My impression is that poor urban planning correlates more with era than geography. One thing I noticed while traveling in Europe is that while the old urban ce

My impression is that poor urban planning correlates more with era than geography. One thing I noticed while traveling in Europe is that while the old urban centers are pretty great, the outskirts, built during the automotive era, are no better than anywhere else. There's just less of it. That said, in SF (according to the article), some pre-automotive buildings were actually retrofitted to reflect the new car culture and add garages.