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How dense is your city?

citydensity.com

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Re: How dense is your city?

#41

Post by vitus »

ars wrote: post #31
kdmccormick wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sprawling suburbs are the opposite of nature. A single large park inside a dense city is far more nature-rich than acres upon acres of suburban lawns are.

You've apparently never actually been in a suburb. They typically have random unkempt forests behind each row of houses, and not just a little bit. Like you need a serious walk between houses on different roads, and all of that is a long unbroken piece of nature. The front of the house near the road has the lawn, but there's a LOT more to suburbs than that. 2 minute walk from where I lived in a suburb was a "forest"…

You have a very narrow definition of a suburb.

Indeed, some suburbs have a lot of nature. I've encountered suburbs where individual houses are in the middle of the woods, off the main road, and yet not 10 miles away are developments where all the houses all look identical because they were built by the same developer and have a lawn in front, a backyard, and no wilderness whatsoever; right outside that development are busy streets on all sides.

I've lived in suburbs that are incorporated cities with population above a hundred thousand, and are eminently as pedestrian-friendly as some larger cities, but are tiny in comparison to the city that they're suburbs of (with more than a million people within that city's limits). And there are suburbs where you cannot get to the nearest grocery store without getting in a car and driving on the highway for 5 minutes.

You can't paint all suburbs as having lots of nature and being devoid of cars, just as you can't say all cities are identical.

Re: How dense is your city?

#42

Post by BenFranklin100 »

A question I’ve often wondered: how is density measured? Yes, I get it’s the total number of people per square mile, but how does work in detail? Do we count people if they only have their residential home there? If so, it means commercial buildings detracts toward this number. This tilts high density ratings towards residential areas like Somerville MA, which has no downtown to speak of, fewer public parks, and lacking in amenities. What it does have is lots and lots of run-down triple decker residential housing far as the eye can see. The city looks like a low-rent suburb rather than one of the densest cities in New England.

Re: How dense is your city?

#43

Post by ars »

ajoseps wrote: post #36
ars wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've apparently never actually been in a suburb. They typically have random unkempt forests behind each row of houses, and not just a little bit. Like you need a serious walk between houses on different roads, and all of that is a long unbroken piece of nature. The front of the house near the road has the lawn, but there's a LOT more to suburbs than that. 2 minute walk from where I lived in a suburb was a "forest"…

man I’m curious what state or country this suburb is in? The suburb I grew up in was nothing like that. If anything you’re describing something more on the rural side of things.

Due to my privacy I'd rather not say the city name, but I will say it was the second largest city in a strongly Democratic coastal state.

The largest city in that state was one of those large city hell-holes with too many people crowded in too small a space. But the second largest city was quite nice once you were not too near the downtown.

Re: How dense is your city?

#44

Post by mjamesaustin »

I love this project, but I find some of the UI decisions baffling.

For instance, as I add cities to my comparison, the colors of the cities I already have in the chart keep changing. Did anyone bother testing it, because that led to some serious confusion?

Re: How dense is your city?

#45

Post by CalRobert »

ars wrote: post #24
nerdbert wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better for the planet, better food and cultural options, shorter travel times for typical daily activities... in my book it definitely is.

And worse for the people who live there. I get anxiety just thinking of living in a dense city. Everyone I know who left a dense city never wants to go back - they talk like people who suffered from Stockholm syndrome and were now freed. And that doesn't even touch the economics: For the most part cities make money by services and not by physical items. Services are very lucrative, so on paper cities make tons of mon…

I left the city for the country and ended up clawing my way back in. Cities, especially dense, walkable ones, are wonderful. Better still if they remove cars.

Re: How dense is your city?

#46

Post by fragmede »

ars wrote: post #33
timeagain wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah my Rolex helps my mental state. I can read the time with it and it is useful for deep sea diving.

And you can do that with a cheaper watch also. That makes in a Veblen, but a more expensive lawn is not a better lawn. So a lawn is not a Veblen.

Having a large expansive lawn with rocky features, rare plants, water features, and fish, while being perfectly manicured attached to an estate is a way better lawn than a 12x20 green rectangle in the front of a suburban home's lot.

Re: How dense is your city?

#47

Post by fragmede »

ars wrote: post #34
fragmede wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People enjoy their Louis Vuitton handbags, also improving their mental state. So the fact that you enjoy your lawn doesn't make it any less of a luxury good. Not faulting you for having one, we humans like our luxuries. Let's just understand that's what they are. Like BMWs and Rolexes.

> doesn't make it any less of a luxury good That's not what Veblen is. A Veblen is better the higher the price, and that is not correct for lawns. A lawn doesn't get better if the cost of the lawn is higher. A lawn is better simply for existing, which makes it a standard good.

Veblen is that the demand is higher the higher the price, instead of the opposite, but instead of getting hung up on wether or not it's a Veblen good, my larger point is that lawns are luxuries like BMWs and Rolexes. Nice if you can afford them but recognize that we've normalized being extra in this way.

Re: How dense is your city?

#48

Post by fragmede »

forthwall wrote: post #17

Interesting how San Francisco has almost the same density as NYC when you get to 2km. I wonder if this has to do with density of old neighborhoods surrounding fidi out-densitying most hoods in nyc

The other interesting comparison is how similar SF and Stockholm are.

Re: How dense is your city?

#49

Post by snordgren »

wpm wrote: post #38
ars wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lawns are a place where I play, or my kids play. Or where I go to just sit and enjoy nature. They are also decoration (flower bed for example) to make my surroundings more pleasant which helps my mental state. If your lawn is a Veblen good you are doing it wrong.

Sounds like an urban park.

Not if you enjoy gardening.
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