Cities that "undershot"

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

New Jersey is the New Yorkiest state outside of NY.

NJ is "NY" (metro area). I mean areas outside the NY metro.

You won't find a more obvious concentration of New Yorkers than South Florida.

[Pedestrian]

San Francisco hasn't become Starfleet Headquarters (yet). Maybe Space Command?

• Video Link

[Obadno]

Originally Posted by Crawford

NJ is "NY" (metro area). I mean areas outside the NY metro.

You won't find a more obvious concentration of New Yorkers than South Florida.

Long ago I did call center work *shudder*

"Me and Bob have been in CAR-ALL GABLES FLAAARR-I-DAH since 1987"

[Gantz]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

San Francisco hasn't become Starfleet Headquarters (yet). Maybe Space Command?

Not if the NIMBYs have their say. NIMBYs would make sure that Space Command headquarters would be reduced to space command outhouse only.

[JManc]

"New Yorky"? People...no...just no. And don't tell anyone from Jersey they are "New Yorky"

As for South Florida...it's South Flarriduh.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Then you probably didn't go to Kissimmee, which is pretty much all Puerto Ricans from the Boroughs. It's probably the second biggest PR concentration in the U.S. these days, after the Bronx.

Orlando, while not as "New Yorky" as South Florida, has a huge population with NY-area connections. Its demographic mix is very roughly the same, with blacks of West Indian descent, Puerto Ricans and South Americans and white ethnics from the "three Is" (Ireland, Italy and "Israel").

neat information.

but at no point during my stay in orlando did i ask myself "wait, am i in florida or new york? i can't tell the difference."

radically different vibes between orlando and NYC.

just one tourist's experiences.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

NJ is "NY" (metro area). I mean areas outside the NY metro.

You won't find a more obvious concentration of New Yorkers than South Florida.

But back to Florida... Florida is just a migrant magnet, as are many of the big population centers in the South. I'm not ready to take Florida out of the South just because Miami and Boca have significant percentages of non-traditional southern cultures. It is still super freaking southern in many places.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

But back to Florida... Florida is just a migrant magnet, as are many of the big population centers in the South. I'm not ready to take Florida out of the South just because Miami and Boca have significant percentages of non-traditional southern cultures. It is still super freaking southern in many places.

We're talking culture, right? The Florida Panhandle is super southern. It's basically Alabama. But most folks in FL live south of Orlando, and there isn't much "South" there.

FL is a big state with lots of typologies. CA and NY/NJ/CT have super-redneck areas, but that doesn't mean they aren't generally urban, affluent states. MS has some wealthy and highly educated towns, doesn't mean it isn't the poorest/least educated state.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

We're talking culture, right? The Florida Panhandle is super southern. It's basically Alabama. But most folks in FL live south of Orlando, and there isn't much "South" there.

FL is a big state with lots of typologies. CA and NY/NJ/CT have super-redneck areas, but that doesn't mean they aren't generally urban, affluent states. MS has some wealthy and highly educated towns, doesn't mean it isn't the poorest/least educated state.

It isn't as ubiquitous as Georgia or Alabama, but south Florida still has more "south" than any northern state.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by Crawford

I thought about Vienna, but didn't include because it was the seat of a grand empire for like 500 years. It was basically the successor to Rome.

It didn't undershoot, it's just well past its prime, IMO. It's core is certainly grand, but not quite on the level of Paris, and many times smaller. You're in commieblockland a short walk from the Stephansdom.

Paris is much larger, but the Haussmann blocks are a little more austere than inner Vienna. I can see the argument for Vienna.

[twig]

Tuscon is the number one city in the US that is most like Chicago, lots of snowbirds from there making the culture almost identical when comparing it to any other city!

To prove my points:

For example, the influence of Chicago on Tuscon has brought with it the fancy grid system:

Chicago: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8303...6260196,12.41z
Tuscon: https://www.google.com/maps/@32.2416...9576859,14.39z

Chicago has also influenced Tuscon about having a waterfront present:

Chicago: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8705...6110359,14.42z
Tuscon: https://www.google.com/maps/@32.2427...9880812,17.39z

They also brought their mediocre football:
Chicago: https://www.google.com/maps/place/So...!4d-87.6157743
Tuscon: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Th...4d-110.9501094

Its interesting just how similar these two cities really are, I mean, it wasn't until the influence of Chicago did Tuscon even use signs...

Chicago: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.1838...7i13312!8i6656
Tuscon: https://www.google.com/maps/@32.2213...7i13312!8i6656

Really, after looking deep into the similarities here, I can see exactly how Miami out new yorks the rest of the country

[Razor]

For Canada

Halifax- Home to Pier 21 where the first wave of newly arrived immigrants arrived before and after the war, unlike it's American East coast counterpart cities, newly arrived immigrants moved inland to Toronto and Montreal where the manufacturing was. Halifax has some size, but could of been much more because of it being a major Canadian port city.

Winnipeg - Was Canada's "third city" at one time, and the premiere city of Canada's West..Being a major shipping centre and gateway to the West, I sometimes wonder how Winnipeg would of faired had it been situated on a Great Lake..North end of Superior perhaps?

Thunder Bay- Another shipping and great lakes port city..Not enough moving through there I suppose.

Hamilton? - Old Canadian city on the Great Lakes.Lost out to Toronto?

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Razor

Thunder Bay- Another shipping and great lakes port city..Not enough moving through there I suppose.

in the great lakes region, the northern areas became the places of resource extraction and the lower portion became the places of resource processing.

resource processing proved to be far more conducive to city building, hence why the lower half of the great lakes region has mighty cities like chicago, toronto, detroit, cleveland, milwaukee, buffalo, hamilton and the upper half has small little hamlets like duluth, thunder bay, green bay, sault st. marie, marquette, escanaba and is radically underdeveloped by comparison.

[jd3189]

Based on the discussion on Southern cities, I think all the major ones missed their chance for larger prewar urban growth and relevance. It makes sense that this is attributed to the North getting more economic advancement and population growth while the South was limited in those respects until recently.


Cities like Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville, Chattanooga, Birmingham, Asheville, etc could have been just as prominent as the inland river or railroad cities like Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Detroit, etc were at the same era.


New Orleans could have retained its position as a major global trading city if the US had better relations with Latin America. Houston and other Gulf cities like Mobile and Pensacola would have rode on that success and the Gulf coast would have been a far more different place than it is today.


Perhaps what I see as the biggest regret is the fact that cities in Florida were not founded and developed a bit earlier. Specifically Miami. It has a nice harbor in Biscayne Bay and is at a central location between the rest of the country, Latin America, Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and even Asia (via the Panama Canal). If Julia Tutle and Henry Flagler got a hold of it during the Reconstruction era and not after, there would have been some more prewar fabric and density. And with Cuba and other places not too far away, the cosmopolitan culture that characterizes Miami today would have had a firmer hold. I like to think that Miami would have been more of a modern version of New Orleans mixed with Havana, sharing characteristics in architecture to Tel Aviv, Singapore, and other cities with examples of modern architecture. Pretty much what is seen in South Beach, Historic Downtown, and parts of Little Havana would have been more widespread. Almost like a Tropical Chicago but still its own thing.


But regardless, it would have been freaking amazing if Southern cities were equal in size to the Northern cities in the prewar era. Even if urban sprawl still happened, it would not have been too bad.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by Mountain man

I hate coming onto threads and seeing someone post a million pictures just to illustrate your point... one or two is great, anymore than that just gets annoying. Nothing makes me clock out on what they were saying faster than that.

Really? I never understood people getting annoyed at too many pictures unless you're using dial-up and you have Windows 98. I am all for as many pictures as possible 99% of the time.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by suburbanite

Was thinking one of the Virginia cities. Norfolk or Richmond maybe. If you looked at a map of Colonial America it would be hard not to think that Virginia is the prime location. Right in the middle of the Eastern Seaboard, Norfolk is perfectly located at the mouth of the Chesapeake, halfway between the Caribbean trade routes and those heading to England. Richmond seems to have 19th century bones that imply a city much larger than it currently is.

Not sure what caused it to miss out. Poor local geography with swampy, humid marshlands? That being said Richmond was one of the largest cities in the Confederacy. Perhaps being located on the border of North/South tensions meant it was too risky a place to foster economic growth in the reconstruction era.

Norfolk would be *much* better off today if Virginia Beach, Chesapeake, Hampton, Suffolk, Portsmouth, and Newport News didn't all think they were the "it" city in the region. Every one of these places think they deserve the next convention, sports arena, business location etc. If the area would have just focused on Norfolk from the beginning the city would look much different. eh

[Mr Saturn64]

I often wonder what would have happened if the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 in Philadelphia hadn't happened. The city lost half of its people either due to the disease itself or fleeing the city. I don't know if this really made that big of an impact in the long run, but part of me has thought that Philadelphia could have been so much bigger and/or much more important if this hadn't happened.

[LMich]

Originally Posted by coyotetrickster

Following Reconstruction, Radical Republicans in the North actively legislated against Southern economic development. Railroads could ship raw materials from southern states, but no manufactured goods. The restrictions were gradually lifted through the early 1900s, but only for certain industries migrating south in search of cheap labor (shoes, textiles, furniture). The net effect was Northern cities experienced massive booms during the golden age of railroads. This expansion was supported by people (immigrants) and capital, neither of which were occurring in the South. Richmond's growth was definitely impacted by proximity to Washington and the presence of a better harbor (Baltimore) served by more rail lines.

I don't want to get too far off subject, but I'm going to really need to see some sourcing for these, as it sounds like Southern revisionist history, quite honestly. Far from wanting to stifle it's growth, the Republicans during Reconstruction wanted to remake the Southern economy into a free-labor economy as they had in the North. It was not in their interest to keep a foot on the economy, especially since they'd won the war and got control of it. Now, political leadership was a whole different story. Of course the North didn't want former Confederate legislators having much power of decision-making on the economy or anything else. But that view of the Southern economy during Reconstruction? Most of it sounds like a conspiracy theory, to me.

[eschaton]

As was discussed in another thread recently, the main reason that the southern cities didn't grow was because of malaria and yellow fever, which continued to be problems into the 19th century. Although they always depressed population growth due to death, in the south itself they weren't as big of a deal, because most people got them in childhood, when it's not a big deal to spend six months laid up in a bed. But they were terrible for immigration, because what company is going to sponsor an immigrant labor force coming in if they know half of them will become laid up with illness very shortly. The lack of appeal to immigrants meant the South mostly missed out on 19th century industrialization (outside of Louisville). Even industries which relied on southern raw materials - like cotton textiles - were mostly done in New England rather than the south well into the early 20th century.

Malaria in particular played a big role not just in the geography of the U.S. South, but Latin America as well. There's a reason why the capitols of Mexico, nearly every Central American nation, Colombia, and Ecuador are all in the highlands. It's just much easier for cities to grow when you don't have to worry about people dying from every stagnant pool of water.

[MayDay]

"cleveland has this behemoth, echoing downtown"

I don't know if 'behemoth' applies, but it's not the echoing place it used to be.