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France had the vision to become something great. Rome still has some elements of a great city. If you combined Manhattan and San Francisco would you have something close I guess.
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
8,487 posts, read 15,019,151 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by JR_C
Interesting topic!
I think the only way we wouldn't have had the modern, stereotypical suburb, is if we never became dependent on the automobile.
Before the car, we had streetcar and railroad suburbs, but their development was different from the auto-centric suburb. They were developed around stops/nodes, like little independent towns.
If we never became dependent on the automobile, I think our cities would still have this hub and spoke design. Instead - since we have become dependent on the car - we have sprawl, which is sort of like a thin layer of development spread all over without much definition.
Well, this isn't something we have to wonder about. Car dependency isn't the sole domain of American suburbia. Many cities around the world, with no suburbs in the American sense, are dependent on automobiles. Case in point, just look at Manila. The land area is 226 square miles, they have 11,553,427 residents, a population density of 51,000...and exactly three light rail lines.
No disrespect to Dallas, but it's like if you crammed 12 million people into the city of Chicago and gave them DART as their public transportation. As you can imagine, it is woefully inadequate for the city's needs. Cars crowed the streets all day, and there is so much air pollution the smog is literally black.
Last edited by waronxmas; 05-12-2010 at 08:29 PM..
That is the glaring defect of most transit systems: You have to go to the central hub before going anywhere else. The LA Metrolink system has one line that doesn't go to LA Union Station, that is exceptional. And the airlines have adopted the idea.
That really is among the largest reasons ridership isn't higher in most places. The Atlanta transit system is lines that radiate from downtown, useless if you don't commute downtown and instead commute from one suburb to another. Most rail systems with a multi-hub system with lines radiating from workplaces hubs and to other hubs. Also lines along similar paths of loop interstates around cities making suburb to suburb commuting easier. This could also make some areas if they aren't already start urbanizing where two or more lines meet as a new hub.
Location: The Greatest city on Earth: City of Atlanta Proper
8,487 posts, read 15,019,151 times
Reputation: 7349
Quote:
Originally Posted by imperialmog
That really is among the largest reasons ridership isn't higher in most places. The Atlanta transit system is lines that radiate from downtown, useless if you don't commute downtown and instead commute from one suburb to another. Most rail systems with a multi-hub system with lines radiating from workplaces hubs and to other hubs. Also lines along similar paths of loop interstates around cities making suburb to suburb commuting easier. This could also make some areas if they aren't already start urbanizing where two or more lines meet as a new hub.
Well in fairness into Atlanta, there is a specific reason MARTA is like that which has nothing to do with poor planning. The suburbs rejected MARTA during the white flight era...and before 3 million people moved to the burbs over the proceeding 30 years. If that didn't happen we'd have pretty much the same system as the DC metro. But now, since congestion is so bad in the burbs, they are now ready to accept transit. It's just going to cost more now.
As for the city itself, even though it is a hub and spoke style system, there is little traffic to speak of in the city proper, and a quarter million people use it each day. In other words, for the area that it serves, it is highly effective.
Well in fairness into Atlanta, there is a specific reason MARTA is like that which has nothing to do with poor planning. The suburbs rejected MARTA during the white flight era...and before 3 million people moved to the burbs over the proceeding 30 years. If that didn't happen we'd have pretty much the same system as the DC metro. But now, since congestion is so bad in the burbs, they are now ready to accept transit. It's just going to cost more now.
As for the city itself, even though it is a hub and spoke style system, there is little traffic to speak of in the city proper, and a quarter million people use it each day. In other words, for the area that it serves, it is highly effective.
Most US transit systems have that issue of why suburbs reject expansion there. I think to some degree suburbanization is partially the result of a non-homogenous society unlike most countries and coincided with some of the social issues of the time.
Well, this isn't something we have to wonder about. Car dependency isn't the sole domain of American suburbia. Many cities around the world, with no suburbs in the American sense, are dependent on automobiles. Case in point, just look at Manila. The land area is 226 square miles, they have 11,553,427 residents, a population density of 51,000...and exactly three light rail lines.
No disrespect to Dallas, but it's like if you crammed 12 million people into the city of Chicago and gave them DART as their public transportation. As you can imagine, it is woefully inadequate for the city's needs. Cars crowed the streets all day, and there is so much air pollution the smog is literally black.
Like as not you're right...and a truly frightening image that is! But on the other hand, had there never been suburban development, don't you think it's probable that mass transit within urban areas would have been expanded?
That is the glaring defect of most transit systems: You have to go to the central hub before going anywhere else...
Chicago, as vaunted as its transit system is, has this exact problem. If you need to get from one end of the city to the other, it will probably take you a couple hours via transit. You either need to head downtown first, or take a series of buses.
Many of the posters here aren't seeing this from the correct point of view.
The OP seems to be implying that America didn't build the auto-centric, single-family tract, separated zoning, cul-de-sac suburbs. I didn't think he was saying that the cities wouldn't expand at all.
In this case where the cities expand but the expansion isn't the suburban sprawl we see today...
Most of the new development would grow out either in an "organic"/vernacular style, or city planners would have planned the developments in a more formal pattern, like a grid.
The development would had been likely focused on the existing small towns near the city and connecting them to the core city.
How would they connect? Well, before the days of motorized transit, the best option would be to take a boat. The "suburbs" in this case are towns along the body of water. The boats would act as a ferry service between the suburb and the docks in the city. This would be more practical for cities like New York or Seattle than a place like Houston or Denver. However, because this is taking place in the 20th century, there is motorized transport. Transit lines would either be built or planned out from the city to connect to small towns, where there would be a stop. At first, streetcars would built, but these would eventually be upgraded to rapid transit lines as the communities grew and ridership increased. In addition, routes traveling through the core of the city would eventually be grade-separated (either tunneled or elevated) due to trains having to fight congestion (aka people), causing delays. What does this mean? It means the tracks for Interurban and streetcars would be ripped out of the city streets and placed in tunnels. Keep in mind that these trains are mostly electric.
Now, you might ask: what would happen to intercity trains? Well, the OP didn't say anything about airplanes, so I assume that airports are eventually built and the airline industry comes to rise. The result? Trains operating between cities less than 500 miles apart continue to work, but long distance passenger trains fall in ridership.
And finally: how dense will the new development be?
Well, there's a way to rate this called the F.A.R., or Floor Area Ratio. This is what it is...
This website is a really good website that talks about the design and development of car-free cities, and how it will work. It's a good read.
Now, that's assuming a city without private automobiles. What would happen if each family had just one car?
That's where things get interesting, but I don't want to spoil the next episode.
Many of the posters here aren't seeing this from the correct point of view.
The OP seems to be implying that America didn't build the auto-centric, single-family tract, separated zoning, cul-de-sac suburbs. I didn't think he was saying that the cities wouldn't expand at all.
In this case where the cities expand but the expansion isn't the suburban sprawl we see today...
Most of the new development would grow out either in an "organic"/vernacular style, or city planners would have planned the developments in a more formal pattern, like a grid.
The development would had been likely focused on the existing small towns near the city and connecting them to the core city.
How would they connect? Well, before the days of motorized transit, the best option would be to take a boat. The "suburbs" in this case are towns along the body of water. The boats would act as a ferry service between the suburb and the docks in the city. This would be more practical for cities like New York or Seattle than a place like Houston or Denver. However, because this is taking place in the 20th century, there is motorized transport. Transit lines would either be built or planned out from the city to connect to small towns, where there would be a stop. At first, streetcars would built, but these would eventually be upgraded to rapid transit lines as the communities grew and ridership increased. In addition, routes traveling through the core of the city would eventually be grade-separated (either tunneled or elevated) due to trains having to fight congestion (aka people), causing delays. What does this mean? It means the tracks for Interurban and streetcars would be ripped out of the city streets and placed in tunnels. Keep in mind that these trains are mostly electric.
Now, you might ask: what would happen to intercity trains? Well, the OP didn't say anything about airplanes, so I assume that airports are eventually built and the airline industry comes to rise. The result? Trains operating between cities less than 500 miles apart continue to work, but long distance passenger trains fall in ridership.
And finally: how dense will the new development be?
Well, there's a way to rate this called the F.A.R., or Floor Area Ratio. This is what it is...
This website is a really good website that talks about the design and development of car-free cities, and how it will work. It's a good read.
Now, that's assuming a city without private automobiles. What would happen if each family had just one car?
That's where things get interesting, but I don't want to spoil the next episode.
"The correct POV", LOL! Who gets to decide whose POV is "correct"?
While for the most part, I don't get involved in "what if" stuff, I have a few comments.
The city planners of the 50s/60s planned these developments the way they did b/c that was the "in" thing at the time.
Many suburbs in many cities once were existing small towns. Why should everything be connected to the core city? Why should everyone work downtown, go to a doctor downtown, get entertainment downtown, etc? What's wrong with a little decentralization?
Boats! Yes that would work well here in the arid west. I see you do address Denver. We do have a mass transit system, the RTD, which connects the burbs with the city, and also somewhat burb to burb. Google RTD Denver.
We had trains at one time. People quit using them.
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