Help me map the boundaries of US rowhouse country

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

not true for portland, we actually have lots. but they are sporadically built around the city. the largest clusters of them in portland proper are in NW portland, the west slope and bethany neighborhoods on the other side of the hills. southeast portland is seeing more and more attached housing too. the far western suburbs along the light rails have tons and tons of them though. intel and nike, and lots of other tech jobs are out there. you wont find historic row houses outside of nw portland though. what we do have alot of though are triplexs. lots of mid 50s, brick mega ranch houses with shared basements and separate entrances. i live in one myself. its built like a bomb shelter but it very spacious and almost graceful inside.

this is one of the weirdest variations of rowhouses i've ever seen (in portland). they present like detached 4 squares or two flats or whatever but are actually attached further back:

ispyjoy.com

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by photoLith

I added everything I know about, nearly everything in PA, VA, OH, IN, and WV I could think of, and all the towns that have any row houses along the national road to St. Louis. This was the most traveled early road in America and the gateway to the West. It originally ended in Vendalia, Illinois and was supposed to extend all the way to St Louis but then the panic of 1837 happened and ended the building of the National Road, now Rt. 40.

here's charles dickens travels of the US...sort of highlights areas of major development away from the eastern seaboard (excepting new orleans) at that time, pretty much corresponds with the rowhouse cities (no indy, for example, not sure about sandusky...). also highlights the fact that it was a waste of time to travel overland beyond ohio at that point.


http://charlesdickenspage.com

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by photoLith

... and Erie which has like 6 row houses left.

Not true... while most of Erie's central rowhouse blocks were destroyed in the name of "urban redevelopment", Erie still has rowhouses in Lawrence Park and in Dock Junction. Actually, much of the housing stock in Lawrence Park is rowhouses built by GE in the early 1900s. And there are others (of numerous styles) scattered around the city. Dock Junction on the west side has smaller numbers, mainly owing to the fact that many of the blocks were demolished to make way for an I-79 interchange in the early 1970s.

Many blocks of Lawrence Park are nothing but rows like below.



Most of Erie's historical rowhouses on the lower east side (like the ones below) were unfortunately wiped out in a major flood in 1915 or in post-war urban redevelopment.




Erie does not have "lots" by any means... especially in comparison to other PA cities, but to say there are 6 left is just not accurate.

[ue]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

Pretty much, yeah, aside from newer stuff.

The first thing I thought when I looked at the map was that Providence and Charleston were missing. But then when I looked at those 2 cities on street view I realized they don't really have many (or, any). Seems like old cities dominated by brick housing are the ones with the townhouses, but ones dominated by wood aren't. And for some reason, Charleston and Providence seem to be dominated by wood in their older houses.

Several cities seem to have what I'd call "almost townhouses." Chicago is filled with them. They aren't quite sharing walls, but they come really close.

I know this discussion is on US cities, but Halifax is a city dominated by wood construction but does have a bit of old rowhousing. It's very sporadic and intermingles a lot with "almost rowhomes".

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by BG918

These types of homes are all over older parts of Denver and are generally from the late 1800's to early 1900's. Some are brick like this one but lots of other ones are stone. The duplex is the most common type but I've seen some that are single family and a few scattered around that are more than 2 units all connected. They are also almost entirely 1 story and as such are targets for scrapes in certain neighborhoods.


http://www.realtor.com/realestateand...row-home-co-op

I don't think that's a rowhouse...

If duplexes are rowhouses, then every US city has "lots" of rowhouses.

Originally Posted by eschaton

I started tweaking the map a bit...

Cirrus asked for no tweaking.

[Centropolis]

i think that duplex was in response to my discussion of an austere, brick one story midwestern/western us subcategory of housing - that i called (and have seen called) the "railroad house" - that actually appears as sfh, duplex, and rowhousing.

[Cirrus]

1. PLEASE do not edit other people's entries on the map. PLEASE.

2. I would say to characterize a dot as "lots" if there is any neighborhood where rowhouses are the dominant housing type, no matter the size of the city. The key is that rowhouses are the predominant type somewhere in the core, not merely interspersed throughout neighborhoods that are mainly not rowhouse. Also I suppose it's worth clarifying that I'm only interested in historic building right now, not new stuff.

3. Here's a more clear example of the one-story stuff in Denver that people are talking about:

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

Cirrus asked for no tweaking.

Crap, I missed that.

The only change (as opposed to addition) I made was changing Camden to lots. Camden's entire urban core is rowhouses (except where blight has made them detached ). It was particularly odd, because Trenton was listed as lots, but Trenton has many detached and semi-detached dominant neighborhoods, and only a small core of rowhouses.

[ColDayMan]

Sorry, can't make map as work has blocked that but Columbus arguably has the most rowhouses (by far) in the Midwest outside of Chicago, Cincinnati, and St. Louis. Weinland Park alone has endless (flat, ugly, but hey they are true) rowhouses.

You can view the various, endless rowhouses in the gallery below:
https://www.urbanohio.com/photo/inde.../category/1415

**Edit** added stuff to that map

[photoLith]

I think PA won

[photoLith]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

Not true... while most of Erie's central rowhouse blocks were destroyed in the name of "urban redevelopment", Erie still has rowhouses in Lawrence Park and in Dock Junction. Actually, much of the housing stock in Lawrence Park is rowhouses built by GE in the early 1900s. And there are others (of numerous styles) scattered around the city. Dock Junction on the west side has smaller numbers, mainly owing to the fact that many of the blocks were demolished to make way for an I-79 interchange in the early 1970s.

Many blocks of Lawrence Park are nothing but rows like below.



Most of Erie's historical rowhouses on the lower east side (like the ones below) were unfortunately wiped out in a major flood in 1915 or in post-war urban redevelopment.




Erie does not have "lots" by any means... especially in comparison to other PA cities, but to say there are 6 left is just not accurate.

I didn't know about those streets you mention. I was just there again a couple of days ago and the only row houses I saw were those on the second image just to the east of the Main Street. I missed those ones you mentioned I guess.

[Flyers2001]

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0989...8i6656!6m1!1e1


Far Northeast Philadelphia Row homes

[softee]

I see someone added Toronto on the map, although I don't agree that it would be classified as "few", since cities such as Buffalo, Cleveland and Detroit are also classified as few. Compared to those cities, rowhouses are far more prevalent in Toronto, they are absolutely commonplace throughout the oldest parts of the city, similar to Pittsburgh.

[Centropolis]

I added St. Charles, Ste. Genevieve, and Hermann, MO all which have examples of zero-lot line mid 19th century residential construction where the walls completely touch...even though the structures are often somewhat dissimilar. Alton, IL also has a few examples which I also added. Also, looks like someone beat me to Dubuque, IA since I was thinking of the rivertowns.

I'm pretty sure i've seen more in Kentucky than just LV and LX, may add some towns later.

[Centropolis]

an interesting thing happened, a solid corridor along the old national road corridor emerged, from pittsburgh to st. louis and a bit beyond, which i highlighted on the map.

[photoLith]

It's a good bet that any city that ends in burg will have row houses. i added Toronto and said it has a few, compared to the old city at large it didn't look like there were that many row houses percentage wise. I have never been there but couldn't find entire blocks of row houses like you see in other east coast cities.

[photoLith]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

I added St. Charles, Ste. Genevieve, and Hermann, MO all which have examples of zero-lot line mid 19th century residential construction where the walls completely touch...even though the structures are often somewhat dissimilar. Alton, IL also has a few examples which I also added. Also, looks like someone beat me to Dubuque, IA since I was thinking of the rivertowns.

I'm pretty sure i've seen more in Kentucky than just LV and LX, may add some towns later.

I looked at some of those southeastern MO towns along the Mississippi, I didn't see any row houses. Where are they? I know St Genevieve is one of the only cities in the US other than New Orleans that has original French colonial houses, but they aren't row houses. Edit, never mind i see where they are in St Genevieve. I never visited that town when I lived in Arkansas, I wish I had, so much history in that little town.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by photoLith

I looked at some of those southeastern MO towns along the Mississippi, I didn't see any row houses. Where are they? I know St Genevieve is one of the only cities in the US other than New Orleans that has original French colonial houses, but they aren't row houses. Edit, never mind i see where they are in St Genevieve. I never visited that town when I lived in Arkansas, I wish I had, so much history in that little town.

the zero lot line mid century (19th) seem to be like a first-wave german settler thing in missouri, which ste genevieve got some of that influence, along with st. charles and hermann. washington, missouri (another first wave german american settlement on the missouri river) technically has some rowhouses but they are like townhouses scattered around directly abutting commercial buildings and not other residential homes.

basically the last hiccup of the ohio valley.

[photoLith]

Cairo, Illinois had some went I visited about 6 years ago. It seems like since then they've all been torn down along with most anything else that was left of the downtown.

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by photoLith

I didn't know about those streets you mention. I was just there again a couple of days ago and the only row houses I saw were those on the second image just to the east of the Main Street. I missed those ones you mentioned I guess.

The larger groupings of rowhouses aren't in areas where a visitor to Erie would really go. There's a handful scattered in and around downtown, but most that still exist are outside the core and are newer (meaning 1910s-1930s) and built in planned areas by major corporations like GE, Chrysler, and National Forge for their workers/returning WWI veterans. Few rowhousees from the 1800s remain in Erie. Most were located in the current footprint of downtown Erie and were destroyed over the years as the city grew. As the core grew into an industrial and commercial center and took over former residential tracts, new residential neighborhood construction in Erie by the 1880s did not favor the rowhouse style like it was in other places.

For a really infuriating example, this was once a rowhouse neighborhood. The brick house is from the 1840s and the wood-sided one on the right is from 1810.


The City, Hamot Hospital, the Catholic Disocese, and Erie Insurance razed entire blocks of classic 1820s-1850s houses the east side of downtown for buildings, parking garages, and lots in this area.

The same occurred on the west side of downtown as the city grew rapidly post-1850s railroad boom. This example from the 1830s is all that remains of the modest rowhouse type that was common on the lower west side.


But overall, Erie is definitely not a rowhouse city like many other cities in PA; it's much more like upstate/western NY/New England/etc as far as housing style goes.