- [Narrator] US cities
are just built different than their European counterparts, and that starts with the street network. This is Central Rome, Italy,
and for comparison's sake, this is Central Salt Lake City, USA. These maps are at the same scale. There are some differences. Obviously, Rome Street
pattern is more organic with roads originating in ancient Rome, twisting this way and that. Salt Lake's roads are
north, south, east, west and nothing else. It's a grid. You tend to see grids in
cities designed from scratch or designed to grow fast
like many colonial cities. Cities like Rome that
grew up over millennia tend to have an organic pattern. Rome's blocks are smaller. I think 10 Rome blocks could probably fit into one of Salt Lake City's blocks and those big blocks are 200 meters by 200 meters by the way. Definitely on the large
side even by US standards. Small blocks are great
for people moving on foot, because smaller blocks result
in high intersection density. Intersections mean choice and
more choice of route is good. It means it's easier to walk from point A to point B directly instead of having to take
long, tiring detours. Another big difference is
the width of the streets and how they're used. I picked an outlier in Salt Lake City. Its main roads are an
incredible 40 meters wide. The story goes that the former
governor of Utah territory proclaimed that the city
streets should be wide enough for a team of oxen and
their cart to make a U-turn. You won't see many oxen in
Salt Lake City streets today, but that kind of width makes it very convenient for moving cars and not nearly as nice for pedestrians. They're so wide that some people have proposed adding
housing to the medians. You can still have room for
cars on either side too. That's an extreme example, but it's not uncommon for US cities to have roadways 25 to 30 meters wide. Meanwhile, some of the
narrower streets in Rome are no more than three
meters wide in places. More commonly, the smallest streets are about six meters wide. What about this wide
street in Rome right here? It's the Corso Vittorio Emanuele II. This was not a street of ancient origin, but was cut through the city in 1886. It connected the Pope and the Vatican to the Capitoline Hill, the historic seat of
power in the Roman Empire and home to the current city hall. It was also designed to
improve traffic circulation throughout the old city. Even with this directive to reduce traffic and the symbolism of
the connection it makes, it's still only 20 meters wide, half as wide as Salt Lake streets. What you get in Rome are a
few wide streets for cars, but most meant for people. In US cities, it's all cars all the time. Now, streets are only
one element of a city and European cities are different than US cities in other ways too, like the sidewalk cafes,
charming old buildings and crowds of clueless tourists, but streets form the structure, the bones of a city's fabric. Getting the street and
block structure right is a massive step towards
a walkable, livable city. Is it possible for US cities to clone European street networks? Let's be honest, probably not, but we could employ a different strategy. What if we took the large
blocks we find in US cities and filled them up with
narrow Euro style streets only a few meters wide? Sure, you'd still have busy car streets crisscrossing the city, but you'd also have a separate network of pedestrian first streets with a completely different vibe. I know that it sounds crazy,
but I think it's possible. I know because I've seen it firsthand. Let's get into it after the bike bell. (pictures swooshing)
(bell ringing) Philadelphia has its
share of narrow streets. One of its mini tourist
attractions is Elfreth's Alley. America's oldest,
continuously inhabited street. It dates back to 1703, which
makes it practically modern by European history standards, but it's old enough to
reflect a European influence. It's also only about three meters wide about the same width as
those streets in Rome but it has a unique American feel in part thanks to the
so-called Trinity houses that line in the street. They're narrow only about five meters wide and three stories, hence their name. They're found all over
historic Philadelphia. Their small size makes 'em some of the most affordable housing
in the central city. Sort of a tiny house for an urban context. One old street with tiny buildings
doesn't mean much, right? It's so odd and out of context
in the modern American city that it's a tourist attraction
with its own museum, but when I visited
Philadelphia this spring I kept stumbling onto these
very narrow historic streets. It's that experience
that inspired this video. I think that Philadelphia can show us that incorporating
European-style narrow streets with small blocks and few
cars is indeed possible. If you visit Philadelphia and want the Elfreth's
Alley experience but better, head to Quince Street instead. It's better because it has
the same charm as Elfreth's with a narrow street and Trinity houses, but it's also part of a
network of similar streets. You can think of it as a smaller network within a larger street
grid of Philadelphia, which is a much more typical
120 meters by 120 meters. Within that block, there are
actually six smaller blocks. The smallest block in the
middle only has 11 homes, excuse me, while I switch to using Imperial units for a second, but the density of that block
is 60 dwelling units per acre. as US planners would say. That would make it some
of the most dense housing in all but the largest cities in the US. Here's what that density looks like as an apartment building
with a parking lot. The density here is so high, because the houses are small
and there is no parking. This block doesn't have the exact same organic street network pattern you'd see in a place like Rome. There's still right angles, but the small blocks, narrow streets and lack of a true grid iron
gives visitors the feeling of being in an old European city. I love that feeling of
being just a little lost and discovering something
new around every turn and being able to do it on foot without ever worrying about cars. In fact, the only downside I
experienced while I was there was the fact that, that
street network wasn't bigger with more pedestrian streets. Philadelphia streets are
almost the exact same width as the Corso Vittorio in Rome. Imagine if you had a Corso
Vittorio every 120 meters. Rome would be way worse. Philadelphia's small pedestrian streets do extend to other blocks, and in the case of Quince Street cross over a larger street and keep going. What's interesting is that this stretch of street
has modern buildings. They're clearly designed to blend in with their historical counterparts using brick for the facades and keeping the three story heights. The modern buildings are not quite as good as the Trinity houses,
because they add garages. This means that the narrow
streets need to be wide enough to allow cars to access them regularly. Something that's not the
expectation in the older section. This also makes the homes
wider reducing overall density. I will admit that the roof
decks are a nice touch to get some private outdoor space. Despite these design quibbles
the modern homes make it clear that these narrow pedestrian streets don't need to be
considered a historic relic that can't be replicated today. Thus far, we've seen how European and US cities are structured differently and how the US has some rare examples of European-style street networks. But the driving question of this video is, can the US build Euro-style
street networks today? What would it take to
see more of these blocks in cities all over the US? The first thing we need are locations to build something like this. They make the most sense in central cities where space is already constrained and a high density neighborhood
like this makes sense. Luckily, most cities are full of locations that could have a block or two
like the one in Philadelphia. Parking lots that take
up an entire city block are a great first option, like this one here in Sacramento. The streets are even 120
meters apart like Philadelphia. You could just copy and
paste, and when you do the value of that block
goes through the roof. Of course, it's not
going to be that simple. There are several ways
that the Philadelphia block would be illegal to
replicate in most US cities. Despite its surviving and thriving for literally hundreds of years as a vestige of European-style urbanism. Road width is one of the
most obvious roadblocks. I can't think of a US city that would allow residential buildings on a street three meters wide, but hey, someone could prove
me wrong in the comments. Minimum street width is often
regulated by the fire code. The fire marshal needs to
be ensured that firetruck can fit down a street and put out a fire. The National Fire Protection Association says that fire departments need streets of at least six meters wide. This allows for one
firetruck to pass another to access fire hydrants and safely move around a building fire. The question is, could
the 20 meter wide roads around the block provide
sufficient access for firetrucks? Maybe, depending on the size of the block. Building entrances need
to be within 15 meters of a road accessible by fire trucks, but that can extend to 46 meters for one in two family
dwellings or town homes, if they have automatic sprinkler systems. If you draw a line 46
meters in from the streets along the edge of the block you can see that they don't
quite reach all the way in. It could work in cities
with smaller blocks though. Portland, Oregon is well known
for its small blocks downtown at just over 60 meters by 60 meters. Lots of cities in the US
founded by the Spanish have block sizes of 90 meters, which would just squeak by
the fire protection standards. Cities with bigger blocks could also include an access road in the center. Fire departments will also use
parking lots as access roads so a couple of small
parking lots could help too. Speaking of parking,
there's another challenge for building these types of blocks today. Most cities have parking
requirements for new development. Parking requirements are often expressed by the number of spaces per
home or the number per bedroom. In urban areas, you may see standards anywhere from a half to one
and a half space per home. Assuming one space per home, a
block like this one in Philly could need a parking
lot that would take up a quarter of that space. Luckily, many cities are reducing or eliminating parking minimums, including larger cities like
Minneapolis and Buffalo, but you may be asking yourself where would all of these residents park, if there were no spaces available to them? If you look closely, there
are some small parking areas tastefully woven into the
urban fabric in Philadelphia. It's not impossible to park
cars in a block like this. And obviously, newer buildings
could have garages built in, and it's not like European
cities don't have cars. A quick look at some of
Rome's streets reveals cars, Vespas and little
parking lots tucked away, but for plenty of these residents, parking may not be important to them. When a resident of
Elfreth's Alley was asked about where they parked
their car, he said, "But really, if you live in this city, you become more pedestrian-friendly and you do public transportation. We do have a car, but it's
parked a few blocks away." This makes sense in US downtowns where you don't need to go
far to find a parking lot and many of them aren't
as full as they used to be now that we're in a work from home era. Another major roadblock
is just zoning itself. You didn't think we could make comparisons between US and European land uses without talking about zoning, did you? Now, it's a lot easier to generalize about suburban residential zoning with this monotonous expanses of homes than it is generalized by US downtowns. For this reason, it's gonna be hard for me to point to a specific
part of a zoning code that would hold this
type of development back. For some cities, it's the
narrowness of the town homes. For others, it may be the fact that there are town homes at all. Town homes are often referred
to as missing middle housing, because they provide a density between single family
houses and condo towers, but don't often exist in
sufficient quantities. They're attractive because
they can provide gentle density at a relatively low price, but zoning codes aren't always written to make it easy to build. But if you had a vacant or underused lot the correct dimensions
for the fire marshal and the local regulations to allow it, it seems to me that you could build a European-style urbanism
within existing US cities. It would be difficult, but welcomed as we here in the States
would love the opportunity to have even a small taste
of what you have in places like London, Amsterdam, Rome, and Paris. Those places already
have the legal framework, culture and history to
make good urbanism happen. We just want it here too. If this is a topic that
really interests you, you might wanna learn more about how European cities built
European-style urbanism. I have a video on the
entire history of Paris that dives into this very topic. You can trace the origins of
Paris from the Parisii tribes near the Ile de la Cite and the Seine all the way to the city's
impressive adoption of the bicycle in this decade. The video is one of my absolute favorites and you can actually check it
out right now over on Nebula. It's live there now. Nebula is a creator-owned
streaming service that I'm extremely proud to be a part of. On Nebula, you can see
all of my extra content including my great city
series "Planning Ancient Rome" and a whole bunch of
smaller bonus video content. But me and all my creator friends have started this new
thing called Nebula First. Other creators are doing the same thing meaning that you can watch videos from Johnny Harris,
LegalEagle, Jet Lag and more earlier than you'd find them on YouTube. Now, Nebula's normally priced at a completely reasonable $50 per year, but if you use my code city
beautiful when you sign in you get $20 off that annual plan that brings it down to 2.50 a month, which is really the best deal
in streaming for what you get. So, go click on the link on
screen, or in the description, to get $20 off an annual
subscription to Nebula and watch my next video on Paris. It's there right now.
