Jacksonville vs Anchorage: A larger city by land area

Damage to Fourth Avenue caused by the March 27, 1964 Good Friday Earthquake. Collapse of Fourth Avenue near C Street in Anchorage due to a landslide caused by the earthquake. Before the shock, the sidewalk on the left, which is in the graben, was at street level on the right. The graben subsided 11 feet in response to 14 feet of horizontal movement. Photography courtesy of the U.S. Army at http://libraryphoto.cr.usgs.gov/cgi-bin/show_picture.cgi?ID=ID.

Anchorage is the largest city in the State of Alaska. The Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport (TSAIA) is the world's third busiest airport for cargo traffic, surpassed only by Memphis and Hong Kong. Of interesting note, covering 1,704 square miles, it's also one of the largest in the United States in land area. That's 947 more square miles than Jacksonville, which is the largest city in the continental United States by land area.

The city's downtown was the original site of the Anchorage Land Auction in 1915, which gave rise to today's present-day grid street pattern. Between 1940 and 1951, Anchorage population increased from 3,000 to 47,000, due to a massive buildup of the military because of its strategic location. However, the "Good Friday Earthquake", the second largest earthquake recorded in world history, destroyed much of the city in 1964.

Like Jacksonville after the Great Fire of 1901, the city came back better than ever. A major reason for this comeback was the discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay in 1968, fueling a modern-day boom as oil and construction companies found their way to the city. In 1975, the city and borough consolidated, similar to what Jacksonville and Duval County achieved in 1968. As of 2002 more than 18,000 people were working Downtown. The largest industries were services, government, and retail. Surface parking lots are a common feature in both downtown Anchorage and Jacksonville. What separates the two is the location of complementing land uses and destinations. The clustering of convention facilities, parks, museums and a shopping mall in the heart of the city, help create a small zone of vibrant pedestrian scale activity. Don't believe us? Take a look for yourself.

Anchorage introduction by Ennis Davis, AICP. Contact Ennis at edavis@moderncities.com


Tale of the Tape


Downtown Anchorage photography courtesy of http://proceedings.esri.com/library/userconf/proc99/proceed/papers/pap923/p9231.jpg

To help Jaxsons gain a better understanding of the scale of Anchorage, here are a few statistics of the city in relation to Jacksonville:


Jacksonville's (green) consolidated city limits inside Anchorage's consolidated city limits (red).

Population

Anchorage City Population 2014: 301,010 (City); 398,892 (Metro 2014) - (incorporated in 1920)

Jacksonville City Population 2014: 853,382 (City); 1,419,127 (Metro 2014) - (incorporated in 1832)

City population 1950: Jacksonville (204,517); Anchorage (11,254)


City Land Area

Anchorage: 1,704.7 square miles
Jacksonville: 757.7 square miles


Metropolitan Area Growth rate (2010-2014)

Anchorage: +4.75%
Jacksonville: +5.46%


Urban Area Population (2010 census)

Anchorage: 251,243 (ranked 149 nationwide)
Jacksonville: 1,065,219 (ranked 40 nationwide)


Urban Area Population Density (2010 census)

Anchorage: 2,956.4 people per square mile
Jacksonville: 2,008.5 people per square mile
 

City Population Growth from 2010 to 2014

Anchorage: +9,184
Jacksonville: +31,598
 

Convention Center Exhibition Space:

Anchorage: Dena'ina Civic and Convention Center (2008) - 47,400 square feet
Anchorage: William A. Egan Civic and Convention Center (1984) - 30,534 square feet
Jacksonville: Prime F. Osborn III Convention Center (1985) - 78,500 square feet


Tallest Building:

Anchorage: Conoco-Phillips Building - 296 feet
Jacksonville: Bank of America Tower - 617 feet



Who's Downtown Is More Walkable?

Anchorage: 82 out of 100, according to 2015 walkscore.com
Jacksonville: 72 out of 100, according to 2015 walkscore.com


Next Page: Anchorage Photo Tour


This Downtown Anchorage parking map highlights the location of various downtown attractions and destinations illustrated in Metro Jacksonville's Anchorage photo tour. Map courtesy of the Early Childhood Mental Health Institute.