# What city has the worst urban sprawl



## unusualfire (May 26, 2004)

^ Buy that empty land now if you wanna make money.


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## JARdan (Aug 21, 2004)

unusualfire said:


> ^ Buy that empty land now if you wanna make money.


Nah... people did that 10-20years ago. All of that land would be worth millions today. Anyone who owns substantial (undeveloped) land within 100km of Toronto's city centre is sitting on a gold mine. Quite a bit of it seems to be inherited.


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## JARdan (Aug 21, 2004)

Here is the west end of Toronto. This is Milton, where I am, 60km from downtown.
You can easily tell where the new development is occurring. A few years ago, Milton was around 35 000. Now, with 5 000 homes being built, the population is already around 50 000. It's estimated the population will be 100 000 in less than a decade (by 2010).


Here is a high up shot. You can see the edge of lake Ontario where Oakville (mid-right), and Burlington (bottom-right) are located. Toward the top and top-right is Mississauga's west edge. The top is the interection of the 401 and 407, the mid-right is the intersection of the 403 and the 407. Mississauga has a pop of 700 000, and burlington and Oakville combined are roughly 400 000.


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## MikeHunt (Nov 28, 2004)

wjfox2002 said:


> LA


I agree.


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## Jaye101 (Feb 16, 2005)

LA is so much worse it's hilarious,


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## JARdan (Aug 21, 2004)

Here are some real images of Milton and they're pretty cool:

Look west toward downtown Toronto (at the top) from 60km away, above the 401. You can see the end of Mississauga's sprawl about 5km up the road from Milton. Within a decade or so, this gap will be filled. The land (on the left) near the interchange has already been developed with CDN Tire, Wal-mart, Staples, and more strip malls:









Looking southest. Notice on the bottom side of the main road (post WWII) the grid, and above the road (80's era) the curved roads. All of the land on the top right of the pic has been developed for homes:









Looking North. 401 is near the "dead" field grass:









North again... just a bit more towards the east:









Looking East on Derry Road. The land on the right has already been escavated and getting ready for a new batch of homes:


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## 909 (Oct 22, 2003)

JayeTheOnly said:


> LA: 1,260km2, 3.9million
> *Greater LA: 87,972km2, 17.5 million*


The Netherlands, area: 
total: 41,526 sq km 
land: 33,883 sq km
population: 16,407,491 (July 2005 est.) 

So i assume that greater LA is not the build-up area?..


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## Dezz (Mar 11, 2005)

Past year I flew from El Gouna to Caïro in Egypt and when I looked out of the plain I immediately noticed Caïro also has huge urban sprawl! :shocked: 

In the Netherlands (where I live) the only city with much urban sprawl is Almere. This new town was founded in 1975 and already has 176.352 (may 2005) inhabitants


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## The Cebuano Exultor (Aug 1, 2005)

*Why do American cities tend to sprawl like there is no tomorrow?*

Guys, I'm just so puzzled why American cities sprawl so much. Seeing urban sprawls of New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Detroit, Atlanta, Miami, Baltimore-Washingtopn, Boston, Phoenix, and even Seattle just makes me feel bad for those people living in there (the alienating feeling and such). It would be terrible commutes daily! I mean, by the looks opf New York's urban sprawl it seems that there must be a new suburb being added to it almost daily! Don't you think? 

I prefer European as well as Asian cities as they tend to have a more wholistic cities (as in a more compact community). The reason is that a slightly denser built-up area would require lesser commuting distance and more interaction among the community. 

How 'bout you guys, what do you think?


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## JARdan (Aug 21, 2004)

It's the North American liftestyle. The fact that there are 330 million people living this way adds to the problem. For example... we think Toronto sprawls quite a bit here in Canada. But picture the entire population of Canada being placed into the are the size of California living this lifestyle. Sprawl is inevitable.

Just look at the pics I posted below.


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## bay_area (Dec 31, 2002)

Shiro over at SSP did an awesome job of mapping the urban extent of the World's Metro Areas...
Los Angeles( Red) and Hong Kong(Blue) to scale









London is a lot smaller the LA too..









So is Paris...









Here's Chicago









Mexico City(Left) is smaller then Denver(Right)









Here's Toronto









Here's Shanghai









Here's Phoenix









Here's Sao Paulo









Here's Seattle









Here's San Francisco Bay/ Sacramento


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## titeness (Jul 3, 2004)

OMG thats friggin scary, this is a direct result of the white man basically stealing land from the indians and thus having little or no appreciation for it, is this the land cost of freedom and upwward mobility? or are we just doing it wrong?


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## Buster (Sep 1, 2003)

titeness said:


> OMG thats friggin scary, this is a direct result of the white man basically stealing land from the indians and thus having little or no appreciation for it, is this the land cost of freedom and upwward mobility? or are we just doing it wrong?


That's nonsense. Pockets of sprawl are dominated by non-whites throughout the U.S. and Canada. Leave the white-man vs. aboriginals out of this because that's a totally separate issue.

The real issue at heart is our willingness to subsidize the infrastructure to make these communities viable. I'm tired of tax dollars wasted on extensive road, sewage, hydro, etc. infrastructure that would cost half as much to support in densly populated areas.

Jardan, that ariel of the western GTA makes my blood boil (that and the humidity). I'd hate to see the gap between Mississauga and Milton disappear. I'd rather see Milton halt all new low-density development and focus on increasing densities in this core. Milton could be a thriving community built on a pedestrian scale if things were tweaked. Otherwise, it'll look like any other sprawling mess in the 905.


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## titeness (Jul 3, 2004)

Buster said:


> That's nonsense. Pockets of sprawl are dominated by non-whites throughout the U.S. and Canada. Leave the white-man vs. aboriginals out of this because that's a totally separate issue.
> 
> The real issue at heart is our willingness to subsidize the infrastructure to make these communities viable. I'm tired of tax dollars wasted on extensive road, sewage, hydro, etc. infrastructure that would cost half as much to support in densly populated areas.
> 
> Jardan, that ariel of the western GTA makes my blood boil (that and the humidity). I'd hate to see the gap between Mississauga and Milton disappear. I'd rather see Milton halt all new low-density development and focus on increasing densities in this core. Milton could be a thriving community built on a pedestrian scale if things were tweaked. Otherwise, it'll look like any other sprawling mess in the 905.


The overwhelming majority of Government officials, town planners, and real estate developers throughout American History have been white males.


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## Buster (Sep 1, 2003)

titeness said:


> The overwhelming majority of Government officials, town planners, and real estate developers throughout American History have been white males.


Gee, that explains everything! Now I see it clearly, the White Man's disregard for Aboriginal people is responsible for sprawl. 

What are you doing wasting time on this forum when you could be teaching urban planning students how the White Man created sprawl as an afront to Aboriginal people?


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## spxy (Apr 9, 2003)

These are from google maps, and have all been scaled, the uk maps are no where near as detailed as the US ones, the are a lot of towns and roads left off the map of London.Some of those US towns in the red maps are a little too big.


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## JARdan (Aug 21, 2004)

Buster said:


> Jardan, that ariel of the western GTA makes my blood boil (that and the humidity). I'd hate to see the gap between Mississauga and Milton disappear. I'd rather see Milton halt all new low-density development and focus on increasing densities in this core. Milton could be a thriving community built on a pedestrian scale if things were tweaked. Otherwise, it'll look like any other sprawling mess in the 905.


lol. Yeah... well to be honest, I like the 80's style development. I'm not sure if you are familiar with Milton, but the houses in behind E.C Drury off of Child's drive are more my taste. Not excessively sprawling, but enough room for a 2 car garage and backyard big enough for a pool. I don't want to have a car, and be forced to live in a sardine can. If I'm going to ever live urban, I will live downtown in a nice condo (which would be perfectly find with me).


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## djm19 (Jan 3, 2005)

Its not entirely LA City planner's fault that the sprawl became so large. LA County is a BIG area, and LA City only controls its portion of it. 

LA City cant help what orange county does, or santa clarita valley, or anything past its bounderies. 

I will say that LA has some of the densest sprawl, as dense as New York, when you ccompare that same area coverage.


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## Talbot (Jul 13, 2004)

The Cebuano Exultor said:


> Guys, I'm just so puzzled why American cities sprawl so much. Seeing urban sprawls of New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Detroit, Atlanta, Miami, Baltimore-Washingtopn, Boston, Phoenix, and even Seattle just makes me feel bad for those people living in there (the alienating feeling and such). It would be terrible commutes daily! I mean, by the looks opf New York's urban sprawl it seems that there must be a new suburb being added to it almost daily! Don't you think?
> 
> I prefer European as well as Asian cities as they tend to have a more wholistic cities (as in a more compact community). The reason is that a slightly denser built-up area would require lesser commuting distance and more interaction among the community.
> 
> How 'bout you guys, what do you think?


No reason to feel sorry for them, they obviously don't mind living in an alienated environment or else they would change their lifestyle.

And, titeness, do you know how racist and arrogant you sound?


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## LosAngelesSportsFan (Oct 20, 2004)

Butcher said:


> LA by far imo. LA is growing outwards because it can't have a lot of skyscrapers(due to earthquakes). Flying into LA makes LA look massive because of the sprasl for miles and miles.


Earthquakes have nothing to do with why LA doesnt have as many skyscrapers as other cities. At least not in the last 30 years. Now that LA cant grow out anymore, it makes sense for LA to Grow up and that is what the metro is doing, with towers popping up all over the place, with 50+ proposed in DT LA, to Long Beach to Wilshire to Century City and even places like Anaheim, with a few and the more in other parts of the OC.


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