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Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

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Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#191

Post by AlphaSite »

mcguire wrote: post #139
baron816 wrote: post #84

The sad thing is that trying to increase density in places like SV isn’t just about taming housing inflation, denser places are also better places to live. I think there are lot of people out there who would like living in a place like Brooklyn Heights, where you have 3-5 story row houses (small enough for a single family) that are connected together along a tree lined block, with shops, restaurants, and bars within…

Yes and no. I can recognize the advantages of such a neighborhood, but about 25 years ago, I decided I can't handle listening to my neighbor's stereo at 2:30 in the morning.

Then live in a modern building with real sound proofing, not something built 60 years ago, when it was t even on people’s minds.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#192

Post by toomanybeersies »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #178
toomanybeersies wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think part of the difference is that the USA has a lot more "Tier 1" cities than other countries would have for their size. Australia really has 2 major cities (Sydney and Melbourne), and two second tier cities (Perth and Brisbane). I think it's also in part to how separated the federal government is from local governments. In Australia, tax money is collected by the federal government and then disbursed to the sta…

Without adjusting this for population I don't know what it really tells us. Yes, Australia with a population of 24 million has fewer "Tier 1" population centers than a country with 325 million. Just going by ratios I would expect the US to have 26 Tier 1 cities. I would also expect the US and Europe to have roughly the same number of Tier 1 cities, since they have roughly the same population. I agree that the federal…

About 40% of the population of Australia lives in the Melbourne and Sydney metros, about evenly split. So 20% of the population lives in Sydney, and 20% in Melbourne.

By contrast, the NYC metro area has around 6% of the population of the USA.

But it's also about bulk number of large cities. If the federal government wants to inject funding into a large city in Australia, they have 2 options. You can't really play politics there, especially since Sydney and Melbourne have similar political makeups.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#193

Post by toomanybeersies »

freddie_mercury wrote: post #179
adventured wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is slightly unusual. Germany is somewhat similar, as is China (scaled to their population). The Tokyo metro is famously 30% of the population of Japan. It'd be like LA having nearly 100 million people. The Moscow metro is 11% of Russia. The NYC metro is 6% of the US by comparison. Germany's two largest metro areas - Berlin and Ruhrgebiet - have a comparable share of its population to NYC at around 6%-7%. Stockholm…

> Stockholm is 23% of Sweden But this is like saying "Phoenix is 23% of Arizona", which is also true. (Arizona and Sweden have roughly comparable populations, though Sweden is a bit larger.)

Not really. There isn't a governmental level above Sweden (the EU doesn't really count), but there is above Arizona.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#194

Post by CalRobert »

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

The problem now, is that surburbanites vote.

Suburbanites, for reasons I can't fathom, have been getting a free, bonus, car-house that comes with the big suburban house, free of charge!

This car-house isn't fancy. It's just a plot of asphalt. But they get one, free of charge, * By their office * In the grocery store * Even right next to the train station in the most baffling example of all (Park and Ride)

And because places that, 100 years ago, would have been houses for people, are now little car-houses, there's nobody without a car left to vote accordingly. If you try to buy the land under these car-houses and build a human-house on it, you get screamed at in planning meetings. Apparently because you're going to add more traffic (i.e. cars)

I'm not sure how to fix this.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#195

Post by CalRobert »

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

For what it's worth, I live in a city with a serious housing shortage and zero political will to improve transit and cycling.

I've been eyeing a smaller city 2 hours to the south, _solely_ because it has the finest cycling/walking greenway in the country. It also has the highest unemployment rate among cities in this country. Of course, that could make hiring cheaper. The dream is that it's a place where there's already low-traffic and an opennness to trying something new that could result in putting in proper, Dutch-style infrastructure.

I do wonder if there are others out there with the same idea. Maybe there's an opportunity here.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#196

Post by closeparen »

cbhl wrote: post #189
elvinyung wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about east bay?

The bay bridge and transbay tube are pretty much at capacity at rush hour (8-10a, 3-7p). You can drive over the Bay Bridge in 15-20 minutes if there's no traffic. If there's an accident and a ball game and rush hour, you could easily be stuck on it for 90-120.

For those who don't know, the Bay Bridge has a relatively thoughtful design where rate-limiting is done at the approaches so that traffic on the bridge itself moves just fine. Then there are dedicated lanes so that buses can jump the queue.

Right now the bottleneck for bus throughput is loading bays at Temporary Transbay Terminal. When the new Transbay Terminal comes online, AC Transit will be able to substantially increase bus throughput over the Bay Bridge.

The Transbay bus system has many distinct routes that go express all the way to SF after making a few local stops in a couple of adjacent neighborhoods. Consequently, it's often faster than BART, especially if you don't live particularly close to your BART stop. Transbay Terminal moving the SF terminus closer to the Market St subway will also make the transfer more pleasant if Embarcadero isn't your stop.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#197

Post by herdrick »

throwawayjava wrote: post #61
StudentStuff wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What companies are creating these positions? What is considered a "high" wage? In my eyes, that could be $58k a year or maybe a touch less depending on the authors perspective, which is a far cry from what similar talent would make in Portland or Seattle, let alone SoCal.

IDK about Boise, but the few mid-sized cities I'm familiar with are bemoaning a tech talent crisis and citing huge numbers of unfilled positions. But when I shop around for jobs in those areas, two things stick out: 1. While they'll generally do better than 58k for non-entry-level positions, midwestern employers won't touch 1/3rd of my coastal salary. Housing doesn't even come close to compensating. Even if someone s…

> 3

Surely you can't be saying that public schools are a reason to stay in the Bay Area?

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#198

Post by TulliusCicero »

indemnity wrote: post #54
rayiner wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tokyo is also not particularly congested.

Nor is it particularly high rise outside of the center, it’s surprisingly sprawl-like as well.

Well, the metro population is ~40 million.

But even then, most of the "sprawl" is still very dense by American standards, a lot of the suburban areas have comparable population density to Boston or SF.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#199

Post by dredmorbius »

aclimatt wrote: post #32

Not the crux of the article, but: > This doesn't mean that they, or the even higher-cost, more congested coastal metros, will adopt Manhattan or Tokyo-style density and transit patterns. Instead, Austin and San Antonio might be the new Houston and Dallas. My goodness, can we /please/ stop this false dichotomy that a city either has to be a Tokyo megalopolis or a suburban sprawlfest? I don't think any reasonable perso…

Paris has several times the density of NYC as a whole. The latter is far more than midtown.

Re: Why Invest in Cities? There's Always Another Boise

#200

Post by TulliusCicero »

elefanten wrote: post #120
anabis wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people commute by train. We are improving, but the morning commute is something foreigners consider particularly wacky, and not something that they want to repeat everyday. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7kor5nHtZQ

I've seen these clips before and always wonder where these examples are on the scale of "average experience". Is this the worst of the worst? ie- only the few most congested stations experience this during peak hours on a particularly bad day? Or is it relatively expected? ie- most major stations will experience this during peak hours on an average day?

I was in a central part of Tokyo while working out of Google's Tokyo office for a few days, and didn't experience any crush passenger loads in the morning. In fact, the trains had plenty of space.

But I did experience a very, very packed train once while I was there, taking a commuter express line out of the city...at 9pm.

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