Design
Chicago Has More 'Avenues,' While San Francisco Prefers 'Terraces'
An analysis of roadway suffixes in six major U.S. cities reveals differences rooted in history.
For folks who've visited Chicago and thought, Damn, this city has a lot of avenues—that's a spot-on assessment. In fact, 35 percent of Chicago's roadways end in "Avenue," which is substantially higher than New York (about 20 percent) and Philadelphia (10 percent).
We know that thanks to data scientist Seth Kadish, who's made a fun visualization of the urban distribution of street-name suffixes. "I visualize any public data I find interesting, and city-data portals are a great source," emails Kadish, who's 30 and lives in Portland, Oregon. "I've done geographic analyses of streets, but I felt this would be a fun, albeit simpler, visualization."