Which Affordable American City is Better Planned?

Hey! I'm going to be streaming on my second channel later this week, talking about cities and trains of course. So if you're interested definitely give it a follow! youtube.com/@alanfisherextras

Go full masochist and do a Texas Triangle (HOU, SA, AUS, DAL) comparison

Philly's narrow streets are why I'm probably never leaving. You can get very far in this city in a 20 minute walk because you're hardly ever waiting to cross a street.

Didn't expect to make a little appearance in this one! Glad I caught you while you were in town. Would love to see more of these comparisons, especially between up-and-coming cities.

We almost had a high speed rail link between Milwaukee, Chicago, Madison, and Minneapolis. But Governor Walker and the Koch brothers killed the project over ten years ago. I still get angry thinking about it.

I love both cities, have lived in both. Chicago is probably my favorite between the two but you cannot go wrong with either. If your family and friends are along the NE corridor that probably gives the edge to Philly.

I get the Philadelphia/Chicago comparison, because Philadelphia has a big city vibe to it, but it’s cut from the same cloth as Boston.

What you said at the end is so true. I've lived in Chicago all my life and I go to UW Madison while having a lot of friends in Milwaukee. The current Hiawatha express is the Amtrak service in the midwest with the highest ridership and one of the few that works reasonably well. What's frustrating is that it was actually faster 100 years ago. It currently has a top speed of 79 mph and takes 90 min (One of the few midwest services that beats out driving). However 100 years ago it had a top speed of 110 mph and took 75 min. It would literally be my dream to not only extend the service to Madison but for it to run at speeds of 110 mph like the Lincoln service. That train would seriously get a ton of ridership. Madison is one of the fastest growing cities in the Midwest and home to one of the largest universities as well. Milwaukee is the largest city in Wisconsin and Chicago is the largest city in the Midwest. If they could connect all three cities that would be amazing.

As a New Yorker, used to slow performing trains, I was very impressed with how fast Chicago El trains accelerated and decelerated, slowed down for curves but quickly sped up again, reach speeds of about 40 MPH between local stops. Our express trains max out at 50 on straight level track if we're lucky, and 55 on a few downhill sections, but on many straight sections of express tracks you'll go no faster than 42-44 MPH. In NYC, our local trains accelerate relatively slowly, and if there's a curve, it'll be signaled to go slowly well before, and doesn't accelerate nearly fast enough after. Our systems were built around the same time so age isn't an excuse; NYC has a lot to learn from Chicago.

I will always love how you fill in the Philly-spaced-hole that all other transit/urban planning channels leave. Everybody always skips over this city!

Just visited philly during the week of July 4th, and I gotta say, going back to my midsized city and it's comparatively awful public transit has me considering the move to Philly.

I love living in Chicago. So easy to walk around neighborhoods or take transit wherever.

glad you enjoyed your time in chicago. the views when riding the L are unmatched.

You're dead on for both the positives and negatives of Philly and Chicago and I chose to move to Philly after spending my entire life in the South for the exact same reasons you did. You truly can't go wrong with either, but also I just love the chaotic nature of Philly 😜

The important question Sad it even has to be just these two.

I literally just came to the realization yesterday that both of these cities are relatively affordable. Thank you, Alan Fisher, for reading my mind and making a convenient video for me.

Philly vs. Boston would be a great one. I think both of them are even more similar to each other than other cities. Both share similar population, density, transit coverage, sports culture, weird accents… etc. I’m from Boston and been to Philly and really saw how parallel the two are except the big issues on topics of affordability. It truly makes no sense how Boston is so absurdly overpriced. I can’t even afford to move back even if I wanted to. It would be interesting to compare and contrast the two cities and how vastly different they operate despite sharing so much in common.

Waking up to see Alan pitting my two urban planning crushes against each other was very exciting and makes grad school applications even more interesting….

I can't speak for Chicago, but biking in Philly has gotten a lot better over the years. When I first got here 20 years ago, riding was only for the young and bold. Now I see all types commuting in the bike lanes in the morning. Although bikers are only a small fraction, it makes a big difference taking dozens of cars off narrow S Philly streets. I feel like it makes people more calm because there's less gridlock, and everyone almost seems happier to see so more people riding. Personally seeing the change is really exciting and gives me hope, cross my fingers we continue to see progress.

This is the most balanced, fair, and accurate comparison of these two cites I’ve ever seen. Awesome work!