I’m in sunny San Diego, California, this week researching a piece for the print product, but the trip also offers our first opportunity to take FrontRow on the road. Throughout the week I’ll be offering some observations about the city: its arts, layout, use, and urban aesthetics. San Diego is a city that is close in size to Dallas, and it experienced similar building booms — 1980s, 2000s — so I hope to find some useful comparisons and lessons.

The first, most obvious difference, of course, is the coast. You feel it as soon as you touch down in the airport that straddles the coastline. The sea creates a barrier and an orientation point, forcing restraint. Almost as important, however, are the city’s many valleys and hills. These elevations force neighborhoods that are more naturally delineated; overt sprawl in the city center is impossible, due to intervening dips and rises.

I’m staying near the historic Gaslamp District, which was a late 19^th-century commercial area á la Dallas’ West End that evolved into a seedy semi-red light district that catered to the many sailors in this military town before being revitalized. The neighborhood’s remaking began more than a decade ago, first introducing the area as a nightlife destination, and then, with the addition of the San Diego Padres’ new baseball stadium, condos and other residential developments were added, giving the neighborhood more around-the-clock life.

Walking down Fifth Street and popping into a kebab stop for a late afternoon snack (an impossibility in Dallas, where kebabs, döners, and other gyro-relatives are mostly confined to a sorry stretch of Belt Line Road in Richardson), I couldn’t help but wonder: Why do these streets work here but not in Dallas?

One answer is the baseball stadium. There was an afternoon Padres v. Mariners game on Sunday, and the life spilled out from the stadium into the streets. There was a buzz through the bars, in the restaurants, and people with no intention of actually going to game mingled through streets full of Padres hats and shirts. There is no underestimating the loss to Dallas of letting the Rangers and Cowboys (and FC Dallas, for that matter) go to Arlington and Frisco, respectively.

The second answer is that the Gaslamp district is relatively small and delineated — maybe twelve square blocks that are easy to navigate. There are some adjacent neighborhoods that are easy reach by foot or bike, as well as trolley and light rail. The public transportation options put Dallas to shame. San Diego was one of the first cities to reestablish its historical trolley lines, beginning in 1980. San Diego did not escape the interstate madness of the 1950s and 1960s, and I-5 does cut an unfortunate gash through thhe city. As a result Gaslamp and the other downtown neighborhoods are oriented away from the highway, whereas in Dallas our sports stadium was plopped down on the other side of it. Something else I noticed was that the Gaslamp area is on a slight incline, and so as you move up the street you catch visual cues ahead that keep you going.

I’m wondering why the West End couldn’t become what Gaslamp is. Surely bringing in a pro sports team and plopping it next to the historic area with no pedestrian impediments (like a highway) would help. But there is also a tenancy issue. There are, quite simply, more interesting restaurants and shops here than in the West End and Victory. These shops also cater to both visitors and residents alike, without pretentions at super high-end luxury or creating a tourist zone in which natives are embarrassed to be found walking about. As a result, there are tons of people walking around. The real Dallas comparison would have to be Oak Cliff, where landlords like David Spence have handpicked their tenants so they can control the feel and appeal of the neighborhood as a whole. The difference here is between thinking about building a neighborhood and filling rentable space.

Tomorrow – San Diego’s Fair Park: what happens when a city throws its resolve behind its former festival grounds.