A neat video showing how population density in Manhattan has changed over 210 years. It was created by NYU urban scholars Solly Angel and Patrick Lamson-Hall and shows neighborhood population densities on the island from 1800 to 2010 using historical maps, aerial photographs, and census ward statistics. One of the creators notes:
The lessons, in short? Densities in Manhattan as a whole rose in the 19th century, peaked in 1910, fell for 70 years, and have been rising slowly since 1980.
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Interesting. The invention of cars changes the way city develops
Absolutely; urban form follows transport investment. And transport follows funding. So what transport infrastructure gets built shapes the nature and the quality and therefore the effectiveness of your city.
In Auckland the old Isthmus areas have the pattern they do because they were built around the tram network. Whereas postwar sprawl ‘burbs like Pakuranga and Albany are like they are because they are built for car access only. Of course as technology and tastes change older and newer transport systems and therefore settlement patterns operate side by side. So the car and bus completely replaced the trams in the older suburbs, and now Bus Rapid Transit is being added to the newer ones. And, it seems likely, that trams or rather modern Light Rail, will return to the mix through those old tram built ‘burbs; they after all just sitting there ready to work perfectly with that technology. Melbourne of course didn’t remove theirs, and although we can’t go back to what there was we do now have the opportunity to return state-of-the-art 21stC systems to the best routes to replace those overcrowded buses. Progress isn’t always a question of always bringing the completely new; sometimes its a question of returning to something we lost.