American cities are too suburban

And Boston, DC, New York, Baltimore, San Francisco don't suffer from that problem. Places like Phoenix and Charlotte do. Not surprised. Also not surprised that the bar for 'urban' is pretty low for Americans given what residential areas outside of New England look like.
 
I agree that the bar is quite low when you think that most of Staten Island and large parts of queens are easily "suburban." NY shouldn't be at 0% and neither should Boston, especially with neighborhoods like Hyde Park and Readville.
 
I think it's based on people's perceptions. Someone from Queens is going to identify as living in an "urban" area even if their block is indistinguishable from things in Nassau County (and god help you if you tell them that Queens is really on Long Island).
 
Matthew said:
I think it's based on people's perceptions. Someone from Queens is going to identify as living in an "urban" area even if their block is indistinguishable from things in Nassau County (and god help you if you tell them that Queens is really on Long Island).
Click to expand...

It's funny that you mentioned that because when I went to college in Connecticut, I had the following conversation with Long Islanders more times than I can count:

"Where are you from?"
"Long Island"
blah blah blah conversation continues
"I guess Brooklyn and Queens are technically on Long Island."
"No, they're part of New York City."
"Yes, I know they're part of New York City, but they're also on Long Island."
"No, they're not."
"I know they're not what many people believe to be Long Island, but they are on the land mass known as Long Island."
"No, they're not."
"Where does Long Island begin?"
"Nassau."
"Is there a body of water that separates Queens from Long Island."
"No."
"Then Queens is on Long Island."
"No, it's not"
"Ah, fuck it."
 
So the Trulia study concluded that 100% of Bostonians consider themselves living in an urban environment. The authors admit they couldn't survey people in every city - they interviewed 2,008 people while there are more than 30,000 ZIP Codes - so they hypothesized. From what I understand, they took the number of 2,213 residents per square mile as the dividing line. If a neighborhood - which to them was a ZIP Code - had more than that number it was urban, less and it was suburban, with some other undefined criteria. West Roxbury, Roslindale, and Hyde Park, which I consider "suburban" have density above that benchmark, Hyde Park the lowest of the 3 with around 5,300 ppsm.
 
The Queens-isn't-on-Long Island phenomenon (or, more accurately, that nobody from Queens or Kings county would ever say they're "from" Long Island) goes to show that a lot of geography comes down to determinations made in the Streetcar era (call it 1915 to 1965). If a neighborhood was laid out with 0-or-1 car in mind, it is very often today considered "urban", but if it assumes "no transit / 2-car" households it is clearly suburban, and if it is mixed, well, we fight about it.

The complaint of "too suburban" roughly equals "car reliant; not dense enough to support workable transit"
 
ErnieAdams said:
The Islanders' Logo Doesn't Even Have Brooklyn On It
Click to expand...

To be fair, sometimes sticking with a 'classic' anachronism is better than taking a chance on a 'modern' alternative:

NewYorkIslandersFisherman.png
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top