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Okay; I got my migration wires crossed — the team moved across the Hudson from Newark to Brooklyn.
Did I get the part about the revival of The Brooklyn Eagle right? Is that happening?
Demographically, Brooklyn is closer to Boston than it is to Philadelphia, but it's still closer to Chicago and Philadelphia than it is to Baltimore or Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia is closer to Chicago and Brooklyn than it is to any of the other three.
Boston's majority white (barely: 52.1%), and Blacks make up a smaller share of the population there than in any of the other cities save Pittsburgh (its 24.2% share is just above Pittsburgh's 23%. I see Boston Blacks complain all the time that their city's Black presence is overlooked or downplayed, and that stat may explain why). Brooklyn's 33.8% Black population share is closest to Chicago's 29.2% (and nobody downplays Chi-town's Black presence), and it just about splits the difference between Boston's share and Philadelphia's 43.6%.
Native Americans make up a larger share of the population in Brooklyn and Philadelphia (tied at 0.9%) than they do in any of the other cities. (all 0.3% or lower).
In terms of Asian presence, Brooklyn, Boston and Philadelphia rank 1, 2, 3 (12.7, 9.8 and 7.8%, respectively), and Chicago (6.8%) and Pittsburgh (5.8%) are not far behind. Baltimore, with a paltry 2.8% Asian share, is the outlier. The first four all have Chinatowns; Pittsburgh's got obliterated; Baltimore, to the best of my knowledge, has never had one.
Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders register on the radar in only three of these cities: 0.1% in Boston and Brooklyn and 0.2% in Philadelphia.
Hispanics account for nearly 30 percent (28.6) of Chicago's population and nearly 20 percent in Boston and Brooklyn (19.5 and 18.9). They account for 15.2% of Philadelphia's and less than 6 percent of the other two.
I would agree that Brooklyn and Boston are more alike in having a stronger Caribbean Black presence than the other three cities, but it's not like Caribbbean Blacks have no presence here: I can find Jamaican restaurants scattered all over the city, next door to my East Germantown apartment stands a Haitian Baptist church, and I took my Trini boyfriend to dinner at a Trinidadian restaurant that's about to move from near Broad and Girard into Center City proper. (Not to mention that the Penn Relays are a national holiday of sorts in Jamaica, and the city fills with Jamaicans on that weekend.)
And Caribbean Hispanics account for a large share of the city's Hispanic population, especially Puerto Ricans and Dominicans.
But here, I would say that none of the differences here rise to the level of differences in kind, save maybe for the quite strong whiteness of Pittsburgh and the equally strong Blackness of Baltimore.
Edited to add one more observation: Boston stands out from the other four cities in having a very noticeable college-town vibe. There may be more college students in Philadelphia and New York, but they don't have as strong an influence on the overall civic culture as they do in Boston.
Ok if it is not a weird metric, then Walla Walla = Philadelphia when it comes to commercial corridors (they have a main street). Actually, Walla Walla may have more per capita than Philly. It is a weird metric in a sense that it results in these kinds of ridiculous comparisons.
In fact, most small towns in the US with one general store, probably have more stores per capita than Manhattan. Nevermind that Manhattan has like 6000 restaurants.
I don't think this is necessarily true. I think Manhattan having so many other visitors and commuters and the culture of dining out probably means Manhattan per capita probably goes on the high side for restaurants/eateries per capita. Where you'd have something really outsized with a small town would be one that's a major spot for visitors--something like Branson, Missouri perhaps. Or if it's something where the municipal boundaries for whatever reason was slated specifically to be as non-residential as possible, but the neighboring municipalities are almost wholly residential. That does exist I think though I'm not sure it's really a small town. I think a notable example of this would be the city of Industry, CA.
Yes; I used the same tables but reported the figure for white alone at the top, which includes Hispanics.
Remove the Hispanics and only Pittsburgh has a white majority among these cities. Removing them from Baltimore's tally knocks the white percentage down only two percentage points, however, while in Brooklyn, Chicago and Philly, it drops the share to about one-third.
Boston becomes plurality-white when you do this. Philadelphia becomes plurality-Black.
But what this also tells me is that most people who discuss the racial demographics of cities don't remove the Hispanics from the white total when running the numbers down.
And, unfortunately for purposes of this discussion, non-Hispanic Blacks are not broken out separately (Hispanics may be of any race).
I don't think this is necessarily true. I think Manhattan having so many other visitors and commuters and the culture of dining out probably means Manhattan per capita probably goes on the high side for restaurants/eateries per capita. Where you'd have something really outsized with a small town would be one that's a major spot for visitors--something like Branson, Missouri perhaps. Or if it's something where the municipal boundaries for whatever reason was slated specifically to be as non-residential as possible, but the neighboring municipalities are almost wholly residential. That does exist I think though I'm not sure it's really a small town. I think a notable example of this would be the city of Industry, CA.
Any rundown town with sub 100 people population and a general store or a roadside diner in a middle of nowhere by an interstate would have higher per capita commercial than Manhattan, and certainly NYC. When it comes to commercial corridors specifically, any small town with a main street, such as Walla Walla, would beat out NYC, Philly, or any other big city. In bigger cities you have a lot more customers per business/higher throughput, hence cities can facilitate "higher order" businesses, such as flagship stores, boutiques, rare brands, specialty restaurants, etc. Per capita is a useless metric when discussing urbanity or specifically a given resident's access to certain amenities and businesses.
TLDR:
- per capita metric is not helpful when measuring availability or diversity of options
- density of businesses per square mile is helpful, or availability for a certain commute time radius <- actual access. This is very intuitive in the real world. When you buy a property, nobody says "this area has X amount of stores per capita" - this sentence doesn't mean anything, they would say "this house is within walking distance to XYZ stores or within driving distance to ABC amenities".
Any rundown town with sub 100 people population and a general store or a roadside diner in a middle of nowhere by an interstate would have higher per capita commercial than Manhattan, and certainly NYC. When it comes to commercial corridors specifically, any small town with a main street, such as Walla Walla, would beat out NYC, Philly, or any other big city. In bigger cities you have a lot more customers per business/higher throughput, hence cities can facilitate "higher order" businesses, such as flagship stores, boutiques, rare brands, specialty restaurants, etc. Per capita is a useless metric when discussing urbanity or specifically a given resident's access to certain amenities and businesses.
TLDR:
- per capita metric is not helpful when measuring availability or diversity of options
- density of businesses per square mile is helpful, or availability for a certain commute time radius.
I'm not absolutely certain of this, but I think Walk Score's metric emphasizes variety of businesses within a 15-minute walk over total number of businesses, since the top Walk Score category ("Wallker's Paradise," 90 to 100 Walk Score) states that "Daily errands do not require a car."
I'd interpret that to mean that, in a hypothetical situation where:
—one neighborhood has, say, 100 businesses within a 15-minute walk, but half of them are restaurants, one-quarter of them are apparel retailers and other boutique-type retailers, and none of them is a drugstore, dry cleaners, grocery store (small convenience grocers count) or general variety store a la Dollar General or small-format Target
—another neighborhood has only 70 businesses within a 15-minute walk, but those businesses include all of the above and fewer of them are restaurants or boutiques
the latter neighborhood will get a higher Walk Score than the former one.
I say that this is hypothetical because I can't think of an actually existing neighborhood where the former would be the case; any area with that many businesses within walking distance is bound to have at least one of every kind of shop necessary to run "daily errands." But I created it to emphasize that variety rather than sheer quantity of businesses with walking distance appears to me to be a major factor in determining an area's Walk Score.
Otherwise, I concede your point about the usefulness of commercial corridors per capita as a metric for comparison.
Any rundown town with sub 100 people population and a general store or a roadside diner in a middle of nowhere by an interstate would have higher per capita commercial than Manhattan, and certainly NYC. When it comes to commercial corridors specifically, any small town with a main street, such as Walla Walla, would beat out NYC, Philly, or any other big city. In bigger cities you have a lot more customers per business/higher throughput, hence cities can facilitate "higher order" businesses, such as flagship stores, boutiques, rare brands, specialty restaurants, etc. Per capita is a useless metric when discussing urbanity or specifically a given resident's access to certain amenities and businesses.
TLDR:
- per capita metric is not helpful when measuring availability or diversity of options
- density of businesses per square mile is helpful, or availability for a certain commute time radius <- actual access. This is very intuitive in the real world. When you buy a property, nobody says "this area has X amount of stores per capita" - this sentence doesn't mean anything, they would say "this house is within walking distance to XYZ stores or within driving distance to ABC amenities".
I agree per capita metric is not a good single metric for availability or diversity of options and that density and variety of options per travel time is a better one. I'm doing one of those annoying technical "well, actually... " bits--sorry!
I understand that with a sub 100 person population along the roadside that's a rest stop on a highway especially if it serves a busy one where it's the only one around. You get quite a few of those in the West as far as I remember. I will say though, it also means there's not much diversity of options. It's sort of like how you want to categorize things and factor in. What does it mean that there's 0 per capita of this or that? Like, you have an attached McDonald's and that's great for per capita eateries or fast food places or hamburgers, but if you have nothing else then your availability of bakery is 0 per capita.
I also don't know if the generalized idea for restaurants applies for Walla Walla though Walla Walla does have one of the better small town main streets in the US. I'm snot sure that its restaurants per capita are lower though than that of Philadelphia or Manhattan though.
Last edited by OyCrumbler; 06-22-2022 at 12:25 PM..
I agree per capita metric is not a good single metric for availability or diversity of options and that density and variety of options per travel time is a better one. I'm doing one of those annoying technical "well, actually... " bits--sorry!
I understand that with a sub 100 person population along the roadside that's a rest stop on a highway especially if it serves a busy one where it's the only one around. You get quite a few of those in the West as far as I remember. I will say though, it also means there's not much diversity of options. It's sort of like how you want to categorize things and factor in. What does it mean that there's 0 per capita of this or that? Like, you have an attached McDonald's and that's great for per capita eateries or fast food places or hamburgers, but if you have nothing else then your availability of bakery is 0 per capita.
I also don't know if the generalized idea for restaurants applies for Walla Walla though Walla Walla does have one of the better small town main streets in the US. I'm snot sure that its restaurants per capita are lower though than that of Philadelphia or Manhattan though.
Not to beat a dead horse, but as a reminder, here is the original comment that I responded to. There is no mention of diversity of options or anything like that, merely a "commercial corridors per capita" argument. My comment on Walla Walla illustrates exactly this point. This is not a useful metric.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MarketStEl
Fewer healthy commercial corridors, yes, but proportionally speaking, there probably are about as many here as in NYC
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In any case. I'll just put it out there, even without counting commercial streets in Brooklyn, I will declare that purely numbers wise, Brooklyn has more commercial corridors than Philadelphia. I have no stats to back this up, but purely from intuitive perspective and as a casual observer on the ground of both places, this has to be true. I'd say, outside of downtown areas of both places, Brooklyn has commercial corridors roughly, on average, every 5 blocks, throughout the whole territory of the borough, while Philly's commercial corridors are mostly limited to major avenues/streets.
Not to beat a dead horse, but as a reminder, here is the original comment that I responded to. There is no mention of diversity of options or anything like that, merely a "commercial corridors per capita" argument. My comment on Walla Walla illustrates exactly this point. This is not a useful metric.
----
In any case. I'll just put it out there, even without counting commercial streets in Brooklyn, I will declare that purely numbers wise, Brooklyn has more commercial corridors than Philadelphia. I have no stats to back this up, but purely from intuitive perspective and as a casual observer on the ground of both places, this has to be true. I'd say, outside of downtown areas of both places, Brooklyn has commercial corridors roughly, on average, every 5 blocks, throughout the whole territory of the borough, while Philly's commercial corridors are mostly limited to major avenues/streets.
Yep, I agree on the gist, I'm just being an ass by doing a "technically" or "well, actually" thing where I'm not sure if Walla Walla truly has greater number of restaurants per capita. I agree it's not a useful metric by itself.
I think Brooklyn has more stores overall. Probably more corridors, but it's hard to count how Philadelphia does it. My experience is almost solely Center City, South Philadelphia and West Philadelphia up into somewhere in the 50s or so. I think what I find interesting outside of Center City and especially noticeable in South Philadelphia is how often random corner shops / bars / restaurants pop up unaccompanied or with just one or few neighbors or catercorner on these tiny blocks. These aren't commercial streets as it's not a full line of them going on for blocks or even a single block, but they do pop up a lot. This happens in Brooklyn in parts, but I felt it was far less common.
Yep, I agree on the gist, I'm just being an ass by doing a "technically" or "well, actually" thing where I'm not sure if Walla Walla truly has greater number of restaurants per capita. I agree it's not a useful metric by itself.
I think Brooklyn has more stores overall. Probably more corridors, but it's hard to count how Philadelphia does it. My experience is almost solely Center City, South Philadelphia and West Philadelphia up into somewhere in the 50s or so. I think what I find interesting outside of Center City and especially noticeable in South Philadelphia is how often random corner shops / bars / restaurants pop up unaccompanied or with just one or few neighbors or catercorner on these tiny blocks. These aren't commercial streets as it's not a full line of them going on for blocks or even a single block, but they do pop up a lot. This happens in Brooklyn in parts, but I felt it was far less common.
Yeah I agree, it is less common in Brooklyn, I think partly because those few random shops eventually become a smallish area of shops a few blocks long.
Yeah I agree, it is less common in Brooklyn, I think partly because those few random shops eventually become a smallish area of shops a few blocks long.
It's hard to tell. I was wondering that myself, but South Philly which I'm mostly referencing does have commercial street corridors and with blocks taking you a pretty short distance given the street and block lengths so you aren't that far from them much of the time and yet the small corner operation is just scattered all around along with that. I wonder if there's something about more permissiveness for retail/commercial use whether from early on or a later change in policy or perhaps having to do with having fairly few identifiably broader commercial main streets because it did strike me as really odd. You'd think that they'd collect more of them at specific points. In that sense, and with how small the blocks and streets are, it reminded me of the way some East Asian cities randomly have shops at places. It's odd, but I really like it.
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