I think Manhattan just makes more sense to me. It really is a grid, except for downtown, and you can't go too far wrong without hitting a river.

I think Manhattan just makes more sense to me. It really is a grid, except for downtown, and you can't go too far wrong without hitting a river.

Hitting a river seems a fairly harsh punishment for getting things wrong. Meanwhile, did you see this paper comparing city grids via a simple infographic? [link] Manhattan is indeed more dedicated to the grid layout than Philly, though the latter is still clearly grid-dominated. (Compare to Boston, for instance.)

There's a follow-up page doing world cities: [link] Unsurprisingly, older cities like Rome and London do not show fealty to the grid. Melbourne does, and then runs trams down them for added bonus. Sydney is a very interesting case I this regard. There's a dominant grid above a certain level, and utter chaos below it.

Utah cities are so dedicated to the grid system that the names of the streets are numbers, so you can use reference points. I'm at 830 W 834 N, and if you're not dealing with those damned one-way or half streets, you can find anything.

Charlotte, though!

I'd say Boston! Good lord.

Philly is a lot bigger than Manhattan, though, and it's complicated by the river that literally runs through it. Whereas Manhattan is bordered by the rivers, except to the north, so if you find yourself going over a bridge, you know you fucked up. And I don't include the boroughs in my NYC driving.

I got lost once in Philly for seriously two hours. I think it's also due to the fact that I grew up near NYC, and I just *know* it(well, Manhattan). I have also not really adopted Philly as my local city, although I know I should. My NYC love runs really deep.

Oh, just go out to some small midwestern town. My cousins live at the intersection of 1st st NE and 2nd ave N (well something like that. Bonkers complicated for a hiccup of a town. Highest in town # is 12th. At some point, the farm was 82nd on someone's plan, 40 minutes away.)

I grew up in a Midwestern town on a bay. They really wanted a grid system, but they also wanted to have everything oriented to the harbor and shipping. It made for interesting compromises.

If you love streets laid out in helpfully numbered grids but ALSO being hopelessly confused by house numbers, go to Queens.

Some junk mail I just deleted from my inbox says that today is National Relaxation Day! Who wants to take a nap!

To make the story of the machine learning webinar complete, I just got an auto-generated email thanking me for attending the webinar. Which was canceled.

If you love streets laid out in helpfully numbered grids but ALSO being hopelessly confused by house numbers, go to Queens.

Haha! I loved my part of Queens -- all the numbers were in the same range, so I can't remember if I lived on 34th Street at 35th Ave, or the reverse, or what. House numbers made sense, though, didn't they? 35-20 34th St would be between 35th and 36th Aves.