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L.A. does have a core region, munchitup's link confirms. It is a large area ( I calculate it at 60 sq miles or so. It starts in DTLA, and moves West through Hollywood, the Westside, ending at Santa Monica. It is the cultural and job center of the region.
Yeah, I guess you could argue that LA has a giant, mega-diffuse core encompassing everything from downtown to the sea, but I don't really see it that way.
Downtown is a different world from Westside. There isn't continuous development between the two. There are many miles of working class areas before you get to the rich Westside neighborhoods. The areas between downtown and the Westside are mostly low or lower rent, and have spotty development patterns. You're going through golf courses, strip malls, vacant spaces and the like.
I mean, why not throw in Pasadena, Glendale, Ventura Boulevard, Long Beach, Marina del Ray, Manhattan/Redondo Beaches and basically anything in LA County with highrises or density?
Perhaps, but I doubt it. Going off the county stats that are available, the 12k figure is clearly incorrect and probably by a decent margin. The majority of riders in LA County are in the city itself, I just have a hard time believing the smaller number of riders from around the county are enough to boost the HHI average by that large of a margin.
The "median" number is just that. It's the number in the middle. With Hispanic ridership alone at 61 percent on a Countywide basis, I would not be surprised if the $12,000 figure isn't far from the mark. It's also possible that the author meant to refer to individual riders rather than households (possible). But at the end of the day, the point remains that NYC and DC have a much more varied demographic of bus riders than LA (and obviously many, many more rail riders). Nobody calls the bus "poor people's transit" in those cities.
LA's true "core" isn't even downtown. It's basically the area from Westwood to Hollywood. This area has no rail, no city-subsidized mega-redevelopment, nothing. It's what people around the world think of, though, when they think LA. Palm trees, celebrities, glamour, etc. That's a better equivalent to downtown Chicago, if you're looking for the iconic heart of the region.
The core is basically Santa Monica to DTLA from the 10 freeway to the SM Mountains.
There is only rail on the Eastern portion running N/S (Red Line) and a small area of E/W rail in Hollywood (Red Line). It also has a small branch of rail running about 1/4 of the way through this "core" (Purple Line). The Expo Line sort of provides a southern E/W anchor for the PT in this "core", though IMO it is a little south of it. Phase 2 will provide the first direct connection from one side of the "core" (Santa Monica) to the other side (DTLA). When the Purple Line is extended, you will have basically 2.5 lines running E/W through the core and a line running N/S on the eastern end. The Sepulveda Pass line would provide the N/S line on the West Side. Someday the Crenshaw line will be extended from WeHo (The station at Crenshaw / Exposition is being built as a subway station to facilitate the line being extended as a LRT subway north to the Purple then Red Line. This is a ways off and the final piece of the Central LA / Westside transit puzzle), this provides a central N/S connector and you have your self a pretty decent grid through this "core".
The core is basically Santa Monica to DTLA from the 10 freeway to the SM Mountains.
Yeah, one could argue this, but, to me, it's too diffuse to be a true core. It's really a number of important nodes within a relatively concentrated area. But most of the core doesn't look any different from parts of LA outside the core. It's just that the delineated core has proportionally more activity centers.
I mean, you go one block off Wilshire, especially to the south, and you're usually looking at suburban style California bungalows. It looks no different than one block off Ventura in the valley, or a random block in Burbank or Glendale.
The difference, of course, is that Wilshire is far more important than Brand in Glendale or Ventura in the Valley. But the overall context isn't much different.
Yeah, one could argue this, but, to me, it's too diffuse to be a true core. It's really a number of important nodes within a relatively concentrated area. But most of the core doesn't look any different from parts of LA outside the core. It's just that the delineated core has proportionally more activity centers.
I mean, you go one block off Wilshire, especially to the south, and you're usually looking at suburban style California bungalows. It looks no different than one block off Ventura in the valley, or a random block in Burbank or Glendale.
The difference, of course, is that Wilshire is far more important than Brand in Glendale or Ventura in the Valley. But the overall context isn't much different.
I agree it is in no way as dense as Manhattan (the large "diffuse core" LA's was compared to). But it similarly is the center of the "LA" world and does have a higher density overall then most of the rest of LA. It has more to do with job and amenity concentration than population density, though the density of this area is about 15k ppsm overall.
I'm not sure I agree that it looks exactly like other areas outside of the core, particularly the areas of this "core" that are closer to the east end of Wilshire. But I agree the contrast is not as stark as you would get in a Chicago or Manhattan.
Yeah, I guess you could argue that LA has a giant, mega-diffuse core encompassing everything from downtown to the sea, but I don't really see it that way.
Downtown is a different world from Westside. There isn't continuous development between the two. There are many miles of working class areas before you get to the rich Westside neighborhoods. The areas between downtown and the Westside are mostly low or lower rent, and have spotty development patterns. You're going through golf courses, strip malls, vacant spaces and the like.
I mean, why not throw in Pasadena, Glendale, Ventura Boulevard, Long Beach, Marina del Ray, Manhattan/Redondo Beaches and basically anything in LA County with highrises or density?
Eh, even with those "dead spots" (which are exagerrated imo) the density of those 60 sq miles is in the 14,000 ppsm, roughly 40% denser than D.C. This area passes through most of the quintessential L.A. neighborhoods, most of the big tourist areas, and a large portion of the region's employment nodes. I'm not sure if munchitup's link calculates the percentage of jobs in this area, but I would imagine its hovering over 20%.
Eh, even with those "dead spots" (which are exagerrated imo) the density of those 60 sq miles is in the 14,000 ppsm, roughly 40% denser than D.C. This area passes through most of the quintessential L.A. neighborhoods, most of the big tourist areas, and a large portion of the region's employment nodes. I'm not sure if munchitup's link calculates the percentage of jobs in this area, but I would imagine its hovering over 20%.
Again, I agree you could do this for LA, but I think it's contrived, and could be done for basically any city.
You can just draw a line around the major jobs centers, to create an area as small as possible that encompasses most of the traditional activity centers. I could do this for Atlanta, or Phoenix, or Houston. They all have the linear job centers like Wilshire, and the highrise satellites, like Century City. It doesn't really function like a unified regional core.
Again, I agree you could do this for LA, but I think it's contrived, and could be done for basically any city.
You can just draw a line around the major jobs centers, to create an area as small as possible that encompasses most of the traditional activity centers. I could do this for Atlanta, or Phoenix, or Houston. They all have the linear job centers like Wilshire, and the highrise satellites, like Century City. It doesn't really function like a unified regional core.
Precisely. If the urban cores of metropolitan areas are to be analogized to our solar system, then NYC's core would be like Jupiter (a tremendous gravitational pull with 63 moons and counting) and LA's core would be like Mercury.
This is interesting. When a study by a Ph.D candidate supports a point you want to make (or you think it supports a point you want to make), you accept it blindly. But when the former chair of UCLA's Urban Planning Department and urban planner and economist extraordinaire, Donald Shoup, Ph.D., says that Los Angeles lacks "urban density," he's to be questioned, mocked, ignored and dismissed.
Besides, the argument was never that L.A. didn't have a core. The argument was that it's decentralized and has a
Atlanta also has a core like that.
Yeah, with a concentration of amenities that make Anaheim (yes, Anaheim) look positively dense and urban in comparison.
L.A. makes DC look sparsely populated in comparison, to say nothing of Atlanta.
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