HomeDiagramsDatabaseMapsForum About
     

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions


Reply

 
Thread Tools Display Modes
     
     
  #81  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 1:49 PM
Steely Dan's Avatar
Steely Dan Steely Dan is online now
devout Pizzatarian
 
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Lincoln Square, Chicago
Posts: 29,606
Quote:
Originally Posted by SFBruin View Post
I think that it would have 2. The Midwest and everywhere else. The Midwest is basically its own cultural island centered around Chicago.
yeah, culturally speaking, america is really only two nations:

a "super chicago" in the middle, and then everything from massachussets to west virginia to florida to tennessee to louisiana to utah to california to alaska is all pretty much the same exact thing. i dare anyone to find any cultural differences between those places.
__________________
"Missing middle" housing can be a great middle ground for many middle class families.

Last edited by Steely Dan; Sep 16, 2019 at 2:13 PM.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #82  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 5:03 PM
jtown,man jtown,man is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: Chicago
Posts: 4,141
Quote:
Originally Posted by SFBruin View Post
I think that it would have 2. The Midwest and everywhere else. The Midwest is basically its own cultural island centered around Chicago.
HUUUUH?

NYC, BOSTON...they influence nothing around them? The freaking South? lol

New England
Mid Atlantic
South
West Coast
Mountain
Midwest

So six states.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #83  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 5:19 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,584
Quote:
Originally Posted by jd3189 View Post
New York City is at the southernmost point of New York State. Chicago is in Northern Illinois. Detroit is in Southern Michigan. Boston is located in Eastern Massachusetts. LA and Miami are at the southernmost parts of their states as well and etc.

I know geographical features had something to do with many of these, but I’m curious to hear if there are other reasons for this being so.
Cities locate where they do based on transportation and agriculture (access to water)

Actually scratch that, cities locate all over but they grow large and important if they have economic reason to do so. Some of this can be arbitrary like Governments building cities and forcing people into them but those are few and far between.

So you'll find large cities:

#1 at ports or heads of navigation (AKA as far as ocean going ships can head in up river) Philly, NYC, London, Houston etc..

#2 at natural transportation hubs, where two rivers meet (st Luis, Chicago, think of the great lakes as essentially a river)

#3 at the natural end point where barges can take goods/transportation nodes via trains and now highways or near the entrance to a major mountain pass transportation route. These typically take place at the natural organic regional centers (Chicago fits this category too) Dallas, Atlanta, Denver etc.

Basically its trade that determines where large cities are going to be, and most trade is the result of geographic features and to some degree human engineering to enhance or overcome those features.

There are some other unique situations in extreme climates like Columbia and Venezuela where the cities are high altitude because building a city in a jungle or in a desert with no water does not work well altitude means cooler weather and more traditional agriculture, or just water at all. That is why places like Caracas, Bogota and Quito are high altitude mountain cities that seam antithetical to development.

Desert cities work only when there is an easily accessible amount of water via rivers and ground water.

But in the end Geography is probably the biggest determining factor, now why are some cities SPECIFICALLY the ones that grow like say Ny instead of Bayonne or Philly instead of Camden? etc etc. Thats all a mater of local randomness and issues that you'd have to look into history to find.

(For example Venice being built out in the estuary instead of on shore because the original city in the region was destroyed by the Huns)
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #84  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 5:42 PM
Jonboy1983's Avatar
Jonboy1983 Jonboy1983 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2010
Location: The absolute western-most point of the Philadelphia urbanized area. :)
Posts: 1,721
I thought Denver is located along the North Platte River, but I guess that's not a navigable body of water.

In any event, my hometown of Pittsburgh was close to ranking as one of these "extreme location" cities. Early maps showed PA has having a boundary along the Monongahela and Ohio Rivers. Since I grew up south of the Mon river, then I would not have been a PA native had these rivers served as part of PA's southern and western boundary.

I do believe that many cities have the location they have because (as many others have posted on here) of their proximity to navigable water, and many of these waterways serve as boundaries.

The statement about capital cities being more centrally located makes sense. They don't want to have a state's government to be too heavily influenced by a single principal city (or vise versa). I do have a question about some of these cities. Lansing, MI and Harrisburg, PA are close to their respective state's most principal city. Is that because they were planned before the final boundaries were drawn? I know Pennsylvania's boundary used to be the Allegheny Mountains just west of Johnstown and Altoona, and Harrisburg became the state capital in 1812...
__________________
Transportation planning, building better communities of tomorrow through superior connections between them today...
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #85  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 5:55 PM
iheartthed iheartthed is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: New York
Posts: 9,742
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jonboy1983 View Post
The statement about capital cities being more centrally located makes sense. They don't want to have a state's government to be too heavily influenced by a single principal city (or vise versa). I do have a question about some of these cities. Lansing, MI and Harrisburg, PA are close to their respective state's most principal city. Is that because they were planned before the final boundaries were drawn? I know Pennsylvania's boundary used to be the Allegheny Mountains just west of Johnstown and Altoona, and Harrisburg became the state capital in 1812...
Detroit was the original capital of Michigan, and also the territorial capital for the short lived Michigan Territory, which included Wisconsin, Minnesota, and the eastern part of the Dakotas. The state capital was moved from Detroit because of its proximity to British America (Canada), which was then still hostile to the U.S. government.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #86  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 6:04 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,584
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jonboy1983 View Post

The statement about capital cities being more centrally located makes sense. They don't want to have a state's government to be too heavily influenced by a single principal city (or vise versa). I do have a question about some of these cities. Lansing, MI and Harrisburg, PA are close to their respective state's most principal city. Is that because they were planned before the final boundaries were drawn? I know Pennsylvania's boundary used to be the Allegheny Mountains just west of Johnstown and Altoona, and Harrisburg became the state capital in 1812...
The state capitol thing is a bit arbitrary but looking historically most "capitals" are essentially the Principal city of states internationally. Paris, Tokyo, Beijing, London, Moscow, Berlin, Rome, Athens, Cairo, Tehran, mexico City, Buenos Aires I mean it just goes on and on.

And for many state capitols in the US while they are no longer the Principal cities they were at some point. Although some are intentionally Arbitrary (Canberra) to avoid political influence or the remnants of some Colonial past like Ottawa or Albany half of Africa's capitals. Our US Federal capital is a bit arbitrary but its a stones through from an old Colonial port (Baltimore) It could have easily been in Philly or NY if politics hadn't of gotten in the way.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #87  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 6:37 PM
ThePhun1 ThePhun1 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2014
Location: Houston/Galveston
Posts: 1,870
Imagine a world (and this forum) if Philly were capital. Heck, imagine Delaware and New Jersey.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #88  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 7:08 PM
pj3000's Avatar
pj3000 pj3000 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: Pittsburgh & Miami
Posts: 7,524
Quote:
Originally Posted by Obadno View Post
The state capitol thing is a bit arbitrary but looking historically most "capitals" are essentially the Principal city of states internationally. Paris, Tokyo, Beijing, London, Moscow, Berlin, Rome, Athens, Cairo, Tehran, mexico City, Buenos Aires I mean it just goes on and on.

And for many state capitols in the US while they are no longer the Principal cities they were at some point. Although some are intentionally Arbitrary (Canberra) to avoid political influence or the remnants of some Colonial past like Ottawa or Albany half of Africa's capitals. Our US Federal capital is a bit arbitrary but its a stones through from an old Colonial port (Baltimore) It could have easily been in Philly or NY if politics hadn't of gotten in the way.
So, wait a minute here... are you telling us that there is a difference between Athens and Jefferson City, Missouri? You mean that Cheyenne, Wyoming isn’t a capital city just like Rome is?
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #89  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 7:26 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,584
Quote:
Originally Posted by pj3000 View Post
So, wait a minute here... are you telling us that there is a difference between Athens and Jefferson City, Missouri? You mean that Cheyenne, Wyoming isn’t a capital city just like Rome is?
Not even sure what you are trying to convey here
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #90  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 10:14 PM
iheartthed iheartthed is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: New York
Posts: 9,742
Quote:
Originally Posted by Obadno View Post
The state capitol thing is a bit arbitrary but looking historically most "capitals" are essentially the Principal city of states internationally. Paris, Tokyo, Beijing, London, Moscow, Berlin, Rome, Athens, Cairo, Tehran, mexico City, Buenos Aires I mean it just goes on and on.
Not exactly. Quite a few of your examples are arbitrary capitals. Athens was a tiny town when it was made the capital of Greece. Shanghai is actually the largest city in China, although Beijing is the historical capital. And Moscow only became the capital of Russia after WW1; before that it was St. Petersburg.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #91  
Old Posted Sep 16, 2019, 10:42 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,584
Quote:
Originally Posted by iheartthed View Post
Not exactly. Quite a few of your examples are arbitrary capitals. Athens was a tiny town when it was made the capital of Greece. Shanghai is actually the largest city in China, although Beijing is the historical capital. And Moscow only became the capital of Russia after WW1; before that it was St. Petersburg.
Moscow and Athens are by far the dominant cities in both those countries now though Im not implying these things dont change. Athens is also traditionally the most important city in Greece going back a very long time only eclipsed by Istanbul when it was Constantinople and still considered "Greek"

Also A china dominated by Shanghai would be a very different (probably better) country but yes Beijing is the historical capitol for the dominant Han Chinese ethnic/cultural group.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #92  
Old Posted Sep 17, 2019, 11:49 AM
ChiMIchael ChiMIchael is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 335
Well, the US was never a cluster of small kingdoms and duchies, plus many of today's cities were established well after the states were.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #93  
Old Posted Sep 17, 2019, 4:04 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,584
Quote:
Originally Posted by ChiMIchael View Post
Well, the US was never a cluster of small kingdoms and duchies, plus many of today's cities were established well after the states were.
Not Really, most of what would become major cities were established in some form before the states were states. Weather a small territorial town or a trade-post/fort
Reply With Quote
     
     
End
 
 
Reply

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Discussion Forums > City Discussions
Forum Jump


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 11:43 AM.

     
SkyscraperPage.com - Archive - Privacy Statement - Top

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.