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Why San Francisco Is Not New York

bits.blogs.nytimes.com

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Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#21

Post by wdewind »

davidw wrote: post #19
wdewind wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The number and quality of restaurants in NY is unrivaled. NYC native and mostly SF-hater here. Hate to say it but SF has us beat for food. If you want to go have a 5 star meal you're going to pay about the same and get about the same food in both cities (NYC obviously has the edge here, but not hugely), but San Francisco has NYC (especially Manhattan) absolutely dominated at the everyday eating level (ie: burritos,…

To be honest, I ate better day to day when I lived in Portland, Oregon than when I lived in SF. Wouldn't know about NY - I've never been there. And I don't know about 'fine dining' options in either PDX or SF, having been in my early 20ies and not gone in for that sort of thing much. These days, the best eating I do is when the in-laws have a big dinner, with stuff like hand-made tortellini!

Wouldn't shock me, my experience has been most of the food on the west coast is better. A lot of this has to do with how cheap it is to get quality produce compared to the east coast.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#22

Post by raverbashing »

wdewind wrote: post #12
nextstep wrote: post #3

Not to mention, New York is relatively clean compared to San Francisco. San Francisco shuts down at 10pm; New York truly is the city that never sleeps, and many neighborhoods feel busy and alive at all hours of the night. The public transportation in SF (and the larger Bay Area) is a classist, unreliable nightmare. New York has probably the best public transit systems in the country. Owning a car in NY is unusual and…

> The number and quality of restaurants in NY is unrivaled. NYC native and mostly SF-hater here. Hate to say it but SF has us beat for food. If you want to go have a 5 star meal you're going to pay about the same and get about the same food in both cities (NYC obviously has the edge here, but not hugely), but San Francisco has NYC (especially Manhattan) absolutely dominated at the everyday eating level (ie: burritos,…

" The general ingredient quality just blows NYC away - both meat and produce."

Well, west coast (meaning: access to Australia and some other selling markets), good climate, etc

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#23

Post by wdewind »

derwiki wrote: post #18
ZanyProgrammer wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A good part of SF not seeming to be a 24 hour city, is that public transit in SF doesn't run 24 hours-at least not BART, and I don't think MUNI Metro does either. The last SB Caltrain leaves at midnight, I think? EDIT: I'll give you being clean, SF can stand to be cleaned up a bit.

Buses are the only public transit that run all night, but those are limited/different than day routes. Plus many people I know who live here have an unreasonable dislike of the buses, so many just don't consider it an option. I think they're great, except for some passengers who get on in the Tenderloin.

I don't live in SF but the few times I've been the bus system has been a complete joke. It's like a stereotype of a bad bus system: dirty, unreliable, slow, filled with junkies, loud, doesn't really go anywhere you'd like...there's a reason Uber was founded in SF.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#25

Post by bsenftner »

Year after year, decade after decade I hear "SF is the next this, that or the other". I believe SF is the city with an inferiority complex. No matter how accomplished SF becomes, it can't simply be itself, it has to take somewhere else down. I've given up the discussion at social events; SF simply want to be anywhere else but itself, and that creates all kinds of f'ed up logic spewing out of it's citizen's mouths.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#26

Post by cyclecount »

hoodq19 wrote: post #11

It's easy to confuse the negative effects of scale with cultural similarities. I've lived in both cities and you'd have to step outside the US to find two cities less like each other. Its easy to understand why New York magazine would publish high-brow link-bait: the decreasing relevance of banking-- NY's primary economic engine. The funny thing is that the importance of banking is cyclical. Banker misbehave, markets…

The tech:SF::banking:NYC comparison is false for a number of reasons. Chiefly, no single industry in New York overwhelms the city the way tech overwhelms San Francisco. Finance, fashion, media, and many other industries are very big in NY. But NY is still bigger, bigger than people from San Francisco can fathom.

San Francisco is already overwhelmed with tech culture, and this sector continues to grow. Everywhere you turn, it feels like you meet people who work for startups or large software firms. There is no comparable industry in NY that is so pervasive. This lack of economic diversification breeds the other diversity deficits this article mentions.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#27

Post by eddieroger »

qwerta wrote: post #15
silvestrov wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real diversity is not how you look or where you come from, but what's inside you and how you think and the culture you belong to.

It kind of sounds like 'No true Scotsman'. Could you explain what sort of diversity you miss in tech sector?

I think the argument is that if everyone in SF is tech focused now, despite different backgrounds, there is a lack of diversity in the interests of the groups taking over SF (techies), where there used to be diversity. So now, everyone's a techie, instead of maybe musicians or artists, etc. I'm not sure it's a good argument, but I think I agreed with it briefly.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#29

Post by eddieroger »

nextstep wrote: post #3

Not to mention, New York is relatively clean compared to San Francisco. San Francisco shuts down at 10pm; New York truly is the city that never sleeps, and many neighborhoods feel busy and alive at all hours of the night. The public transportation in SF (and the larger Bay Area) is a classist, unreliable nightmare. New York has probably the best public transit systems in the country. Owning a car in NY is unusual and…

Having spent time in both, but living in neither, I think that's fair. Specifically, good observation on the cleanliness of the city. New York is busy, but I never felt it was dirty in the way I immediately felt SF was. I think a large part of it was the uncontrolled panhandling and the fact that there are certain areas that those folks know will be busy, so they go there. I've never seen anyone openly urinate on the streets in New York, where I have twice on the same trip to San Francisco - an anecdotal fact that kind of blew my mind.

Re: Why San Francisco Is Not New York

#30

Post by kenjackson »

wyclif wrote: post #10
nextstep wrote: post #3

Not to mention, New York is relatively clean compared to San Francisco. San Francisco shuts down at 10pm; New York truly is the city that never sleeps, and many neighborhoods feel busy and alive at all hours of the night. The public transportation in SF (and the larger Bay Area) is a classist, unreliable nightmare. New York has probably the best public transit systems in the country. Owning a car in NY is unusual and…

The food culture and restaurants in NYC are on a completely different, higher level than SF. Having experienced both, I laugh whenever people in the Bay Area try to claim that SF has the best restaurants. It's not even a race; NY has SF whipped in that regard.

Eh, I disagree. I've spent time in both and I prefer SF restaurants. I think it may have to do with the fact that local is generally better in California. Also there are some types of food where I just don't prefer the NY style -- in particular I don't like NY pizza. I've tried all the recommended spots and I think I just don't like the style as much.

EDIT: Someone mentioned elsewhere about the high quality of food in the Bay once you leave SF. A good example of this is Michael Warring's found in a strip mall in Vallejo (yes, a strip mall in Vallejo) -- just really good food: http://www.urbanspoon.com/r/6/1691241/restaurant/Michael-War...

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