damned. Maybe it's because of the different soil conditions and precipitation patterns allowed for SF to build in places that PGH or CIN couldn't...I don't really know.

Cincinnati's urban core is on a tight grid until it runs into the hills. Flat portions of the city either on top of the hills or in valleys are largely built out in grids. It's the streets that navigate the hills that are really wonky and curvy. So you have a pattern of grids served by curvy streets that climb and navigate around the hills. You can clearly see the flat vs hillside areas in this map view. Northside is in a tight grid, but all the streets around it look like rivers as they twist and turn up the hill.

Pittsburgh has far less flat land than Cincinnati, so its road network is even crazier.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by edale

Hm, well there are certainly flat portions of SF. The Sunset and Richmond Districts, as well as land closest to the bay (much of which is built on fill) are flat. But a large portion of SF's grid is overlayed on its hillside communities. And the hills are famously very steep. Whereas Pittsburgh and Cincinnati's road network is largely built around the topography, it seems like SF built the road network as a grid, topography be damned. Maybe it's because of the different soil conditions and precipitation patterns allowed for SF to build in places that PGH or CIN couldn't...I don't really know.

Cincinnati's urban core is on a tight grid until it runs into the hills. Flat portions of the city either on top of the hills or in valleys are largely built out in grids. It's the streets that navigate the hills that are really wonky and curvy. So you have a pattern of grids served by curvy streets that climb and navigate around the hills. You can clearly see the flat vs hillside areas in this map view. Northside is in a tight grid, but all the streets around it look like rivers as they twist and turn up the hill.

Pittsburgh has far less flat land than Cincinnati, so its road network is even crazier.

SF topography reaches great heights, but in general it is quite gradually-rising coastal ridges.

Again the fact that a large grid dominates the city is testament to the fact that a contiguous city could be built there all over a century ago. The same could not and cannot be said for Pittsburgh.

There is a relatively small portion of developed area in SF that is famously steep. It’s mainly gradual coastal rise. There are vast grid neighborhoods with perfectly straight streets. This would simply be impossible to this day in Pittsburgh, which is e clearly sliced up by streams, creeks, rivers throughout. There’s a reason there are nearly 450 bridges in the city of Pittsburgh and an estimated 2,000 in Allegheny County. SF has nothing like this.

[Docere]

Interesting to see the top 10 countries of birth for immigrants in the Buffalo area:

1. Canada 5,783
2. India 5,253
3. China 4,287
4. Italy 2,723
5. Bangladesh 2,467
6. Jamaica 2,404
7. Germany 2,314
8. Burma 2,061
9. Yemen 2,010
10. Iraq 1,997

https://www.newyorkupstate.com/buffa...mmigrants.html

[Steely Dan]

^ color me shocked that mexico isn't in the top 10.

[Innsertnamehere]

indeed. Less than 2,000 Mexican immigrants in Buffalo? I mean it's basically as far from the Mexican border as you can get in the US other than New England, but still.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by edale

Hm, well there are certainly flat portions of SF. The Sunset and Richmond Districts, as well as land closest to the bay (much of which is built on fill) are flat. But a large portion of SF's grid is overlayed on its hillside communities. And the hills are famously very steep. Whereas Pittsburgh and Cincinnati's road network is largely built around the topography, it seems like SF built the road network as a grid, topography be damned. Maybe it's because of the different soil conditions and precipitation patterns allowed for SF to build in places that PGH or CIN couldn't...I don't really know.

Yeah, SF seems hillier than Pittsburgh to me. It definitely has steeper streets than I've seen in Pittsburgh.

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ color me shocked that mexico isn't in the top 10.

Buffalo's Latin community is predominantly Puerto Rican. The Niagara Street corridor is basically Little Puerto Rico

They even have decorative street signs calling it "Avenida San Juan" and a gorgeous mural on a small mixed use building. The streetscape improvements of the last couple of years has also made it more vibrant, with reduced auto traffic lanes and real bike lanes. Niagara street is looking the best in decades.

The 3.3 mile corridor, once completed, will go from an industrial corridor to one that “befits its waterfront proximity and recent increased level of private investment”, according to Watts Architecture and Engineering, the group that is in charge with construction.

Specifically, the new stretch of Niagara Street will place more of an emphasis on pedestrians and bicycles by trimming traffic from two lanes in each direction to one lane with a turning lane in the center. Additionally, there will be dedicated biking paths and more traffic lights.

https://www.buffalorising.com/2017/1...nida-san-juan/

I hope benp will post links to his photos or streetview before/after comparison

[Wigs]

Related: The soon to reopen (May 2023) and renamed Albright Knox Gundlach Art Museum ($195M expansion) has a great public art initiative to beautify the city with murals throughout the entire city of Buffalo

• Video Link

Outsiders just don't understand Buffalo is becoming a really cool city once again.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Wigs

Buffalo's Latin community is predominantly Puerto Rican. The Niagara Street corridor is basically Little Puerto Rico

Yeah, like Cleveland, I was aware that Buffalo is east of the great Mexican/Puerto Rican divide, but it's still very surprising to me that Buffalo doesn't even register 2,000 Mexican immigrants.

Chicago and Milwaukee are west of the Mexican/Puerto Rican divide, but both of them still have significant Puerto Rican communities as well, even if they're FAR out-numbered by Mexicans in both cities.


Here's Chicago's "Paseo Boricua", the historic heart of the city's Puerto Rican community along a stretch of W. Division St. in Humboldt Park.


Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paseo_Boricua

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Yeah, like Cleveland, I was aware that Buffalo is east of the Mexican/Puerto Rican divide, but it's still very surprising to me that Buffalo doesn't even register 2,000 Mexican immigrants.

Chicago and Milwaukee are west of the Mexican/Puerto Rican divide, but both of them still have significant Puerto Rican communities as well, even if they're still far out-numbered by Mexicans.


Here's Chicago's "Paseo Boricua", the heart of the city's Puerto Rican community along a stretch of Division in Humboldt Park.


Source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paseo_Boricua

I'm sure eventually Mexican immigrants will start trickling in to Western NY. I know the Mexican restaurant offerings have increased but that's it.

That neighborhood looks neat! Love that huge flag sign, true placemaking.

[subterranean]

There very well could be more than 2,000 Mexican immigrants not showing up on the radar, especially in the Trump/Post-Trump era. Buffalo has a lot of restaurants and I'm assuming just like everywhere else suburban white kids aren't running the lines.

[benp]

Originally Posted by subterranean

There very well could be more than 2,000 Mexican immigrants not showing up on the radar, especially in the Trump/Post-Trump era. Buffalo has a lot of restaurants and I'm assuming just like everywhere else suburban white kids aren't running the lines.

You would be surprised. My sister-in-law from Texas calls Buffalo the place "where white people work" as white working class still dominate lower levels of the workforce, including food and beverage.

I can't say one way or another whether Mexican population has increased or not. A friend of ours from Mexico who lives here didn't seem to think it has very much. I hear a lot of Spanish spoken in some of the area shops and grocers I go to, but from what I can tell most are Puerto Rican, Cuban, Dominican, and maybe Central American. (I prefer shopping at grocers that serve immigrants, as there is a wider, cheaper, and fresher variety of different fruits and vegetables than standard markets). Our supermarkets have dedicated Hispanic food aisles, but a separate small Mexican section is carried on a different aisle (along with things like British, Indian, Japanese, etc), if that tells you anything about the Mexican population. They have been slowly adding more variety in the last couple of years, but some of it has been Tex-Mex not even Mex-Mex.