No major cities
It’s a Bigfoot reserve.
Because they live somewhere else
we just went to that area yesterday!! its very rocky and lots of cliffs on the coast, and super super hilly and forested in the interior.
many absolutely do live there, and those municipalities marked on your map there are reasonably populated. but the terrain is not super great for building large stuff, and they really do not like deforestation either. it is also farther away from freeway I-5, where most stuff on the west coast is freighted by truck, and is more expensive, at least from our experiences.
the sunset on the coast is SO pretty though :)
These places feel normally populated for the geography when you drive through them.
Correlation between geography and population density
Also most of the time that people live on coasts in dense areas is because they’re shipping ports or some other very specific reason
This isn’t an informed guess, but I’d imagine it has to do with ground suitability, as well as risks caused by the ocean and weather. I recently read an article that major cities in the area, away from the coast, are causing the ground to sink below their weight.
A few reasons. One is there isn’t much flat land; most of it is hilly and even mountainous and covered in thick forests. The flat areas are occupied with farms and towns but the space is small and not enough for big cities to grow. The hills and mountains are heavily forested and there has never been a big enough population to need to encroach on them. It’s also not great for building and farming, unless grazing animals.
The other big reason is there are no natural deep sea ports in that region. It’s either marshy or the estuary of the river Colombia. Small fishing towns would be fine, but not big industrial ports that drive city growth (or did in the past). Meanwhile, Portland sits further back up the river with plenty of flat land and access to the water, so makes a natural port. And Seattle sits on the bay further north and is coastal, and a good port.
The dynamic got set up of big cities further back, and those areas never really grew. Once the land became part of state forests, then that restricts growth even more.
EDIT: Here is a topographical map showing in blue the flat land: https://en-gb.topographic-map.com/world/?center=38.54817%2C-119.79492&zoom=6
I just realized why it’s called Portland.
In my defense, I’ve never seen a map of it before.
Nope, the name was decided with coin flip. Lol Could ended up as Boston.
Going down a Wikipedia rabbit hole:
[Portland, Maine] was formally founded in 1786 and named after the English Isle of Portland. In turn, the city of Portland, Oregon, was named after Portland, Maine.
I failed at finding how the Isle of Portland got its name but saw this:
In Dorset, England:
The origin of the name “Portland” on the Isle of Portland is uncertain, but theories include:
- It may be a corruption of the Celtic word “Port Lann” (“harbor by the cliff”).
- It may derive from the Old English “portelond” (“land by the harbor”).
- It may refer to a fortified harbor or headland.
https://etymologyworld.com/item/portland
Its the first time I’ve seen the site though and that page feels a bit AI generated
That’s a little disappointing.
Inland port -> Portland seemed nice and tidy
But why was Portland one of the options?
One of the founders (Francis Pettygrove) was originally from Portland Maine, and the other was from Boston. They both wanted to name the new city after their hometown.
It’s entirely possible that part of Pettygrove why wanted to name it after his hometown is because he thought it would be fitting for river port city. But idk if he ever stated anything to that effect.
i thought you were kidding until i saw the wikipedia link. that’s fascinating, and very cool that they still have the penny
All good points but you also forgot to mention another key factor. This is more or less the rainiest region in the country. It’s extremely wet and most people don’t like that.
Yes. The temperate rainforest region of Pacific Northwest is a horror show. 300+ days of rain. And the others are just cloudy. You can’t swim in the ocean. It’s constantly below 80. Don’t move here. It’s horrible.
So… no high speed fiber access then?
You can’t swim in the ocean. It’s constantly below 80.
Uhhh all ocean water is below 80 degrees otherwise humans will near boil when going near it.
cant swim in the ocean
Windsurfers rejoice!
It really is shitty out there most of the year. Even in summer it can be 95 degrees in the valley and raining on the coast. Most of the people living out on the coast are natives, retirees, and Trump supporters as there isnt much work outside of casinos, gas station/fast food, and logging. There’s also tourism but thats also just the beach, the casinos, and your standard saltwater taffy shop, antique shop, kite shop trio repeating over and over all up and down the coast.
Yeah people love to complain about rain in Seattle but some parts of the coast here get around double that amount of rain.
Mostly because no one wants to deal with twinkling vampires.
In addition to what the other commenters have said about being hilly, the water side is also difficult to live on without a good boat. Might be an up and coming spot in the water world though.
Why do you think almost no one lives there just because you don’t know of a major city in the area?
It’s simple logistics, there’s no reason for a major city to be there.
You have Seattle, Vancouver, Victoria in the same region. And if anything is coming to the area it’s going to that region already, and if it’s going farther south you have better ports in Oregon.
Genuinely curious what made you interested in this idea or where it came from
I’ve had similar thoughts. It’s ocean-side cities along America’s West coast, it’s along the same coast as some of the most desirable locations to live in the world (SF, LA, and many cities in between and beyond.) it seems strange that the population moves further inland when you look on a map.
It’s just weird that it’s the West Coast of North America and the major cities (seattle and Portland are well inland)
Just a little further south and it’s one of the mot populated regions (SanFran, San Jose, LA etc)
If you do a quick look at the terrain option on Google maps. I think it’s very obvious that there were advantages places for larger populations to settle around. That particular section of the west coast is fairly inhospitable. Look at the coastal sea floor as well. It paints a fairly clear picture on its own, especially when comparing it to the east coast. Secondly find a timelapse of the how north American was settled as colonies. Stuff mostly came from the east and eventually made it’s way to the west. Railroads are big big part of how the west was colonized and there wasn’t much use for north south railways as things progressed as there was to get things to and from the east.
That locks in or at least reinforces the locations of where major populations can establish themselves.
It’s only been about 135 years since trans Pacific trade started(quick google info please be kind if that’s wrong) in the year 2000 it was still inside the lifespan of a single living human that international trade across the Pacific was really anything at all
And it was with people’s that had absolutely no relation with the European colonists. And they were also very xenophobic culturally and didn’t develop very advanced in deep ocean sailing due to lack of interest.
The old world was east of the Americas, mystery and the unknown was the Pacific. There be monsters there!
So all in all it seem to make a lot of sense that there wasnt much economic pressures requiring big coastal economies until well after established communities and regions developed.
I think Astoria is one of the older major coastal trade cities, but it faltered as Seattle and Portland developed.
And to your point about being inland a ways, they are in much most hospitable regions for farming and agriculture to support a large population
My buddy lives in Lincoln city. He’s a glass blower
glass and your buddy must be very happy together.
Because somebody put a giant red fence around the area, nobody can get in.
The Goonies: am I a joke to you?
NGL I’d move to Astoria in a heartbeat if I had a remote job and a place to land lined up, but the Epstein class has decided that can’t happen
Other comments give a good tl;dw already, but in case anyone wants a video with pictures and examples, Geography By Geoff has done this topic a few times. Here’s one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqyM54CNSsY
Maybe too hilly or steep cliff coast ( = bad when you want fishing or an harbor)
Wildly wet. Tons of rain. Geographic reasons for it.
This is why i want to move there lol (not to detract from your point)
sings “I’m only happy when it rains…”
