Your city's "favoured quarter"

[UrbanImpact]

Originally Posted by Docere

Is there actually a "superrich"-dominated neighborhood or suburb in the US - i.e. somewhere where you'll find more CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, big hedge fund investors, world-famous celebrities, people with private jets etc. than law firm partners, surgeons, CPAs, corporate managers etc.? UES/Park Avenue comes the closest I think. I find this focus on billionaires and so on rather curious, given that they represent a tiny fraction of the wealthy.

There may be a few blocks or streets, but the richest of rich live, for the most part, around where the "regular 1%ers" live. Of course they control more stuff, have way more money, have more and bigger homes and the like.

Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos live in Medina, Washington. It's a rich place but it's hardly a "billionaires only" community.

Right here in Florida?
https://goo.gl/maps/HC4JYcDkz7aYv4Fd6

[Crawford]

What is that area along Bloor near High Park? That area is very attractive. Really nice commercial stretch, with lots of good restaurants. Doesn't really feel rich, but has a great upper middle class family feel.

[Docere]

It's called Bloor West Village.

[austlar1]

Originally Posted by UrbanImpact

Right here in Florida?
https://goo.gl/maps/HC4JYcDkz7aYv4Fd6

And, yet, they still don't bury the utilities! https://www.google.com/maps/@26.5707...7i16384!8i8192

[UrbanImpact]

Originally Posted by austlar1

And, yet, they still don't bury the utilities! https://www.google.com/maps/@26.5707...7i16384!8i8192

Florida Power & Light says that prices would go up as well as maintence fees for everyone in the metro. Their excuse not mine.

[Docere]

Toronto's "favored quarter" is centered on Yonge St. and runs from roughly Bloor to the 401 and ranges from urban to suburban in character. You have a contiguous area of mostly affluent neighborhoods with a population of 292,000.

These include: the Annex, Rosedale-Moore Park, Yonge-St. Clair, Casa Loma, Wychwood, Humewood-Cedarvale, Forest Hill South, Forest Hill North, Yonge-Eglinton, Mount Pleasant West, Mount Pleasant East, Leaside Lawrence Park South, Lawrence Park North, Bedford Park-Nortown, Bridle Path-Sunnybrook-York Mills, Banbury-Don Mills.

[Wigs]

Docere, when you mentioned Nottingham Terrace in Buffalo, this is what people think

c. 1929, ~9,200 total sq.ft on a 1 acre lot with 25'x50' inground pool
Zestimate is $1.87M

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/1...0167347_zpid/?

• Video Link

Since Buffalo declined for 60 years, $1M homes used to be rare. Recently a home sold for $3M and a condo for $1.28M so the upper end is rising in the city limits, not just the suburban mansions on acreages.

Even though the census tract isn't high income, the street has always been known to have some of the wealthiest people in Western NY. For years the street was apparently home to Jeremy Jacobs and family members, owner of Boston Bruins and Buffalo based Delaware North companies. He apparently still maintains a palatial Tudor style home in Western NY but south of the city set on 250 acres in East Aurora.
https://virtualglobetrotting.com/map...use/view/bing/

Other Billionaires with residences in the Buffalo area:
- Terry Pegula (owner of the Buffalo Sabres and Buffalo Bills)
- "bond king" Jeffrey Gundlach (who donated around $60M for the expansion of the Albright Knox into the set to reopen AKG Art Museum). In LA he has a compound with high security. In Buffalo he owns a much more modest home on Lincoln Pkwy (one of the Olmsted designed parkways)
https://goo.gl/maps/ZbMDyAWpKyyifMhAA
https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/7...30167412_zpid/
- the Rich family (Rich Products)

[Docere]

I guess the wealthy pocket only makes up a small part of the census tract? Per capita incomes may be quite a bit higher than median HH income.

[Quixote]

For NY/NJ/CT, the suburban communities with cachet tend to be in areas with more natural topography. Upstate, CT, North Shore LI, northern Bergen, and Summit/Millburn area are all more verdant due to being more forested as a result of higher elevation. This naturally lends itself to development patterns that generally feature less “dense sprawl” (like southern Nassau County, which was mostly barren plain before settlement) and more in the way of homes on bigger lots and bucolic streets.

So this notion of “balance” is largely driven by external, immutable factors. East/west of Manhattan is somewhat balanced but north/south is lopsided.

With the Bay Area, east/west is lopsided but north/south isn’t. Same goes for LA, although OC is latitudinally east of most of LA County, especially south OC.

Also, countless celebrities, politicians, and billionaires have and continue to own vacation homes (the Obama’s, Charles Koch) in the Coachella Valley. There’s wealth at the most extreme ends of the LA metro — from Ojai to San Clemente to Indian Wells.

https://www.architecturaldigest.com/...k-palm-springs

[Quixote]

You can throw in Lake Arrowhead, Big Bear, and Joshua Tree as well.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by austlar1

And, yet, they still don't bury the utilities! https://www.google.com/maps/@26.5707...7i16384!8i8192

Where's citywatch? Power pole alert!

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by Quixote

You can throw in Lake Arrowhead, Big Bear, and Joshua Tree as well.

Then you have Santa Barbara/Montecito right beyond that too.

San Diego-to Santa Barbara is pretty crazy for real estate/wealth.

[Docere]

Toronto's wealth is heavily concentrated in the central corridor.

Average income by Census Tract, 2021 census

Tract 86 (North Rosedale) $285,200
Tract 138 (Lawrence Park) $276,800
Tract 87 (South Rosedale) $258,400
Tract 264 (Bridle Path) $252,800
Tract 125 (Moore Park) $248,800
Tract 266 (York Mills) $235,400
Tract 265 (Lawrence Park) $235,000
Tract 139 (Lytton Park) $222,000
Tract 130 (Forest Hill) $221,800
Tract 601 (SE Oakville) $207,600
Tract 120 (Summerhill) $205,200
Tract 186 (Bennington) $202,200
Tract 119 (South Hill) $200,200
Tract 140 (Lytton Park) $190,800
Tract 602 (SE Oakville) $180,200
Tract 506 (Lorne Park, Mississauga) $173,800
Tract 227 (Kingsway) $170,800
Tract 604 (SE Oakville) $167,800
Tract 89 (Yorkville) $161,200
Tract 228 (The Kingsway) $159,800
Tract 131 (Forest Hill) $155,800
Tract 196.02 (Leaside) $152,000
Tract 277 (Bathurst-Lawrence) $150,600
Tract 91.01 (Annex) $150,400
Tract 230.01 (Edenbridge) $150,000

Of the 25 tracts, 21 are in Toronto and 18 in the favored quarter. 3 are in central Etobicoke in the western part of the city. 4 are in the western suburbs, mostly Oakville.

[Docere]

# of tracts by location:

Old City of Toronto, south of St. Clair: 7
Forest Hill: 2
North Toronto: 3
East York: 2
North York: 4
Etobicoke: 3
Mississauga: 1
Oakville: 3

# of tracts by electoral district:

Don Valley West (York Mills, North Toronto, Leaside): 6
University-Rosedale (Annex, Rosedale): 5
St. Paul's (Forest Hill, Yonge-St. Clair): 4
Eglinton-Lawrence (North Toronto, Bathurst-Lawrence): 3
Oakville: 3
Etobicoke-Lakeshore (Kingsway): 2
Etobicoke Centre: 1
Mississauga-Lakeshore: 1

[Quixote]

Originally Posted by LA21st

Then you have Santa Barbara/Montecito right beyond that too.

San Diego-to Santa Barbara is pretty crazy for real estate/wealth.

Let’s stick to what is technically Greater LA.

I find it fascinating how the Coachella Valley — as far as you can get from LA while still being in a populated place within the metro (it’s as far as Barstow) — has been an appealing destination for the rich and famous, retirees and high school kids, conservatives and liberals (including LGBTQ+) for generations. Beverly Hills 90210, The OC, The Hills, Melrose Place, Saved by the Bell, the pseudo-Brat Pack 1987 movie Less Than Zero, etc. all featured at least one “Palm Springs getaway” episode.

Today, Palm Springs is unofficially known as the “golf capital of the world” with well over 100 courses as well as being a world-class destination for tennis — golf and tennis being the two most stereotypically popular sports among “rich people.”

[Quixote]

OC actually provides good balance both north/south (10 freeway) and east/west (110 freeway, draw a straight line up to the 134/5 junction).

East you have Downtown, the most authentic Mexican food and culture this side of the border, 80,000+ Armenians concentrated in a small, contiguous geography, JPL, Caltech, Norton Simon, Rose Bowl / Parade, Huntington Library, some of the best Cantonese cuisine outside China, Santa Anita Park, Claremont Colleges, the San Gabriel and San Bernardino Mountains, Coachella Valley, Joshua Tree, Long Beach, and the port complex.

Then you have OC, which conservative reputation aside, has a strong brand valuation. The beaches are nicer and cleaner than LA, Disneyland and California Adventure, two championship-winning pro sports teams (including the Angels with Mike Trout and Shohei Otani, the Angels just behind the Mets in franchise valuation at #7), Michelin-star and James Beard-winning pho, a major public UC, Katie Porter, the late great Kobe Bryant, and television shows portraying it as a place of wealth and glamor to millions around the country and world. It’s a county of 3.15 million where the median household income is over $100,000. For comparison, San Diego County has a similar-sized population (about 100K more) and has a much larger biotech industry, but the median household income is $88,000.

All of those things, whether tied to income/education or not, demonstrate some degree of cachet, pedigree, and/or preeminence that give the eastern direction favorability beyond merely high net worth individuals, expensive real estate, and luxury shopping. World-class culture, entertainment, sports, nature/recreation, and ethnic food/diversity are quite favorable too and are what make a particular city unique.

[mrnyc]

greater cle 2017

[Docere]

Population density (per square mile) of some favored quarter Toronto neighborhoods:

Annex/Yorkville 28,264
Rosedale 11,688
Yonge-St. Clair 27,800
Forest Hill 15,185
Davisville/Yonge and Eglinton 57,034
Lawrence Park/North Toronto 13,984
York Mills 4,332

[Docere]

Montreal Island clearly has an east-west split, with the west being the favored and traditionally more anglo side. You have a contiguous favored quarter type area containing Westmount, Outremont, the Town of Mont Royal and Hampstead.

Westmount is the old-money anglo district that's functionally urban but remained a separate municipality, it's pretty similar to favored quarter areas around Yonge and St. Clair in Toronto. Today it's probably a roughly even split between WASPs, Jews and Quebecois.

The interwar district of Outremont it was the home of the francophone elites, but also has had a sizeable Jewish population (it was home to upwardly mobile Jews in the interwar years, today it's Hasidim). It's no longer an independent municipality, but a borough of Montreal.

TMR and Hampstead were incorporated in the early 20th century, but were not fully developed and are mostly postwar suburbs. TMR has shifted from anglophone to mostly francophone. Hampstead is predominantly Jewish (wealthier Hampstead and more middle class Cote St. Luc are Montreal's main Jewish suburbs).

[Quixote]

The Westside will always remain LA’s favored quarter even if Downtown, Westlake, Koreatown, and Hollywood were to Manhattanize and undergo complete gentrification.

It will always have the biggest homes and milder weather, and unlike the North Shore of Long Island, is part of the city. Malibu is an exception though. It happens to be the priciest enclave and not really part of the Westside. Malibu is very much an escape from the city, more developed like the Hamptons but closer to the action like Stinson Beach.

With a stretch of coast that runs for 27 miles and a population of approximately 16,000, Malibu provides ample space to feel a sense of seclusion without having to be isolated—the city is home to renowned bars and restaurants and Los Angeles is less than 25 miles away.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbes-...in-malibu/amp/

The city’s center of gravity has been shifting eastward for the last 20 years though, so it will be interesting to see if Malibu is as “close to the action” 25 years from now. However, Ojai and Santa Barbara will still be our Hamptons.