Welcome to Round 2! Now we've cleared out a lot of our weaker competition (and some very strong competition; sorry Chicago, Toronto, and Oxford!), and it's time to get real--in a sense these are actual finals, between the top two cities in each category, even though it's only round 2. And that means I'm going to be pickier, and finickier, and generally more demanding of these cities: fewer ties, and higher standards.
We're starting again with the category of cities I've lived in for an extended period, which means it's time for Seattle, city of my birth, and Boston, the metro area I moved to right after that. Let's get to the competition, shall we?
Category 1: Visiting Without A Car
a) How can you get to the city?
Both of these cities are served by a major Amtrak route and have train service to the airport. If this were round 1, that might be enough. But let's consider this a little further. On the Boston side, the Blue line is not my favorite service because I tend to be trying to get to the Red line, which doesn't have a direct connection to the Blue. But it does go downtown:
And of course the Silver line exists as well, as do bus services to the airport. Boston also has both Acela and service to the north and west, and a strong commuter system if you're visiting from not-quite-as-far-away.
Seattle has Amtrak Cascades, which is a lovely line that I adore, the 1 Line to the airport, and the Sounder if you're coming from Tacoma or Everett. But it's just not quite as robust a system as Boston's.
VERDICT: Seattle 0, Boston 1
b) How do you get around?
If you go to Boston, you might walk the Freedom Trail which is, you know, pretty walkable. And you might visit the famous universities, which are all on the T. And you might go to the Aquarium, which is even on that same line from the airport.
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And then there's Fenway Park, and the Garden, and all of it's basically on the T (see below).
If you go to Seattle, you might take the ferries, which are transit themselves and give a great view of downtown. Or of course the University of Washington, which has its own stops on the Link and is a massive bus hub as well. And the stadiums are right next to each other downtown, right on Link too. And heck, if they ever get a basketball team back, Seattle Center is a major hub, and even has a monorail...
The difficulty is that all those things I described in Boston are actually directly on their stops. The things in Seattle are mostly a couple blocks away. It's almost as if trying to shoehorn everything into one line is limiting...
VERDICT: Seattle 0, Boston 2
c) What are the limits on a visitor without a car?
Look, Foxboro Stadium is a blight upon Boston's sports scene for its inaccessibility, and Seattle doesn't stand for that nonsense.
VERDICT: Seattle 1, Boston 2
Category 2: Living Without A Car
a) Can you expect to get to work?
On the one hand, anecdotally, my family never commuted by car in Seattle, and never commuted by car in Boston, and so it's a wash. It's more impressive that my parents never commuted by car in Seattle over four decades, versus a more limited time in Boston, but it's still pretty close.
Collectively, both cities crush national commute averages, with only about 40% of workers commuting by car alone.
Boston wins in terms of people actually out there commuting to work, but Seattle is a capitol of work from home. Given that working from home is inherently easier to get to work for than even using transit, I'm going to tip it to Seattle here.
VERDICT: Seattle 2, Boston 2
b) Can you live the rest of your life?
Here's where I'd flip that knife's edge back the other way: Seattle has more food deserts than Boston, and I will maintain anecdotally that while the home I grew up in was very close to a grocery store, there's a reason my parents had two cars even though they didn't commute to work by car. Seattle's a fine place to live without a car--many of my friends do--but Boston is a bit better.
VERDICT: Seattle 2, Boston 3
c) How are the basic amenities?
Seattle has a problem with sidewalks: there aren't enough of them. Boston does not have this problem. When you consider that both cities have world-class museums, parks (both even designed by Olmsteds, father and sons), and other civic amenities, this makes a big difference.
Love the view, but it was not easy to walk here.
VERDICT: Seattle 2, Boston 4
Category 3: Miscellaneous
a) Are there people on the street?
There certainly can be in both cities! I am a big fan of the tiny streets in downtown Boston for this:
To be fair, that's a line outside of Pizzeria Regina, but the North Side has a lot of people on the street in general.
Seattle may not have the small-scale winding streets of downtown Boston, but it's no slouch here either:
Gotta love Pike Place Market!
Overall, I've walked back streets and main streets all over both cities, and in my experience the quiet residential parts of Boston have less street activity than similar streets in Seattle, especially when you consider the relative size of the hills.
Good urban design, oddly few people out sometimes.
VERDICT: Seattle 3, Boston 4
b) Where is the city's urbanism going?
Boston has done, in my opinion, a really good job expanding its bike network. Of course, it's getting predictable pushback, but look at this:
And this:
I'm a fan.
Seattle has had delays on the 2-Line of Link light rail and issues with the West Seattle line, but they're ahead of schedule on the Federal Way extension of the 1-Line.
That said, the whole existence of these numbered lines feels designed to remind me that Seattle still only has one line (and a stub of a 2nd line, which doesn't connect). It's good that they're expanding, but it's not like the T has stopped considering expansion (even if it's just the Silver Line buses).
And the Green Line extension is just about as nice (in my opinion) as anything on the 1-Line.
Of course, Seattle is also improving bike lanes...
This is very close; I think I'm going to tip it to Seattle because while both cities are electing new mayors, none of Seattle's candidates seem to favor rolling back urbanism. They just disagree on how much to advance it. I think Boston may well re-elect Wu, but the existence of those anti-bike-lane candidates is more concerning in a close race.
VERDICT: Seattle 4, Boston 4
c) Is it functionally diverse?
Hoo boy. As with all our US cities (and really most global cities) there's of course a legacy of segregation here. On the one hand, I remain frustrated that Seattle's parents were the ones who sued over affirmative action in schools (don't get me started on that, please). On the other hand, Seattle is less segregated than Boston in terms of black and Asian populations segregating from whites, and has a larger Hispanic community as well.
Both cities are cities where you can expect to see someone who doesn't look like you, no matter your race or ethnicity, and to encounter people of different experiences and backgrounds, including religion, sexual identity, and a lot of other axes of human experience. However, in Seattle you are less likely to have to go to a particular area to find them.
VERDICT: Seattle 5, Boston 4
d) How do people there react to knowing you're not using a car?
Look, Seattle is doing its best here. But even that very article tooting Seattle's horn about car-free households shows Boston ahead of it. Boston and its metro are places where it can be very normal not to own a car, especially for the US. Seattleites aren't totally weird about not owning a car, but Boston is going to win here.
VERDICT: Seattle 5, Boston 5
e) How do people react to people living close together?
Well, I did not expect this to come down to literally the last question, I'll admit, even though I thought it might be close. And I promise I didn't rig it so it would; this was my genuine assessment along the way. So let's think about density for a minute. Both cities are massively underhoused, so people living cheek by jowl is pretty normal. But Boston--and not just Boston proper, but the metro area--is just denser than Seattle. The densest incorporated part of the Seattle metro is, unsurprisingly, Seattle itself, at 7k people per square mile. Suffolk County as a whole is denser than that, by a large margin, and parts of the Boston metro are over twice as dense.
It's transit-oriented development, to be fair, but look at the height out here in Cambridge-Somerville.
Downtown Seattle will not look at you strangely for living near other people, but so much of the zoning is single-family, non-dense housing that there are parts of the city that do seem to actively resist it; Boston has NIMBYs of course, but not from the same basis in density.
FINAL VERDICT: Seattle 5, Boston 6
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