# Are there any cities where the north side is the rough part of town? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 13, 2009, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336 "2009-03-13T15:45:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/1 "2009-03-13T15:45:53Z")
I’ve heard of the Southside, the Westside, and the Eastside being tough, but I’m not familiar with any Northsides being on the wrong side of the tracks. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/2 "2009-03-13T15:48:46Z")
Regina, Saskatchewan, has the [North Central neighbourhood](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regina_neighbourhoods#North_Central). ---
**Author:** ![Petrobey\_Mavromihalis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bcef8e/32.png) [@Petrobey\_Mavromihalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Petrobey_Mavromihalis)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/3 "2009-03-13T15:50:59Z")
Harare. ---
**Author:** ![Duckster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/duckster/32/1244_2.png) [@Duckster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duckster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/4 "2009-03-13T15:54:40Z")
Adelaide, Australia’s northern suburbs. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/5 "2009-03-13T15:55:40Z")
Dublin. “Nort-soyders” are considered rougher than the limp-wristed types south of the Liffey. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/6 "2009-03-13T15:59:04Z")
Charlotte NC has the bad part of town in the north. A lot of it depends on winds , in most cases rich people chose to live upwind of factories so they would not get hit by the bad smells. In NC the prevailing winds come from the southwest. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/7 "2009-03-13T16:01:42Z")
Yeah, as a matter of fact…Milwaukee is pretty rough on the North Side. ---
**Author:** ![Balthisar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/balthisar/32/2825_2.png) [@Balthisar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balthisar)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/8 "2009-03-13T16:02:14Z")
Aren’t the areas north of Toronto “rough”? ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/9 "2009-03-13T16:02:39Z")
Until about 10 years ago, “uptown” Manhattan (as in, “The Upper East/West Side”) was understood to run to 96th St. North of that (and a lot of the island goes north of that) and the neighborhoods had names like Harlem, Morningside, Washington Heights, etc., which had “reputations”. As parts of those areas gentrified, little used names for sub-neighborhoods got revived or “discovered”, such as the term “Hudson Heights” to designate a part of Washington Heights near Ft. Tryon Park. I saw some real estate listings for “SpaHa” in “Spanish Harlem”, about which I’m still not sure if it was sarcastic humor or a real attempt at yuppie branding. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/10 "2009-03-13T16:04:53Z")
Kowloon is considered a lot rougher than Hong Kong Island. Not that it’s really “rough” in our terms. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/11 "2009-03-13T16:05:08Z")
Rochester, NY. The northeast quadrant was the literal “wrong side of the tracks” and was the home of the immigrant stew that did the factory jobs. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/12 "2009-03-13T16:13:29Z")
Islamabad, the North is the Himalayas and the Taliban. But incidentally, the areas next to the mountains are the most posh, it is the actual mountains where things get rough. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/13 "2009-03-13T16:15:17Z")
Philadelphia, although it’s not the only rough part of town. ---
**Author:** ![Zyada](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zyada/32/3028_2.png) [@Zyada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zyada)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/14 "2009-03-13T16:23:40Z")
Fort Worth had the stockyards on the north side of town, and that is still one of the poorest areas of the city. ---
**Author:** ![FrWindyShephardHenderson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a9a28c/32.png) [@FrWindyShephardHenderson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FrWindyShephardHenderson)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/15 "2009-03-13T16:32:48Z")
Here in Cork (thats Ireland btw) the northside is the dodgy area. Always found it strange that all the Accident and Emergency facilities were on the southside. For any visitors a Norrie is a person from the northside. ---
**Author:** ![MikeS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/16 "2009-03-13T16:37:42Z")
> [@robardin](#): > > Until about 10 years ago, “uptown” Manhattan (as in, “The Upper East/West Side”) was understood to run to 96th St. North of that (and a lot of the island goes north of that) and the neighborhoods had names like Harlem, Morningside, Washington Heights, etc., which had “reputations”. Isn’t the area of the Bronx just across the Harlem River from Manhattan still pretty rough? That could still be considered the “north side” of NYC. ---
**Author:** ![Gfactor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9de053/32.png) [@Gfactor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gfactor)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/17 "2009-03-13T16:57:22Z")
Moved from General Questions to In My Humble Opinion. \*\* Gfactor\*\* General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/18 "2009-03-13T16:59:38Z")
Many people would consider Montréal-Nord to be a rough area of town. They were recently rocked by protests that arose from anger over a police officer’s shooting of an unarmed 17-year-old who was playing dice, which focused a lot of attention on poverty and social exclusion in the area. ---
**Author:** ![staballoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@staballoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/staballoy)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/19 "2009-03-13T17:11:45Z")
Here in Winston-Salem NC (pop. 225K), the rougher part of town is a crescent sweeping from up the east side from southeast to north. Most of the city’s growth, naturally, has been from south to northwest. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336/20 "2009-03-13T17:26:33Z")
> [@](#): > > Moved from General Questions to In My Humble Opinion. Actually, there’s a [Cecilian column](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1358/is-the-south-side-always-the-baddest-part-of-town) on this question. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-there-any-cities-where-the-north-side-is-the-rough-part-of-town/489336.md?page=2)