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No, only cars benefit from this. The idea is to remove people from the streets to allow more cars to move. This has the effect of making that area less desirabl

No, only cars benefit from this. The idea is to remove people from the streets to allow more cars to move. This has the effect of making that area less desirable. Look around the world. Desirable places strongly correlate to people walking at street level, because this allows people to pass shops, cafes, etc. and easily go in. It's the core of city life. Crystal City is one of the least nice places close to downtown DC. Above ground it has huge streets, little street life and few people walking around. Compare that with Dupont Circle, where the city is full of life (this is where I work). Raised or underground walkways are a great way to kill a city. Skybridges are a very 1970s idea and they are being torn down. Where I live, Downtown Silver Spring (not far from Crystal City), sky bridges are expressly forbidden in the CBD. There are some areas way up North (upper Midwest, Canada) where there are underground walkways due to the weather in the winter. Most places, including the DC area, are fine in the winter. There is a lot of writing about Skybridges out there. Here is a start: http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/654/skybridges-dont-make-the-connection/ http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/654/skybridges-dont...

Retric 14y ago
That's particularly bad because people often don't use skybridges even when they are there. Pedestrians generally don't want to climb two flights of stairs on each end just to cross a street; they will take the shortest path. I agree, most Skybridges are terrible. But, it's a density and network effect question, when you can walk 6 blocks without going back to street level AND the shop you want to get to is also up/down there AND you take your elevator / escalator to that level then it works. The Crystal City underground suffers from making the underground path a lot longer so you can often get someplace faster at street level. However, I have both lived and worked in the area and used it all the time. PS: Dupont Circle greatly benefits from being part of a much larger city, it is walk-able with a well connected subway system. However, it's a low density area and driving around there sucks. If live in that area or take the metro it's great, but you can't sustain that when building get taller and people still want to drive.
- pwthornton 14y ago
  I would disagree that Dupont Circle is low density. Density is more of a reflection of the width of roads than the heights of buildings. Narrow roads and alleys allow for a lot of density without a lot of height. Look at Western Europe to see how they get more density than U.S. cities without sky scrapers. Paris is largely mid-rise buildings or lower. Paris is denser than NYC and not that far behind Manhattan in terms of density (54,000 people per sq mi in Paris versus 71,000 for Manhattan and 27,000 for NYC as a whole). DC density could be greatly raised without taller buildings by filling in missing teeth (abandoned lots of unused buildings on otherwise built streets) and by urbanizing the large swaths of the City that are suburban. Narrowing some streets to allow for wider buildings would also help. Ultimately, I think we'll have to agree to disagree. I don't think elevators or escalators really belong in an urban setting. I do agree that being able to get to a store that you know you want to get to via underground tunnels can have its benefits. But one of the things that I like about living in an urban area are all my unplanned walks, where I walk around, check out the shops, grab a coffee, maybe go into a few stores. A lot of urban life is unplanned and when we remove people from streets, we begin to lose that.
  - Retric 14y ago
    DC is under 9,500/square mile which is ~1/3 those high density areas. So, sorry but building height is important when your comparing areas with 4 vs 40 floor building AND a balanced mix of commercial and residential space. However, NY City also has a lot of 3 and 4 story buildings and central park is huge. Still the difference is mostly a question of the density of office space vs housing as NY includes a lot more of the surrounding area than DC.
    - pwthornton 14y ago
      Huge swaths of DC are single family homes. DC also has Rock Creek Park, which is twice as big as Central Park. We also have the Mall. There is a lot of land in DC that can't be built on. Paris is denser than just about any US city and it is largely low and mid rise.
    - 14y ago

Retric 14y ago

That's particularly bad because people often don't use skybridges even when they are there. Pedestrians generally don't want to climb two flights of stairs on each end just to cross a street; they will take the shortest path. I agree, most Skybridges are terrible. But, it's a density and network effect question, when you can walk 6 blocks without going back to street level AND the shop you want to get to is also up/down there AND you take your elevator / escalator to that level then it works. The Crystal City underground suffers from making the underground path a lot longer so you can often get someplace faster at street level. However, I have both lived and worked in the area and used it all the time. PS: Dupont Circle greatly benefits from being part of a much larger city, it is walk-able with a well connected subway system. However, it's a low density area and driving around there sucks. If live in that area or take the metro it's great, but you can't sustain that when building get taller and people still want to drive.

pwthornton 14y ago
I would disagree that Dupont Circle is low density. Density is more of a reflection of the width of roads than the heights of buildings. Narrow roads and alleys allow for a lot of density without a lot of height. Look at Western Europe to see how they get more density than U.S. cities without sky scrapers. Paris is largely mid-rise buildings or lower. Paris is denser than NYC and not that far behind Manhattan in terms of density (54,000 people per sq mi in Paris versus 71,000 for Manhattan and 27,000 for NYC as a whole). DC density could be greatly raised without taller buildings by filling in missing teeth (abandoned lots of unused buildings on otherwise built streets) and by urbanizing the large swaths of the City that are suburban. Narrowing some streets to allow for wider buildings would also help. Ultimately, I think we'll have to agree to disagree. I don't think elevators or escalators really belong in an urban setting. I do agree that being able to get to a store that you know you want to get to via underground tunnels can have its benefits. But one of the things that I like about living in an urban area are all my unplanned walks, where I walk around, check out the shops, grab a coffee, maybe go into a few stores. A lot of urban life is unplanned and when we remove people from streets, we begin to lose that.
- Retric 14y ago
  DC is under 9,500/square mile which is ~1/3 those high density areas. So, sorry but building height is important when your comparing areas with 4 vs 40 floor building AND a balanced mix of commercial and residential space. However, NY City also has a lot of 3 and 4 story buildings and central park is huge. Still the difference is mostly a question of the density of office space vs housing as NY includes a lot more of the surrounding area than DC.
  - pwthornton 14y ago
    Huge swaths of DC are single family homes. DC also has Rock Creek Park, which is twice as big as Central Park. We also have the Mall. There is a lot of land in DC that can't be built on. Paris is denser than just about any US city and it is largely low and mid rise.
  - 14y ago