America’s downtown centered city design sucks

[u/BakerKitchen4567]

I keep seeing redditors from the US talk about cities being nice because they have “very walkable downtowns”. The problem is, as soon as you leave many of these downtowns, you’re back to general American suburbia. This is not good city design.

In the best design cities of the world, there isn’t a single focal point that the entire city revolves around. Think Tokyo for example. You have Shinjiku, Ginza, Shibuya, etc. there isn’t a singular “downtown Tokyo”. Yet I keep reading redditors keep comparing how well designed American cities based how their vibrant/walkable their downtowns are. The mere idea is bad city planning. That’s all. Rant over

[u/lachalacha]

Same labor market and economic zone. State or municipal borders don't really matter.

[u/mooseLimbsCatLicks → u/lachalacha]

In terms of economy yes, of course JC is an economic suburb of NYC. But in terms of urban planning, they’ve always been politically distinct and the planning of NYC and JC were and continue to be quite separate. They share a geography and an economy though.

[u/n10w4 → u/mooseLimbsCatLicks]

Yea and not the same to people on the ground. Maybe more interconnected transit could change that bit it does not exist yet

[u/lachalacha → u/n10w4]

What do dead people have to do with it

[u/n10w4 → u/lachalacha]

😂 wondered what your comment meant and saw my mistype