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There are many old, great US cities that have been converted from dense, manhattan-like landscape into 90% parking lots. https://mobile.twitter.com/Pxtl/status

by Pxtl 7y ago

There are many old, great US cities that have been converted from dense, manhattan-like landscape into 90% parking lots. https://mobile.twitter.com/Pxtl/status/1180325377996201985 https://mobile.twitter.com/Pxtl/status/1180325377996201985

CydeWeys 7y ago
I've seen this image before (and many more like it), and it's truly sad what we've done to our cities. But the good thing is, parking lots are huge opportunities for developers. I'm from DC, and the city has radically developed itself over the past few decades in turning what used to be entire blocks of surface parking lots into massive apartment and office buildings up to ten floors tall. It's very easy to develop a parking lot; that land tends to be relatively cheap to acquire and demolition costs basically nothing.
vinceguidry 7y ago
They had to really look hard to find a part of downtown that looks like that. If you zoom out a bit you can see how all that parking came to be - the nearby stadiums / conference centers. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Forsyth+St+%26+Trinity+Ave/@33.7528435,-84.3947923,1019m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x88f5038263f5351d:0xd541460aa33ca98c!8m2!3d33.7506905!4d-84.3951784?hl=en https://www.google.com/maps/place/Forsyth+St+%26+Trinity+Ave... Atlanta's pretty run down in parts, but downtown really isn't that bad.
- jcranmer 7y ago
  But you can compare to, say, Baltimore, where there's barely any surface parking around the convention center there, despite the fact that it's right next to a major sports stadium.
  - vinceguidry 7y ago
    Sure, you can make that comparison, I just don't know what useful conclusion you'd get from it. Maybe property rights are stronger there. Maybe nobody offered enough money. Land in Atlanta has historically been relatively cheap compared to New England. I have a pet theory that states that land values are higher on the coast mainly because sprawl doesn't have as many places to go, so it concentrates in smaller areas. Atlanta was historically a rail hub, exacerbating sprawl because transport could always move people farther outward. Picture pouring money onto a map, and walls are anywhere it's infeasible to develop the land. The money will spread out where there's no natural barriers. It will pile up if there's a lot of them. Money piling up means increased property values.

by Pxtl 7y ago

CydeWeys 7y ago

I've seen this image before (and many more like it), and it's truly sad what we've done to our cities. But the good thing is, parking lots are huge opportunities for developers. I'm from DC, and the city has radically developed itself over the past few decades in turning what used to be entire blocks of surface parking lots into massive apartment and office buildings up to ten floors tall. It's very easy to develop a parking lot; that land tends to be relatively cheap to acquire and demolition costs basically nothing.

vinceguidry 7y ago

They had to really look hard to find a part of downtown that looks like that. If you zoom out a bit you can see how all that parking came to be - the nearby stadiums / conference centers. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Forsyth+St+%26+Trinity+Ave/@33.7528435,-84.3947923,1019m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x88f5038263f5351d:0xd541460aa33ca98c!8m2!3d33.7506905!4d-84.3951784?hl=en https://www.google.com/maps/place/Forsyth+St+%26+Trinity+Ave... Atlanta's pretty run down in parts, but downtown really isn't that bad.

jcranmer 7y ago
But you can compare to, say, Baltimore, where there's barely any surface parking around the convention center there, despite the fact that it's right next to a major sports stadium.
- vinceguidry 7y ago
  Sure, you can make that comparison, I just don't know what useful conclusion you'd get from it. Maybe property rights are stronger there. Maybe nobody offered enough money. Land in Atlanta has historically been relatively cheap compared to New England. I have a pet theory that states that land values are higher on the coast mainly because sprawl doesn't have as many places to go, so it concentrates in smaller areas. Atlanta was historically a rail hub, exacerbating sprawl because transport could always move people farther outward. Picture pouring money onto a map, and walls are anywhere it's infeasible to develop the land. The money will spread out where there's no natural barriers. It will pile up if there's a lot of them. Money piling up means increased property values.