As opposed to North South, in the Northern hemisphere, there is an East West bias, that is quantifiable.
Because of prevailing winds, in polluted areas, the higher up you are, and the more often your location is upwind of pollution sources, the more likely it is that your area will be “better” than those in the valleys and downwind. Geographers have identified equations for this. A noteable study in the 1960s was done in Seattle. I don’t have the academic’s name, but he made calculations predicting “white flight” or “black succession” (choose your politically correct term of choice) for that city. His first results were very good. He refined his calculations and did a comparison with the next census. The results were so good that he refused to publish the equations, on the grounds that they would become a self fulfilling prophecy (sp?).
A related concept arises with the advent of driving to work. Those who live in the West, and work in the East drive facing into the sun travelling both directions. Living East avoids this problem.
As you note regarding Hoyt, there can be other factors such as local amenity (views, adjacency to prestige locations like major universities), and ethnicity that will modify the local principles. As well, if (like Chicago) it is not possible to actually live East of the Centre, then other locations will take over that function. BTW, the West Side of the City of Chicago is considered no better than the South side AFAIK, but the lake front is high prestige over most of its length, which fits into Hoyts model just fine.
Here’s a link to the column: Is the south side always the baddest part of town?
tecknow, it is helpful to others if you provide a link to the column when you are starting a new thread. Helps keep everyone on the same page. After all, and there are lots and lots of columns. No big deal, you’ll know for next time.
Not to sound racist, but in Milwaukee most of the blacks live on the north side, the south and west is highly populated by Mexicans, and the east side on the lake is full of rich white people.
And back in Allentown, PA, where I’m from, I don’t remember how it was all divvied up but there were a lot of Puerto Ricans.
(PS: I’m not ripping on any of these people. I grew up with blacks, go to school with a lot of Mexicans, my best friend is puerto rican, and I’m a poor white person. I hope to be among the aforementioned white people someday.)
True, except that:
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The Far North Side of Milwaukee is still white, and,
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The Hispanic population is centered on the Near SOuth Side.
Here in Sacramento, it gets complicated, as the worst AND the best neighborhoods in town are both located in South Sacramento.
I guess if we get enough cities on the list we can figure out if there’s a significiantly larger number of them with, say, south or east “bad sides”.
So, I’m in Toronto, and (like Chicago) it has a ‘side’ (the south) occupied by water – though it could be argued that waterfront developments and upper-class residences on the islands south of the city center count as a not-bad side.
The ‘bad’ side – or at least the ‘worst’ side – is the east side. It’s not all that bad, clearly not ‘the bad side of town’ of the TV/movie world, but it’s the side you’d get told about if you asked someone.
The worst parts of the city, though, are near the core (to the east) and far to the northwest.
Dublin. Limerick, Belfast and Cork, all in Ireland, have a strong socio-economic gradient running from the general north/northwest (the worst) to thesouth/ southeast (the best). Dublin and Belfast face east across the Irish Sea, Cork faces southeast/south and Limerick is on aqn estuary on the western seabord. Does this make any sense to anyone, anywhere?
GS
Why is it that even when stating a concrete fact, we’ve all been beaten into saying, “Not to sound racist, but…” even when the next statement could never ever be construed as offensive? Atlantis, I’m really, truely not trying to take the piss or pick on you, I’m really thinking about myself. I was having this very conversation in the pub recently. Im from Georgia originally, but I live near London now, and I prefix so much of what I say in these pc-conscious ways, and get so much grief over it. To make it worse, I work in Adult Basic Skills, so I have no idea how to express myself without apologising!
In my experience, the southside has always been the bad side, but usually moreover due to the location of the river or rail line.
Or rather, having this conversation about good/bad sides of town…
I always attribute Dublin’s split to the East/West river running through it (the Northside, where I live, is generally perceived as “worse” than the Southside). London is an East-facing seaboard city with a East/West river, but it’s generally the South of London that’s perceived as “worse”. My take: it’s random, but influenced by geographical features.
I don’t know what this researcher was smoking, but Seattle has never (especially in the 60’s) a large African-American community. (North or South)
tecknow writes:
I confess to being unfamiliar with this study. Can you provide a cite?
In St. Louis, the “bad” side of town is the north part. It was not always this way, however. Before Busch Stadium was built, Sportsman’s Park was located on North Grand, and it was surrounded by many businesses and residences. Now, it doesn’t look quite so nice, to say the least, and the more economically-developed portion of the city is to the south, though that has very poor pockets too.