This isn’t true: NYC has largely eliminated SROs, but the most touristy neighborhoods are also frequently the ones with the most shelters and/or DHS accommodations. Off the top of my head: Chinatown, Midtown/TS, and the UWS all have a large number of shelters and accommodations. I grew up next to one on the UWS, volunteered at another, and currently live next to a third.
Check a map of homeless shelters in sf and compare it to Manhattan. Manhattan has them scattered around, sf has everything in the tenderloin. It's like having a 10x10 block of only homeless related stuff right next to times Square. So it's very visible. NYC's poverty is pushed to the edges of city and boroughs
* Manhattan alone has twice as many people as San Francisco, in less than half the space. It also isn't districted as cleanly as SF is -- even the office and business areas of Manhattan are heavily residential. Put another way: everybody lives somewhere in Manhattan, so it makes sense to scatter shelters and other managed housing throughout the island.
* If we're talking specifically about shelters, Manhattan's are not particularly scatted: the majority are in midtown (right next to Times Square!), and a sizable minority are on the LES/in Chinatown. It's hard to find an official reference for this (since so many of NYC's shelters are nonprofits), but here's a user-created map with some datapoints[1].
* As mentioned in the original comment, NYC aggressively attempts to house its homeless population, including with indefinite hotel rentals. Hotels are dispersed through the city, so it's no particular surprise that their use as homeless housing results in the homeless being somewhat less concentrated in particular neighborhoods. You have an independent (and correct!) point about poverty in the city, but I don't think your observation makes sense for homelessness itself.
I think your making the same point as me but not agreeing with the conclusion? Right nyc is more diverse in each area as far as types of buildings. Sf's tenderloin and mid market area is unique as it's a highly concentrated area of homelessness. It also happens to be right next to some of the busiest areas. All of this bleeds over to business, tourist and hotel areas so people see it all the time. Richmond, sunset, bernal, Glen Park are neighborhoods that are pretty far from the tenderloin and don't have homeless people in them. theres nothing in nyc thats compareable to the tenderloin area. what ive seen for visitors is they go to the moscone center for some event, only a mile away from the tenderloin, then their company puts them in a hotel downtown near Powell Street, only blocks from there. so people come to sf and are immediately exposed to dense concentration of the homelessness.
I think we're agreeing on most things, but there's one thing in particular that we're not: I'm saying that there is an area in NYC that is simultaneously (1) visited heavily by tourists and (2) has a large proportion of the city's shelter and homeless services capacity. That area is Midtown, which contains Times Square, Penn Station, Grand Central, Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and most of the other major tourist attractions in NYC. That area is also home to the largest tourist and convention-oriented hotels (the Penn, the Waldorf-Astoria, etc.).
And, to be clear, the homeless are more visible in that area! But I wouldn't say disproportionately so, given the population and density of Manhattan itself. I consider that a testament to NYC's (relative) success at providing homeless services.
