State of California, U.S.A. (by EMArg)

Quick City Overview: Los Angeles






What we know today as the city of Los Angeles is actually an aglomeration of towns who were once united as a big metropoli, in order to share the electricity and water systems. Unlike the other biggest cities of the developed countries, Los Angeles grew in a very weird manner, with its regions connected with almost only a highway/freeways network and almost no public transportation. Nowadays, even with the new subway and light-rail network, the car is still essential when it comes to get to one place to another within the city. All of these regions have their own defined culture, being the South LA the area of the african-american and latin population (famous for the gang wars) and the North LA for the wealthiest people, with gorgeous places like Santa Monica, Malibu and Hollywood. To the east is also the Downtown LA, just in front of the latin population of Pasadena. The city of Los Angeles is widely known in the world for its Film Industry and the studios such as Warner Bros., Paramount and Sony Pictures. And also because of the Walk of Fame, the Dolby Theatre where the Oscars take place every year and the Chinese Theatre, all of them at the Hollywood Boulevard.

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Quick City Overview: San Francisco






San Francisco is the exact opposite of the city of Los Angeles. It’s a small and compact city, having its chaotic Downtown less than 10 blocks away from low and relaxed residential neighborhoods. On the shores of the San Francisco Bay there’s several docks and piers, from which depart the ferry lines who connect the city with the towns of the bay. Just like Los Angeles, it has a very colourful old architecture, on a weird and exquisite resemblance to the brick buildings of the cities of the East Coast. The history of San Francisco started with the foundations by the Spanish Empire on the lands of California, in this case 1776. The city went through some drastical changes, like when it was annexed to the new Unites States of America or when it served as a urban center for the gold extraction, and also through some total changes, like when it was completely destroyed by the earthquake and the big fire of 1906. After that, San Francisco reborn from the ashes and became one of the key ports for the troops going to the Second World War. At the second half of the century, it also became a key for the US, this time for the new movements who fought for the sexual freedom. The last part of the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21th was the last big change for San Francisco, with the establishment of the high-tech corporations. This new wave of entrepeneurs became huge in the last decades, resulting in what can be seen as a Manhattan of the West Coast, with a new population who can pay high real estate prices and the old population moving to Oakland, the other big city of the San Francisco Bay.

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Downtown LA







It could be said that every district in Los Angeles has its own downtown. It’s somehow like little examples of the american urbanism: the financial district full of skyscrapers, surrounded by the low-rise suburbs, connected by big highways. The city of Los Angeles also has its main downtown, the Downtown LA, famous for being the scenery of many action movies and detective series. Like most of the US cities, most of the Downtown LA skyscrapers are part of the International Style movement, with the main characteristic of being boxy buildings without any major details in their facades (with some exceptions like the Sears Tower in Chicago). The US Bank Tower, who breaks this monotony, was one of the tallest buildings in the United States. Today, the Wildshire Grand is being constructed and its gonna be one of the tallest in the West Coast, with almost 330 m. and a design who fits more into this particular era of modern skyscrapers. There’s plenty of old buildings with brick facades, like in New York but somehow different. Same with the Art Deco architecture. While the Art Deco skyscrapers of New York are substantially darker (and taller), the West Coast Art Deco is more colorful. On the other side of the architecture of the amazing city are the International Style skyscrapers, who are so close from each other that some of the streets don’t even have sunlight at day, with big avenues crossing each other, pedestrian bridges, and tunnels, from this point of view very similar to the urbanism of Hong Kong.

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