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Pittsburgh has the Golden Triangle as well as a second downtown in Oakland.
Oakland is the academic, cultural, and healthcare center of Pittsburgh and is Pennsylvania's third largest "Downtown". Only Center City Philadelphia and Downtown Pittsburgh can claim more economic and social activity than Oakland. The neighborhood is urban and diverse and is home to several universities, museums, and hospitals, as well as an abundance of shopping, restaurants, and students.
Lots of cities have areas around a university similar to Oakland. I have no doubt those stats are accurate, but you can't really buy much of anything in Oakland such as clothes, household goods, and such like you can in a real downtown that has dept. stores, etc.
Denver, too, has an area like that around the University of Denver. Lots of restaurants, bars, hair salons, Starbuck's and the like, but no dept. stores, Target-ish places or similar. So I didn't 'nominate' it as having two downtowns.
Lots of cities have areas around a university similar to Oakland. I have no doubt those stats are accurate, but you can't really buy much of anything in Oakland such as clothes, household goods, and such like you can in a real downtown that has dept. stores, etc.
Denver, too, has an area like that around the University of Denver. Lots of restaurants, bars, hair salons, Starbuck's and the like, but no dept. stores, Target-ish places or similar. So I didn't 'nominate' it as having two downtowns.
That's funny because the OP didn't lay out how many targets and dept. stores where required for an area to be classified as a "downtown". I would think that being the 3rd largest business district in a large State like PA would qualify as a being a "downtown", but hey that's just me.
That's funny because the OP didn't lay out how many targets and dept. stores where required for an area to be classified as a "downtown". I would think that being the 3rd largest business district in a large State like PA would qualify as a being a "downtown", but hey that's just me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by STLCardsBlues1989
St. Louis kind of does.
There's downtown, and then the suburb of Clayton.
As you can see, when you start expanding the definition, you get all sorts of places that have more than one "downtown".
Here is a definition from Wikipedia, which is what I was going with:
In most other North American cities, "downtown" is the formal name of the neighborhood in which the city's central business district is located.
Oakland is not the central business district of Pittsburgh, no matter how much business is done there. Oakland is the college area. It could be likened to "The Hill" in Boulder. It is not a true downtown.
Last edited by Katarina Witt; 09-09-2008 at 07:20 AM..
I'd just like to point out that a few low-to-mid rise office buildings scattered around an expressway in fields of parking lots does not a downtown make. There's gotta be some density. For example, that area around O'Hare is not a downtown. It's just an area where some tall-ish buildings sprung up - many of them hotels - around an airport. You can find those all over the place.
There are some cities with two or more legit downtowns - New York, LA, Atlanta, maybe Houston. But there's not that many, and most of the photos on here depict what I'd call a "vertical office park district," which is not the same thing as a downtown.
I'd just like to point out that a few low-to-mid rise office buildings scattered around an expressway in fields of parking lots does not a downtown make. There's gotta be some density. For example, that area around O'Hare is not a downtown. It's just an area where some tall-ish buildings sprung up - many of them hotels - around an airport. You can find those all over the place.
There are some cities with two or more legit downtowns - New York, LA, Atlanta, maybe Houston. But there's not that many, and most of the photos on here depict what I'd call a "vertical office park district," which is not the same thing as a downtown.
i like how you put "maybe" Houston. uptown houston looks like a downtown from far away but when you get to the ground level it's not urban at all.
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