Which other US cities resemble Downtown Detroit's architecture?

[One Shot]

Cleveland is the closest, IMO, with the Terminal Tower complex and Euclid serving as their Woodward. But Detroit has a more impressive overall collection of prewar towers.

The prewar tower statistic baffles me when you think of major cities around the country today. Did we really have that many buildings [[are they gone now?) and we’re the other cities really that small back then. Not doubting it just want it explained. When I look at the skyline of Chicago and NYC it’s crazy to think we ever had them beat. Is there a list of our prewar towers?

[JBMcB]

Pittsburgh reminds me of a mini-Detroit. Same boom phase, probably driven directly from Detroit, in steel for autos and buildings. Just about the same mix of pre-war, post-war and modernist towers.

[iheartthed]

The prewar tower statistic baffles me when you think of major cities around the country today. Did we really have that many buildings [[are they gone now?) and we’re the other cities really that small back then. Not doubting it just want it explained. When I look at the skyline of Chicago and NYC it’s crazy to think we ever had them beat. Is there a list of our prewar towers?

Detroit was likely the 3rd or 4th largest skyline until the 1970s. Los Angeles's skyline has never really been that impressive. Philadelphia probably had a skyline comparable to Detroit pre-1970, as both cities were very close to each other in population and density in the mid-20th century.

Detroit never had Chicago or NYC beat, but it was far closer to Chicago before 1970 than it is today.

[rb336]

Detroit was likely the 3rd or 4th largest skyline...

Detroit never had Chicago or NYC beat, but it was far closer to Chicago before 1970 than it is today.

As far as size and # of buildings? No. But for pure aesthetic appeal? I'll take Detroit.

[Bham1982]

TWhen I look at the skyline of Chicago and NYC it’s crazy to think we ever had them beat. Is there a list of our prewar towers?

Detroit never "had them beat". NYC had probably 10x as many prewar mid/highrises as any other city on earth. Have you ever been to the Upper West Side? It's almost entirely midrise prewars of some distinction.

Chicago also had many more prewars than Detroit. It was a much bigger city with more developed core than Detroit. It never developed NYC-type prewar areas like the Upper West Side, Garment District and Washington Heights, though.

Detroit was probably #3 back around 1930. Philly and Cleveland were up there too. But NYC today probably has more notable prewars than the next 10 cities combined.

[Don K]

It was never an actual ordinance, but Philly did have a gentlemen's agreement that no building would be taller than the top of William Penn's hat on top of City Hall [[548 feet, IIRC - well whaddaya know, I just checked and my memory didn't fail me.), so Philly missed out on having really tall buildings until the 80s, when the agreement was left in shreds. These days, you can barely see City Hall through all of the new towers that have been built, whereas when I was growing up in the area City Hall dominated the skyline. Having said that, Center City Philadelphia probably covers more acreage than does downtown Detroit, likely because the height limit forced it to spread out. Also, Philly's era of rapid growth was in the 1800s, so not many art deco buildings were built there.

I've always said that Detroit missed out because our three largest companies all were headquartered outside of downtown [[New Center, Dearborn, and Highland Park). I know U.S. Steel's headquarters always was in downtown Pittsburgh, and AFAIK Gulf Oil and Alcoa also were headquartered there, so I'd say Pittsburgh has a more impressive skyline compared with the population of the city or the metro.

In sum, Detroit ain't Chicago or NYC and never has been, but that's okay. In absolute terms it has a pretty nice skyline, although it could have been so much better had the auto companies located their headquarters downtown.