Chaos on commercial streets: For fans of gritty, cluttered stores and restaurants.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

Those areas are mainly in the neighborhoods beyond the old gates of Østerport, Nørreport and Vesterport. They were built very quickly in a flurry of 19th century greenfield construction following a royal decree, so they resemble cities that were built over in that era much more than they do the largely 18th century centre of town.

https://goo.gl/maps/W1AA4z7awUP2

https://goo.gl/maps/3CEXCWbcF9t

its interesting actually feeling my brain re-adjust (virtually) to a fully pedestrian scaled environment (from a streetcar/automobile scale that may or may not accommodate pedestrians well) looking at these.

[Centropolis]

here's the primary urban commercial street in my suburb, fully given over to machinery with ok pedestrian accommodation: https://goo.gl/maps/vfEt2wxVJ1R2

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

here's the primary urban commercial street in my suburb, fully given over to machinery with ok pedestrian accommodation: https://goo.gl/maps/vfEt2wxVJ1R2

I would love to own a home and be able to walk to an area like that once I have kids and all that...

Seems like a perfect mix of urban but doesn't have a chaotic vibe to it...or stressful environment may be a better word choice.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

I would love to own a home and be able to walk to an area like that once I have kids and all that...

Seems like a perfect mix of urban but doesn't have a chaotic vibe to it...or stressful environment may be a better word choice.

yeah, it's actually not chaotic at all, except when the streetcar tears peoples car doors off. but it's no philly or queens in that way.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

I would love to own a home and be able to walk to an area like that once I have kids and all that...

Seems like a perfect mix of urban but doesn't have a chaotic vibe to it...or stressful environment may be a better word choice.

welcome to my world.


live on a quiet kid-friendly street like this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9657...7i16384!8i8192

then walk a couple blocks over to a commerical street like this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9655...7i16384!8i8192


it's "urbanish" and walkable, but car ownership is not onerous (car use can be another issue).

it has a nice mix of SFH's, 2/3/6-flats, & corner apartment buildings (lots of unit type diversity).

it's certainly not the east village, but it's also certainly not schaumburg.

it's just a nice creamy family-friendly middle. and you can buy a family-sized home without being a millionaire!!!

it's not for everyone, but i feel really lucky that my family ended up in neighborhood like lincoln square.

[LA21st]

Originally Posted by ChrisLA

Although this particular spot is on Ventura is rather bland and uninteresting, I can assure you this neighborhood certainly isn’t blue collar. This is on the western edge of Woodland Hills which is some middle, and more so upper middle class to wealthy.

I live about an 1/2 mile from this stretch of Ventura Blvd and pass it every day. If you go a few blocks east, you will have your Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Sprouts, Starbucks, Coffee Beans, Lexus, Porche, Lamborghini dealerships and just about any type of fancy restaurant, and bar/lounges you can think of from every ethnic background. It is really only a small stretch thats like this, there is a lot of money in the mist of this spot.

I will admit for Woodland Hills to be such an exclusive area, the portion of Ventura Blvd running through here is rather ugly. By the way I live near those highrise buildings to the left in that scene. That’s the Warner Center which is a major business district in the west valley.

Yea, the houses in the South San Fernando Valley are insane. They just get overshadowed by the more famous, glitzier areas further south.

I work in Encino btw.

[edale]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

here's the primary urban commercial street in my suburb, fully given over to machinery with ok pedestrian accommodation: https://goo.gl/maps/vfEt2wxVJ1R2

What a wonderful neighborhood. St. Louis really has some great neighborhoods. I've only been through the city a couple times, but the whole area around Wash U and Forest (?) Park is just awesome.

The apartment streets around this area pictured (https://www.google.com/maps/@38.6578...7i13312!8i6656) remind me a bit of what you'd find in the Cleveland Heights/Shaker Square area of Cleveland.

[dubu]

if you want stressful streetcar / car highways.
https://www.google.com/maps/@45.5344...7i13312!8i6656

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

welcome to my world.


live on a quiet kid-friendly street like this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9657...7i16384!8i8192

then walk a couple blocks over to a commerical street like this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9655...7i16384!8i8192


it's "urbanish" and walkable, but car ownership is not onerous (car use can be another issue).

it has a nice mix of SFH's, 2/3/6-flats, & corner apartment buildings (lots of unit type diversity).

it's certainly not the east village, but it's also certainly not schaumburg.

it's just a nice creamy family-friendly middle. and you can buy a family-sized home without being a millionaire!!!

it's not for everyone, but i feel really lucky that my family ended up in neighborhood like lincoln square.

Absolutely love every bit of that! The neighborhood is what I usually refer to as a "Halloween neigborhood."

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

Absolutely love every bit of that! The neighborhood is what I usually refer to as a "Halloween neigborhood."

oh yeah, our neighborhood is nuts on halloween. hundreds upon hundreds of kids moving like conveyor belts along the sidewalks collecting candy as they go. the kids don't even walk up to the buildings and ring doorbells, people just camp out on the sidewalk in front of their building and hand out candy as the throngs of children pass by. if you're an 8 year old kid on a mission, you can seriously clean-up with untold pounds of candy.

and even though there's not a single residential highrise to be found anywhere in our hood, population density is still a respectable 25,000 ppsm, and because 3 bedroom flats here go for $1,800-2,200 to rent/ $400-500K to buy, middle class families with children like ours haven't been priced out yet, so there's a lot of us.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by edale

What a wonderful neighborhood. St. Louis really has some great neighborhoods. I've only been through the city a couple times, but the whole area around Wash U and Forest (?) Park is just awesome.

The apartment streets around this area pictured (https://www.google.com/maps/@38.6578...7i13312!8i6656) remind me a bit of what you'd find in the Cleveland Heights/Shaker Square area of Cleveland.

yeah, there was a discussion a while back about the pre-war suburbs of st. louis and cleveland, and there's some funny parallels. while the core cities look different, there's some suburbs/ suburban neighborhoods that are very, very similar, even down to the university presence (case western/washington university) right on the city limits and pre-war suburbs (including apartment neighborhoods) extending on, on the other side of the universities.

[Centropolis]

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Se...!4d-81.5504421

inner-suburban cleveland would be *really* like st. louis if they demolished this, ran a grid through, and built an auxiliary cbd/highrise condo district and a rail extension.. although a really dense mixed use development would be better than a bunch of class A that might poach downtown.

[montréaliste]

Yes, to boost what edale posted about centropolis' links to St Louis University neighborhood, it is a striking example of what U.S. urbanism contributed in the earlier decades of the 20th Century.

I wish we could do more to imitate these qualities one by one and replicate access to proximity, and pleasant architecture.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

Yes, to boost what edale posted about centropolis' links to St Louis University neighborhood, it is a striking example of what U.S. urbanism contributed in the earlier decades of the 20th Century.

I wish we could do more to imitate these qualities one by one and replicate access to proximity, and pleasant architecture.

washington university, but yes. st louis university is in a completely different area and treated its victorian neighborhood rather unkindly. washington university took a completely different approach and embraced the urban/sub-urban fabric around it.

[Pedestrian]

This is Hayes St, a couple of blocks from my SF condo. It's where I usually go for lunch or casual strolling:





https://mapstreetview.com/#mhosp_-20vy5t_7l.a_-5f42

[jtown,man]

Are Bay Windows a selling point in SF or is it just a mandatory thing lol

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

Are Bay Windows a selling point in SF or is it just a mandatory thing lol

Both. All the older building have them and so the Planning Dept. seems to favor them by demanding "contextual architecture". But I have one in my living room and it's kind of nice.

[Jonesy55]

You must get more light in through bay windows rather than flat frontages I guess due to the extra angles to catch the sun.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by Jonesy55

You must get more light in through bay windows rather than flat frontages I guess due to the extra angles to catch the sun.

Exactly--I put my living room sofa in the bay and I can lay there and take a full sunbath. Also to get a 180 degree view.

[edale]

Hayes Valley is so pleasant. I also love the little alley shops around there. There's a teeny tiny Blue Bottle in the alley right around there, which I thought was very charming and borderline twee, much like a lot of SF.