Cities Whose Downtowns are Bordered by Freeways Only

[jgb191]

Would the Big Easy qualify?  I-10/I-610 in New Orleans, Louisiana maybe??

[StogieGuy7]

Would the Big Easy qualify?  I-10/I-610 in New Orleans, Louisiana maybe??

It may seem that way, but the actual central business district (as well as the French Quarter, etc) are located south/east of I-10 (610 is farther north and west than 10). There is US90 south of downtown, I-10 northwest and the Mississippi River to the south and east (ironically, NOLA is on the east side of the Mississippi, yet it curves northward at this spot actually placing downtown to the west of the river).  Anyhoo, downtown NOLA may seem cut off, but technically it is not as there's no freeway cutting it off to the east/northeast.

[roadman65]

It may seem The Bronx in NYC is contained in between I-87 on the west, I-95 to the north, NY 895 to the east, and I-278 to the south, but the actual implied downtown ( as Bronx is part of the larger NYC and has no downtown) would be along the area on both sides of I-95.

Plus NY 895 was recently downgraded to arterial as part of New York State's freeway downgrade purge ( hence I-81 in Syracuse and the Inner Loop of Rochester) so its containment by freeway  boundary would have been altered anyway.

[Flint1979]

It may seem The Bronx in NYC is contained in between I-87 on the west, I-95 to the north, NY 895 to the east, and I-278 to the south, but the actual implied downtown ( as Bronx is part of the larger NYC and has no downtown) would be along the area on both sides of I-95.

Plus NY 895 was recently downgraded to arterial as part of New York State's freeway downgrade purge ( hence I-81 in Syracuse and the Inner Loop of Rochester) so its containment by freeway  boundary would have been altered anyway.

Actually the unofficial downtown of The Bronx is Melrose.

[coldshoulder]

Rochester, NY, was like this until the eastern portion of the Inner Loop was removed and replaced with a boulevard.

I've compared Youngstown, Ohio to Rochester because of the similarity of their near-downtown freeway layout.  Youngstown's still exists in it's original entirety.

https://goo.gl/maps/ToYEoev7W4JqEVWz8

[Henry]

Chicago gets close, but Lower Wacker Drive and Lake Shore Drive in the Downtown area both aren't quite freeways, not to mention the Draw Bridge on Ida Wells Dr/Congress Parkway

Also, Lake Shore Drive and Ohio Street were once planned to be part of the original I-494 before planners realized it wouldn't be an ideal location for that route, so they moved it to the (also unbuilt) Crosstown Expressway. Had this been built, then maybe it would count, but I-55 is probably too far south to be considered downtown.

[webny99]

Formerly Rochester, then part of the Inner Loop was removed.

Rochester, NY, was like this until the eastern portion of the Inner Loop was removed and replaced with a boulevard.

Did anyone mention that Rochester, NY qualified before the Inner Loop was removed?[/s]

Rochester does (or at least did) have the unique distinction of both the "downtown" and the actual city limits being mostly surrounded by freeways, the non-freeway portion of NY 104 in Greece and the Charlotte neighborhood being the only exceptions.

[webny99]

I've compared Youngstown, Ohio to Rochester because of the similarity of their near-downtown freeway layout.  Youngstown's still exists in it's original entirety.

https://goo.gl/maps/ToYEoev7W4JqEVWz8

I can see the similarity, with I-680 playing a similar role to I-490. The Inner Loop was even smaller, though, and existed independently of other route designations. Only the southern leg was concurrent with I-490, and the remainder was unnumbered.

[vdeane]

Formerly Rochester, then part of the Inner Loop was removed.

Rochester, NY, was like this until the eastern portion of the Inner Loop was removed and replaced with a boulevard.

Did anyone mention that Rochester, NY qualified before the Inner Loop was removed?[/s]

Rochester does (or at least did) have the unique distinction of both the "downtown" and the actual city limits being mostly surrounded by freeways, the non-freeway portion of NY 104 in Greece and the Charlotte neighborhood being the only exceptions.

I-590 veers into Brighton.  Or rather, Brighton managed to avoid having the city annex the remaining chunk inside the "outer loop".

I've compared Youngstown, Ohio to Rochester because of the similarity of their near-downtown freeway layout.  Youngstown's still exists in it's original entirety.

https://goo.gl/maps/ToYEoev7W4JqEVWz8

I can see the similarity, with I-680 playing a similar role to I-490. The Inner Loop was even smaller, though, and existed independently of other route designations. Only the southern leg was concurrent with I-490, and the remainder was unnumbered.

940T

[Dough4872]

Philadelphia with I-76, I-95, and I-676

I don't know if I would count that since I-76 passes well to the south of Center City. Had I-695 been built this would have been the case.

[webny99]

I can see the similarity, with I-680 playing a similar role to I-490. The Inner Loop was even smaller, though, and existed independently of other route designations. Only the southern leg was concurrent with I-490, and the remainder was unnumbered.

940T

Technically yes, but it was not signed with a number.

[vdeane]

I can see the similarity, with I-680 playing a similar role to I-490. The Inner Loop was even smaller, though, and existed independently of other route designations. Only the southern leg was concurrent with I-490, and the remainder was unnumbered.

940T

Technically yes, but it was not signed with a number.

Well, it is signed "Inner Loop", and according to a numerology calculator I just found on Google, that comes out to 55.  Then again, another one claims 118, so who knows.

[webny99]

I can see the similarity, with I-680 playing a similar role to I-490. The Inner Loop was even smaller, though, and existed independently of other route designations. Only the southern leg was concurrent with I-490, and the remainder was unnumbered.

940T

Technically yes, but it was not signed with a number.

Well, it is signed "Inner Loop", and according to a numerology calculator I just found on Google, that comes out to 55.  Then again, another one claims 118, so who knows.

Ha, if only we could claim that 55 was the speed limit on the entire route... 

[Occidental Tourist]

Downtown Los Angeles has all four of its boundaries made up by freeways: US 101 to the north, I-5 (or US 101) to the east, I-10 to the south, and CA 110 to the west.

What other cities have an all-freeway border for their downtown areas?

Isn't the LA River the east boundary?

This and defining it by the freeways is a bit of a tautological definition. I'd consider downtown to also include Union Station, Chinatown, Olvera Street, Fort Moore Hill, the area around Men's Central Jail and Piper Tech, the areas west of the 110 that include LA Center Studios and Wilshire Blvd, and the Figueroa/Flower corridors north of Adams.  Also, the various warehouse districts (Flower, Garment) extend well past the freeways and even into Vernon.  I'm not sure claiming the same warehouses on one side of the freeways are in downtown but on the other side are somehow not is logicially defensible (unless you're defining downtown based solely on where the freeways are).

[wriddle082]

Nashville doesn't quite qualify, as I-24 runs across the Cumberland River from Downtown, and the area across the river from Downtown up to I-24 is referred to as the East Bank.  This area is, however, closely linked due to the presence of Nissan Stadium, connected by the John Seigenthaler Pedestrian Bridge and four other non-freeway bridges, has a Top Golf, and Oracle is planning to build what will be their largest office hub in the north end of this area, which they say will employ 8500.

At any rate, Nashville's downtown is growing so fast that before long there will be skyscrapers (likely apartments) on the East Bank near Nissan Stadium's replacement, so by then you could consider it to be Downtown.  They would just need some skyscrapers on the north side along Rosa Parks Blvd. up to I-65 and it would be complete.  There are already residential high rises along the south and west portions of the Downtown Loop.

[mrsman]

Downtown Los Angeles has all four of its boundaries made up by freeways: US 101 to the north, I-5 (or US 101) to the east, I-10 to the south, and CA 110 to the west.

What other cities have an all-freeway border for their downtown areas?

Isn't the LA River the east boundary?

This and defining it by the freeways is a bit of a tautological definition. I'd consider downtown to also include Union Station, Chinatown, Olvera Street, Fort Moore Hill, the area around Men's Central Jail and Piper Tech, the areas west of the 110 that include LA Center Studios and Wilshire Blvd, and the Figueroa/Flower corridors north of Adams.  Also, the various warehouse districts (Flower, Garment) extend well past the freeways and even into Vernon.  I'm not sure claiming the same warehouses on one side of the freeways are in downtown but on the other side are somehow not is logicially defensible (unless you're defining downtown based solely on where the freeways are).

Yes.  WWhich came first the downtown or the freeways?

The freeways in LA definitely provide a rough definition, but as discussed parts of Downtown spill over the freeway and in some cases parts of Downtown end well before the freeway (i.e. the parts of the fwy loop east of the LA river).

Now the 110 and 10 were definitley built where they were to be just outsided the downtown, so land was cheaper, and downtown eventually extended to those boundaries (and arguably went slightly over those boundaries).

So in some ways the freeways do contain downtown, but downtown do grow or shrink over time so the boundaries arent constant.

[Occidental Tourist]

Agreed to some extent. Except the 101 Freeway wasn't the northern boundary of downtown even when it was built.  There were always parts of downtown north of the 101, which partially explains why the southeastern approach has the 101's control city as the LA Civic Center but doesn't treat the 10 as being the approach for "south" downtown.

When the 101, San Bernardino Freeway, the Harbor Freeway, and the southeastern loop (Golden State Freeway and Santa Monica Skyway) were planned and built, they definitely weren't seen as defining the borders of downtown.  Bunker Hill and what would become the Financial District were undesirable neighborhoods filled with homes.  Downtown at that time was a corridor from Olvera Street down Main and Broadway to about Olympic. It was narrow and tall. 

While some of it eventually filled out to some of the freeways, other parts didn't. The Arts District and the Warehouse District east of the LA River are very difficult to describe as being part of a downtown.  Everything south of the Financial District (e.g., South Park) are only very recent additions to the urban core while rest south of there (Old downtown and the area around the Metropolitan Courthouse) were urban almost even before the freeways.

Arguably, before the freeways, LA had an hourglass shaped downtown, thick at the north end near Olvera Street, Union Station, and the govt buildings, thinning out until Wilshire, and then thickening out through the theater district all the way down to almost the Adams District.  While time and deliberate gentrification projects have pushed some of these boundaries outward  and fattened them a bit, the boundaries of downtown being defined by the freeways is true only to the extent that one could define the entire city of LA as being defined by the boundaries of other freeways.

I leave you with this.  Here's the north end of the Figueroa corridor next to the 110 just south of the 101.  Today this is chock-a-block with high rises.  But in the late 70's, even with the massive push in the 50's and 60's to gentrify nearby Bunker Hill, most of it is a parking lot or empty lots.  This is one of the corners of the supposed downtown defined by freeways, and even 40 years ago--long after the freeways that supposedly defined it had been built--it was still surprisingly undeveloped.

[The Nature Boy]

Downtown Los Angeles has all four of its boundaries made up by freeways: US 101 to the north, I-5 (or US 101) to the east, I-10 to the south, and CA 110 to the west.

What other cities have an all-freeway border for their downtown areas?

Isn't the LA River the east boundary?

This and defining it by the freeways is a bit of a tautological definition. I'd consider downtown to also include Union Station, Chinatown, Olvera Street, Fort Moore Hill, the area around Men's Central Jail and Piper Tech, the areas west of the 110 that include LA Center Studios and Wilshire Blvd, and the Figueroa/Flower corridors north of Adams.  Also, the various warehouse districts (Flower, Garment) extend well past the freeways and even into Vernon.  I'm not sure claiming the same warehouses on one side of the freeways are in downtown but on the other side are somehow not is logicially defensible (unless you're defining downtown based solely on where the freeways are).

Yes.  WWhich came first the downtown or the freeways?

The freeways in LA definitely provide a rough definition, but as discussed parts of Downtown spill over the freeway and in some cases parts of Downtown end well before the freeway (i.e. the parts of the fwy loop east of the LA river).

Now the 110 and 10 were definitley built where they were to be just outsided the downtown, so land was cheaper, and downtown eventually extended to those boundaries (and arguably went slightly over those boundaries).

So in some ways the freeways do contain downtown, but downtown do grow or shrink over time so the boundaries arent constant.

This is why this kind of a tough question for any growing city. A growing city will well...grow and business will pop up along the freeway (both sides) because of the ease of access. If you build a freeway near a growing downtown, it'll grow to the interstate and beyond.

A dying rust belt city like Youngstown wouldn't have this problem. In fact, I would argue that Youngstown over performs its size in terms of freeway access because it had 100,000 more people when freeways were being constructed so things were built to a scale that is no longer needed.

[Road Hog]

Texas' 3 major cities all do:

Houston:
I-10/I-45/I-69

San Antonio:
I-10/I-35/I-37

Dallas:
I-30/I-35E/I-345/Woodall Rogers

Everything south of Woodall is Downtown. Everything north of it is Uptown and has a fair number of skyscrapers, so with the construction of Klyde Warren Park there is more connectivity.

I expect a similar blurring of lines with Deep Ellum once the I-45 trench is built and capped.

[mrsman]

Agreed to some extent. Except the 101 Freeway wasn't the northern boundary of downtown even when it was built.  There were always parts of downtown north of the 101, which partially explains why the southeastern approach has the 101's control city as the LA Civic Center but doesn't treat the 10 as being the approach for "south" downtown.

When the 101, San Bernardino Freeway, the Harbor Freeway, and the southeastern loop (Golden State Freeway and Santa Monica Skyway) were planned and built, they definitely weren't seen as defining the borders of downtown.  Bunker Hill and what would become the Financial District were undesirable neighborhoods filled with homes.  Downtown at that time was a corridor from Olvera Street down Main and Broadway to about Olympic. It was narrow and tall. 

While some of it eventually filled out to some of the freeways, other parts didn't. The Arts District and the Warehouse District east of the LA River are very difficult to describe as being part of a downtown.  Everything south of the Financial District (e.g., South Park) are only very recent additions to the urban core while rest south of there (Old downtown and the area around the Metropolitan Courthouse) were urban almost even before the freeways.

Arguably, before the freeways, LA had an hourglass shaped downtown, thick at the north end near Olvera Street, Union Station, and the govt buildings, thinning out until Wilshire, and then thickening out through the theater district all the way down to almost the Adams District.  While time and deliberate gentrification projects have pushed some of these boundaries outward  and fattened them a bit, the boundaries of downtown being defined by the freeways is true only to the extent that one could define the entire city of LA as being defined by the boundaries of other freeways.

I leave you with this.  Here's the north end of the Figueroa corridor next to the 110 just south of the 101.  Today this is chock-a-block with high rises.  But in the late 70's, even with the massive push in the 50's and 60's to gentrify nearby Bunker Hill, most of it is a parking lot or empty lots.  This is one of the corners of the supposed downtown defined by freeways, and even 40 years ago--long after the freeways that supposedly defined it had been built--it was still surprisingly undeveloped.

Very well put.

My own feeling of what downtown's boundaries were at the dawn of the freeway age would basically be Sunset/Macy - San Pedro St - Olympic - Figueroa.  (And also incorporating Union Station area, not a perfect rectangle.]  This basically included the development plans for Bunker Hll and werent limited to the existing CBD.  Even residential areas are part of the Downtown.  Highway plans arent limited to highways, development is definitely a part of the plans as well.

[TheStranger]

Other than Fresno, much of California doesn't seem to truly have "downtowns bordered by freeways" at all -

- as mentioned above, Sacramento's north downtown boundary is the railroad track near B Street (so not even Route 160 or the American River)

- San Francisco could have qualified for this had 480 and 101 been built out north of I-80, but with 480 gone and the Central Freeway's terminus now at Market/Octavia, pretty much traditional downtown SF is way north of I-80 and while SOMA incorporates I-80 and a bit of 280, it's not really "surrounded" by either freeway route.

- Oakland's downtown is bordered to the west by 980, but arguably 880 is already past downtown and 580 itself does not go to downtown directly either.  (80 barely skirts the city too)

- Downtown San Jose has Route 87 as a west border and I-280 as the south border, but the north limit is Julian Street and the east limit is likely around San Jose State University

- Downtown San Diego is surrounded on its north and east side by I-5, but is otherwise bordered by the waterfront along Harbor Drive (former US 101).

- Stockton's downtown is mostly bisected by Route 4, with I-5 just past the west edge.

- Bakersfield's downtown is much closer to the Route 178/Route 204 (former US 99) junction, and several miles away from either current Route 99 or Route 58.

- Downtown Long Beach is on the opposite side of the Los Angeles River from the Long Beach Freeway (I-710) at all times

---

As for an example that almost counts:  Downtown Anaheim is within a triangle surrounded by Route 57, Route 91 and I-5 - though the north edge of downtown doesn't come close to Route 91.

[jp the roadgeek]

Was thinking Albany with I-87 (Thruway), I-90 (free portion), and I-787

[cockroachking]

Was thinking Albany with I-87 (Thruway), I-90 (free portion), and I-787

I wouldn't personally consider UAlbany to be downtown, but someone more familiar with the area might know better.

[vdeane]

Was thinking Albany with I-87 (Thruway), I-90 (free portion), and I-787

I wouldn't personally consider UAlbany to be downtown, but someone more familiar with the area might know better.

It's not.  In fact, those freeways basically loop the edge of the entire city (minus the panhandle to the west that follows Washington Avenue Extension).  Downtown is roughly the box between Madison, Eagle, Orange, and the Hudson River.

[boilerup25]

Could be a stretch because of the river, but Portland, Oregon by I-5 and I-405.