It's better to live in the east since you don't have to look at the sun on your commute.
Nice reasoning. (Though only applicable to 'newer' cities, or at least more recent expansion of cities).
Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
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Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#22Actually in most of the major US cities, the south side is bad. For example, SE DC, south side Chicago, south-central LA
I don't know about DC and LA(though I wonder if both have developed recently enough that the effect would be negated) but in Chicago the souh side is the furthest east (due to lake michigan) and the suburbs to the east of the city aren't exactly wealthy either.
South LA is about 20 minutes from the ocean, by car. I would generalize that any part of Los Angeles that's further than 15 minutes from the ocean or the mountains (there are several mountain ranges to choose from) is relatively poor.
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#23Actually in most of the major US cities, the south side is bad. For example, SE DC, south side Chicago, south-central LA
Same for the non-San Jose parts of Silicon Valley: Palo Alto and Mountain View are ritzier than neighboring Sunnyvale and Santa Clara. I don't know enough about San Jose itself to say, nor about San Francisco. In SF, though, it seems like many of the ritzier areas (Pac Heights, Marina, Marin) are to the north.
NYC is a notable exception: Harlem and the Bronx are in the north, while SoHo, Tribeca, Greenwich Village, etc. are all in the south.
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#24Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#25In China, the opposite. Coastal cities (in the east) are usually richer.
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#26In China, the opposite. Coastal cities (in the east) are usually richer.
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#27Short and to the point, lacking any kind of fluff. Very refreshing. Almost every other article of this kind is so incredibly long that it feels like a game of "spot the explanation".
Thanks. (I wrote it!)
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#28In Australia, where the prevailing winds are also westerlies, the opposite is true. i.e. the east of most cities is more prestigious than the west.
Except in WA, where many prestigious suburbs are in the West (Peppermint Grove, etc), and Adelaide where they are distributed around the center (North Adelaide to the North, Unley Park & Springfield to the South, as well as some in the East). I think that in Australian cities factors other than wind direction have a larger influence.
Sydney, the further west you go, the worse it gets. The population center of Sydney is actually 10km west of the city. Pretty much all the nice suburbs are either East, or North.
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#29Actually in most of the major US cities, the south side is bad. For example, SE DC, south side Chicago, south-central LA
Interesting. Applies to Boston too - to the north are the rapidly gentrifying yuppie suburbs of Cambridge, Somerville and Medford, while to the south are the more depressed areas of Roxbury, Dorchester and Mattapan. Same for the non-San Jose parts of Silicon Valley: Palo Alto and Mountain View are ritzier than neighboring Sunnyvale and Santa Clara. I don't know enough about San Jose itself to say, nor about San Franc…
Re: Why are the east of cities usually poorer?
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks. (I wrote it!)
Ooh! I have a question. Do you know what the situation is in Seattle? Is it so odd, with water separating cities and neighborhoods, impacting traffic, and a corporate empire in the eastern part, that it's hard to make out? Would it have been easier to see the situation you describe decades ago?