What's the center point of your city?

[DTComposer]

As I think through this, it's interesting how many of these points are nowhere near the geographical center of the city, even for cities not on a coastline, although some make more sense if you look back at the patterns and paths of development.

For San Francisco, I'd say the Ferry Building (foot of Market Street, at the Embarcadero) has the right combination of major intersection and iconic landmark.

San Jose: Plaza de Cesar Chavez (Market and Park) (also the location of the State Capitol when it held that position).

Los Angeles: This is tough - the nature of L.A. is that none of its iconic elements are located downtown (or at best they're on the periphery). Someone mentioned 6th and Grand, but I can't think of anything there that would say to me "I'm in Los Angeles." I could make a case for a Hollywood location (Sunset Strip, Hollywood and Vine, etc.)...if I stuck closer to downtown I could maybe argue 1st and Grand (Music Center and Disney Concert Hall, adjacent to City Hall/Civic Center), but so much of the adjoining area is given to parking and empty lots...maybe (keeping it in line with this forum) the Four-Level Interchange?

Long Beach: Ocean Boulevard and Pine Avenue.

[6a]

some might even put it at Hilliard—Rome & Renner, but they are quite wrong.

Let us never speak of that again

Hell, I live in Hilliard and I don't consider that Hilliard, haha.

[briantroutman]

Sounds like you guys are thinking of the geographic center...

Yes, I completely misread your original post. Pass me the dunce cap.

For San Francisco, I think this would be on Market St. at either Montgomery or California–certainly nowhere beyond the triangle of those three streets.

San Francisco - Union Square.  Runners up would be the Civic Center plaza... and the Ferry Building...

For San Francisco, I'd say the Ferry Building

I think it's hard to pick a spiritual and cultural center of the city because it seems to me that there are many separate, disconnected San Franciscos. There's the Financial District SF that is full of out-of-town commuters during business hours and is dead at night. There's the Touristy SF that basically hugs the north end of the city from the Ferry Building through Fisherman's Wharf to the Golden Gate. There's the (relatively) poor residential SF in the south and east... It seems like many people exist within one or two and might not ever see the rest.

I'd say City Hall/Civic Center (or the intersection of Van Ness and Market nearby) would the point that best bridges these different parts of the city.

[KEVIN_224]

For the state of Connecticut, the center point is off of Savage Road in East Berlin, CT. For the city of New Britain, CT? Good question! The "dot" for the city is placed on City Hall, at the beginning of West Main Street downtown. A geographical center would probably be slightly north of that.

[hotdogPi]

Boston MA: Government Center T station
Hartford CT: Pulaski Circle
Manchester NH: US 3 at Granite St.
New Haven CT: Yale
Providence RI: US 1/US 44 concurrency
Springfield MA: Approximately I-91, exit 7.
Worcester MA: MA 9/MA 70

[Eth]

For cities with N, S, E, W addresses, I'd say you pick the zero point of the addresses:

Chicago - State & Madison
Los Angeles - 1st & Main
Portland, OR - Burnside at the River
Baltimore - Charles & Baltimore
Atlanta - 5 Points

Sometimes this doesn't quite work. For Atlanta (which actually belongs in the "quadrant" category), it does - Five Points is the obvious choice (incidentally, it looks like Google opts for the State Capitol instead). In neighboring Decatur, however, this would work out to where McDonough Street crosses the railroad tracks - a pretty good geographic center, but not really the center of activity. I'd instead opt for the old courthouse, near the intersection of Ponce de Leon (historic US 29) and Clairemont Avenues.

[vtk]

Boston MA: Government Center T station

Not Center City T station?



My previous non-local attempts were based almost entirely on the street grid itself.  I didn't check against address data except for Chicago, and that information did not sway my opinion in that case.



Columbus has an unusual problem with geographical ignorance regarding the extents of suburbs.  Due to long-standing agreements, the City Of Columbus tends to ooze out between the suburbs.  The resulting contorted boundaries between Columbus, the suburbs, and unincorporated areas, can be tough to keep track of.  Add to that suburban school districts which don't closely follow city boundaries, and ZIP codes which don't follow them at all, and it gets really fuzzy.  Many people never even bother to look at a map, so they identify whatever suburb is named in their mailing address and/or school district with essentially all non-rural areas within some threshold driving time from their house.  These are the people that horribly misplace Hilliard, Powell, or Galloway.

[hotdogPi]

Boston MA: Government Center T station

Not Center City T station?

I can't find anything that says that there is a station called Center City.

[vtk]

Boston MA: Government Center T station

Not Center City T station?

I can't find anything that says that there is a station called Center City.

I visited in 2010 and rode the T a fair amount on two separate days.  I thought there was a station named Center City, though the spot where it most likely was is now called Gov't Center on the MBTA subway map.  It also says that station is closed for remodeling.  Maybe it was called Center City before it was closed?  Also, the various Green Line branches were only identified by their endpoints at that time, as I recall.

Edit: Wikipedia says my memory sucks.  Also, I forgot to mention that when you first said Gov't Center, I thought you were referring to Courthouse, which is where I remember it from 2010, but apparently I didn't remember the correct name for it at first.

[agentsteel53]

maybe (keeping it in line with this forum) the Four-Level Interchange?

yep.

mileages to LA on freeways all use the Four-Level as the zero point.

[Duke87]

This sort of stuff can change.

The traditional center point of Stamford, CT was at the intersection of Main St, Atlantic St, and Canal St - a five way intersection with city hall in the SW corner.

Of course, a quick glance at a modern map will reveal that this five way intersection is today only a three way intersection - two of the legs were knocked out in the late 1970s to make way for the perhaps aptly, perhaps ironically named Stamford Town Center - a typical ca. 1980 indoor suburban shopping mall, with a massive parking garage, and (originally at least, this has since been changed somewhat) no stores that face the street or anything that provides any welcome to pedestrians other than a massive brick wall with a few doors in it at the corners.

And the building which formerly was city hall is still there, but no longer serves that function. Clearly, this intersection is no longer the center point of the city. Today, if you choose a center point based on where things are the most happening, you want either Bedford St between Broad and Forest (one block north) or Summer St between Main and Broad (one block west). The latter probably wins in general, at the south end is Columbus Park (formerly known as "West Park"), which is the venue for a series of concerts every summer.

[english si]

London - there would also be an argument to be made for London Bridge, the bridgeable point in the river there is why there's a city there.

So for Sydney the centre is in the middle of the harbour? For Plymouth, MA, it's some bits of air that directed the Mayflower to hit North America on that rock?

London Bridge was never the centre - reason for the city isn't the centre. While it remains part of the city proper to this day, it's never been inside the walls. Sure, like the area to the west of the walls, it was a major trading area, but Southwark took ages to grow from more than a village - it was that western area that grew, especially once Westminster was established in the 11th century (as a rival power - the City still has sui generis government and almost isn't part of England*) when Edward the Confessor built a Palace and started rebuilding the church next to it as a Royal burial place, and then in 1066 Harold and William decided that there was the place to be crowned it gained a lot of import.

However, until about 300 years ago, when the West End really took off, the centre was in the area now roughly where Bank is. It's where the Roman Forum was, it's where the roads all converge, it's where Watling Street turned (it also turned at what are now New Cross Gate, Borough, and Marble Arch. Somehow the Marble Arch to New Cross Gate road is a pretty straight road, with Watling Street looking as if it retains it's original course, and if the Romans could have bridged at Vauxhall, that would have done it there). It's where the route out to Colchester (the capital before Londinium) ended. Bow bells, the definer of Cockney, ring out from the closest church to it (OK, there are others a similar distance, but St Mary-le-Bow is on the all-important route west out of the City, Cheapside (formerly Watling Street).

But despite Bank clearly being centre of the City (capital-C), the centre of the city (lower case-c) is Trafalgar Square as it deals with Westminster and the West End. Interestingly, it's been where distances were measured to for over 800 years (source) despite there being next to nothing NW of it until the 1700s.

*William the Conqueror built a keep on a unbuilt on small hill near London Bridge, just outside the city walls of London to keep the Londoners in and subdued, not to protect the city. It's that massively famous one, and no it isn't actually in the City of London proper (St Paul's is about the only thing that tourists visit in the actual City proper). When roads were classified in 1922, no classified roads entered the City of London, despite Bank being the centre of the whole English numbering system.

[roadman65]

Orange Avenue and Central Boulevard for Orange County, FL in Downtown Orlando is considered the actual center point of the City of Orlando and the county it is in.

[billtm]

Lafayette, IN: The intersection of Main and 2nd streets.

Lexington, KY: The intersection of Main and Broadway. Even though Main St. is on a one way pairing and that isn't where the zero point is, those two streets are both very major and go through the whole city.

[ET21]

DeKalb: Lincoln Highway (IL-38) and 1st Street
Oak Lawn: 95th Street (US 12/20) and 53rd Ave, basically the Library and City Hall complex
Galena: Dodge and Franklin

[Pete from Boston]

Boston MA: Government Center T station

Not Center City T station?

I can't find anything that says that there is a station called Center City.

I visited in 2010 and rode the T a fair amount on two separate days.  I thought there was a station named Center City, though the spot where it most likely was is now called Gov't Center on the MBTA subway map.  It also says that station is closed for remodeling.  Maybe it was called Center City before it was closed?  Also, the various Green Line branches were only identified by their endpoints at that time, as I recall.

Edit: Wikipedia says my memory sucks.  Also, I forgot to mention that when you first said Gov't Center, I thought you were referring to Courthouse, which is where I remember it from 2010, but apparently I didn't remember the correct name for it at first.

"Center City" is a Philadelphia term.  In Boston it's just "Downtown."

Prior to being named Government Center in the 1960s, it was Scollay Square. 

Courthouse station, the fanciest bus stop you ever did see, is less than ten years old and has never has a different name.

[vtk]

Courthouse was definitely Courthouse when I was there. My association of "Gov't Center" with that station was essentially a fuzzy match.

Where the heck did I pick up the concept of a station called Center City?  I've never been to Philly.  I don't think Chicago has a station by that name.  The L and the T are the only rail transit systems I've ever navigated...

[empirestate]

Trenton - The Battle Monument, hands down. Symbolizing George Washington's victory on the Hessians in Trenton, Trenton's nickname "The Turning Point of the Revolution" is echoed with the tallest structure in the city at the intersection of present day NJ 31 and US 206. Unfortunately, the neighborhood around that parts is beyond sketchy, which makes visiting it... sketchy as well. No other place in Trenton really comes to mind as a center point.

State and Broad looks like a good possibility to me, or perhaps along Warren somewhere. I like the monument in theory, but it's a bit off the beaten track.

Since I was tricked by the non-trickiness of the question, what a lot of people refer to then at 'Center Strip' is the area around Bellagio, Caesars, Flamingo, & Ballys, which to most people would be the Center of Las Vegas.

Which actually raises the point: is there any argument for putting the center point there, if that's the location people are expecting to find when they look for "Las Vegas"? Can the center point be outside the thing being named?

Back to Toronto...

I don't know about Queen, but it just looks like the most viable candidate for a major east-west street. Eglinton and Bloor are both too far north, and Front is too far south. So Yonge and Queen it is.

I was thinking maybe King, if not Queen (or Dundas).

Manchester NH: US 3 at Granite St.
Providence RI: US 1/US 44 concurrency
Worcester MA: MA 9/MA 70

I feel like Manchester's is slightly north of that, perhaps around Hanover St. Similarly, I think Worcester's and Providence's are a little to the south.

Galena: Dodge and Franklin

Why there? There seems to be a pretty obvious downtown area several blocks to the south.

How about Lake Forest, CA? Would you put it at the old El Toro station, since that's the ancestor settlement of the city? Or would it go at the so-named Lake Forest development, since it's the city's current namesake? You surely wouldn't put it at city hall, which is about as far to the margin as you can get!

And how about nearby Irvine? At the ranch?

[ET21]

Galena: Dodge and Franklin

Why there? There seems to be a pretty obvious downtown area several blocks to the south.
[/quote]

Historic downtown technically does go up Franklin street, as the downtown has almost a triple-decker layout. Since the commercial area does go a bit further north, it seemed to be the best place.

In terms now of what you were thinking, it would be at US-20 and Main St

[empirestate]

Galena: Dodge and Franklin

Why there? There seems to be a pretty obvious downtown area several blocks to the south.

Historic downtown technically does go up Franklin street, as the downtown has almost a triple-decker layout. Since the commercial area does go a bit further north, it seemed to be the best place.

In terms now of what you were thinking, it would be at US-20 and Main St

Hmm, that's another unexpected choice. For what it's worth, my best guess, having never visited to town, would be Main St. at Perry or Hill, someplace like that: http://goo.gl/maps/D8FhW

Or maybe even at the nearby welcome center, which looks like a historic civic building: http://goo.gl/maps/Ruzwe

Franklin & Dodge, however, brings me to a (very attractive) residential intersection somewhat outside the apparent center of town: http://goo.gl/maps/UIlgx

Likewise, US 20 at Main St. seems to be along a relatively peripheral highway, at the very far end of the main drag: http://goo.gl/maps/iR6Vr

I wondered if there's something at these locations that I can't see from Google, that makes them candidates for the center point?

[Pete from Boston]

Worcester MA: MA 9/MA 70

Similarly, I think Worcester's and Providence's are a little to the south.

I am not 100% clear on the question, but if there's a "center" of Worcester I don't think there's any question that it's the Common/City Hall block (you know, where the development called Worcester Center was built).  Belmont at Lincoln (9/70) is off at one edge of downtown.

[SidS1045]

I am not 100% clear on the question, but if there's a "center" of Worcester I don't think there's any question that it's the Common/City Hall block (you know, where the development called Worcester Center was built).  Belmont at Lincoln (9/70) is off at one edge of downtown.

Having lived in Worcester for 21 years, I'm *very* clear on the question, and you are correct.  No way the 9/70 junction is the "center of town."

[empirestate]

I am not 100% clear on the question, but if there's a "center" of Worcester I don't think there's any question that it's the Common/City Hall block (you know, where the development called Worcester Center was built).  Belmont at Lincoln (9/70) is off at one edge of downtown.

Having lived in Worcester for 21 years, I'm *very* clear on the question, and you are correct.  No way the 9/70 junction is the "center of town."

Having only visited in passing, I would definitely agree with that assessment. However, I can see how the 9/70 junction might appear as a center when depicted on a map that favors highways.

[Dr Frankenstein]

Montréal: Hmm... Rue Sainte-Catherine and Rue Saint-Laurent?
Ottawa: Wellington Street and either Elgin Street or Bank Street... not sure.
Beauharnois: Rue Ellice and Rue Richardson. Because I said so.
Longueuil: I'd say Rue Saint-Charles and Place Charles-Le Moyne.

[SteveG1988]

Mount Holly NJ, i would place it on county route 537 that cuts right down the center of town, either place it at the post office or the corner of 537 and High St