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> Paris downtown Where is downtown Paris? 1/2/3 arrondissement? I never heard the term used for Paris. Mostly, it is used to describe the Wall Street area
by throwaway2037 2y ago
> Paris downtown
Where is downtown Paris? 1/2/3 arrondissement? I never heard the term used for Paris. Mostly, it is used to describe the Wall Street area of Manhattan (NYC) as the island is relatively north-south and Wall Street is on the southern end.
- travisjungroth 2y agoIt’s also come to mean the densest part of any city. Even the town I group up in would call the densest part “downtown”, even though the only buildings taller than two stories were city hall and the historic theater.
- TeMPOraL 2y agoToday I learned! I always thought "downtown" and "uptown" were more like "south from X" and "north from X" where X is some reference point in context (e.g. "where I'm standing"). Turns out, it's more similar to "downwell" and "upwell", i.e. towards or away from some central point (gravity wells being spherical-ish and all).
- vikingerik 2y agoUptown can mean anything out of: geographically north, upstream on a river, higher elevation, or higher income and wealth of the residents. It just so happens that for Manhattan which is the most famous uptown, all four of those indicators point in the same direction. In general I think an area would more likely be called an uptown if it met more of those criteria relative to some downtown. (And there would be correlation, wealthier residents would buy higher-elevation land.)
- 0_____0 2y agoI notice that non US English-speaking tend to use the term CBD instead of downtown, my assumption is that it is because of the NYC thing you mention
- Symbiote 2y agoBritish people would say city centre or town centre. Australians are the ones who say CBD.
- 0_____0 2y agoI've seen it in Canada, NZ and India as well. Def not AU specific.
- kjs3 2y agoNew Orleans seems to like giving directions relative to it's CBD (just south of the French Quarter). It's otherwise not common here in the US.
- teruakohatu 2y agoIn New Zealand we refer to it as the CBD, but you could also say city centre or town centre (or just “town”). Not sure I have ever heard downtown being used to refer to part of a New Zealand city although I understand its meaning.
- thaumasiotes 2y agoI don't think there's any association with New York. etymonline claims that "downtown" originally refers to the idea that the suburbs are at a higher elevation than the city proper. I don't know how much stock I'd put in that, but I trust it more than someone's random intuition about the geography of New York. ( https://www.etymonline.com/word/downtown https://www.etymonline.com/word/downtown : "The notion is originally literal, of suburbs built on heights around a city." ) It's the only available word for the concept in American English. I wouldn't recommend saying CBD; that would refer to cannabidiol or to marijuana in general.
- 0_____0 2y agoReading more about it, accounts vary. There are historians who posit it was in fact inspired by Manhattan, or maybe Boston, but it's not cut and dry. Edit forgot link: https://downtownny.com/news/where-did-downtown-come-from/ https://downtownny.com/news/where-did-downtown-come-from/