This thread is depressing me. I wish that Bush would have used the military to invade these rundown cities and revitalize them, much like the way Irag will be rebuilt.
Just kidding about the invasion part. But it seems strange that so much care and attention is being paid to rebuilding a foreign country while so much misery and poverty needs to be dealt with in this country.
dantheman - Campbell’s Field (I think that’s what it’s called) is wonderful! From behind the seats along the third base line you get a great view of the Philly skyline too. Going to a ballgame there is a very pleasant and fairly inexpensive way to spend an evening. We’re going back there in June with the Cub Scouts to see a Riversharks game.
I’d imagine Camden could be disqualified on this Cicero rule. Afterall, they had a mass shooting there in the '40s by a nut named Howard Unruh. One of America’s first, I believe.
What’s so bad about Cicero, though? I’m unfamiliar with it.
[I would have bought River Sharks tickets had Rickey Henderson signed with them, but as it’s a 3 hour plus drive for me, I probably won’t be up there . . .]
Hey, I live within a mile of the White House on the Virginia side and I like Baltimore, too. If you S.O.B.s would just come off the baseball monopoly and let us have our Senators back I wouldn’t have any problem with the place.
Anyway, I’d just like to say that I’ve spent time in a lot of cities along the east coast, including Newark, Pittsburgh, and Lawrence. Only two really bad places come to mind.
Earlier in the thread I was sitting there thinking, “how come nobody has mentioned Bethlehem?” Then I realized that Allentown and Bethlehem are more or less the same place. It gets my vote for Most Depressing City in America. But Bethlehem at least has Moravian College, which is a charming little school. That oughta count for something.
But depressing is one thing; scary is another. Newport News, VA is the only place where I felt unsafe just trying to drive through it. It’s a completely subjective point of view, but from the stories I hear from friends who come from there I can determine the following things: it is widely thought to be a very violent, dangerous place, it has extremely poor race relations, and everyone I know who comes from there has no plans whatsoever to return there. However, I’m guilty of a weirddave-style drive-by analysis, so you’ll need someone else’s word to confirm those things.
If you want to read my take on what I think is the most depressing small town I’ve ever seen, take a little travelogue to Petersburg, VA. I think it fails to qualify under any of the Gov.'s rules, but I submit it for Dishonorable Mention status.
And since we’re on the subject, I think the nicest town I’ve ever seen in the U.S. is Savannah, hands down.
Cicero, Illinois, is a more-or-less rundown industrial city that is next to the City of Chicago. It, throughout the last 75 or so years, has had a reputation for political corruption and Mob dominance, and, in my mind, is the archtypical “bad-from-the-start” city, with Gary, Indiana a close runner-up.
fruitbat,
My observations on DC are, admittedly, about 5 years old. I was working for a company that did in home sales and they had me in the district at least 2-3 days a week. I think I had calls in every slum, tennament and burned out rowhouse in the city. Once, at high noon, I was driving down a street and watched 2 guys steel a car right in front of me. I got shot at once. If things have changed for the better, well then good for DC. I would like to point out one thing; you said:
One problem I have with DC is that without the Federal Govt, the city has nothing to offer. There would be no mall, no Georgetown, no subway, etc. I suppose it’s just the curmudgeon in me, but that seems like an unfair base for the city to have. Ahh, well, glad my observations are outdated anyway.
Oh, and you can have the Senators AFAIC, I’ve been a major proponent of DC baseball for a while now. It would force King Peter to cultivate the native fanbase which he has almost totally ignored and destroyed in favor of the DC wine-and-cheese crowd in the last 10 years.
Hmmm…don’t know why I didn’t mention this before. As part of my PhD dissertation research, I compiled and studied population changes for over 300 metropolitan areas (1990 census defined) from 1940-1990. Of all the metro areas studied, only one had sustained population decline from one census to the next (40-50, 50-60, 60-70, 70-80, 80-90). That was Jersey City, NJ. I can’t say whether or not Governor Quinn’s Cicero Rule applies to Jersey City - any comments?
Note: several metro areas had population declines in four of the five census periods from above. Two I remember vividly were Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and Allentown/Bethlehem. I believe Newark was also one of the cities as well.
Well, in Niagara Falls, they’ve been trying to invite the Canadians over for years!
As pertains to Niagara Falls’ decline: A lot of locals think that NF’s problems have been all the fault of bad politicians and bad internal decisions. Hence the Niagara Falls Reporter’s ongoing column name: Citycide. I think some of its problems are self-inflicted but not all. There’s a few other things which haven’t helped:
Why did the New York side fail when the Canadian side…I don’t want to say “flourished,” because it’s Tacky City, but at least did better? Personally, I think it’s partly because Niagara Falls’ economy was diversified. When the major chemical and manufacturing plants retreated, much as they had in other Rust Belt communities, city leaders consoled themselves that they could rely on tourism, and that they really didn’t need to attract more industry. Big mistake. Whereas, on the Canadian side, tourism was the only game in town, and when the tourists came in fewer numbers, the provincial and federal governments rushed in to prop it up. In New York, Albany never really came through, having Buffalo, Rochester, and other manufacturing cities to save.
WeirdDave you are redeemed by cheering us on as we tilt at the windmill of a baseball team.
The one time I actually went to Allentown I was on a road trip with a gorgeous girl. We were starving and decided to stop in Allentown for some reason to get a bite to eat. I swear we spent half an hour looking for the ‘good’ section of Allentown before we realized it was all the same.
I have been to Detroit after the busnesses close after 5pm on business days and everybody goes home, it is desolate, dangerous, and has nothing for people to see or do(and that is the good part!!! - downtown).
Nobody in Michigan that I know of wants to move to Detroit, everyone wants to leave and go to the suburbs.
I’d vote for Detroit and then Buffalo but I can’t claim enough cities to qualify. Last time I was in Detroit I ended up around Tiger Stadium. I didn’t stop for red lights.
I actually like downtown Pittsburgh. Nice architecture and the steel mills along the river have been replaced by parks.
Can’t say I would want to live in any large city. Nothing turns me off more than pan handling.
I live in a suburb of Hartford, and sadly, I must agree. Hartford was a great little city, many years ago. In the 1940’s and 50’s, it had a first-rate school system, beautiful downtown buildings, and a high standard of living. There were fun and interesting things to do, and people would stay downtown after work. There were nice restaurants, stores, and various cultural activities.
The decline started about 1965, and continues today. The middle class moved out to the suburbs, all the better stores closed, the crime rate increased, and the school system became so bad that it was taken over by the state. In the 1980’s, a real estate development company bought several downtown buildings, and tore them down, while telling everyone that they were planning to build bigger and better buildings. Well, the development company was found to be nothing more than a giant pyramid scheme, whereupon it collapsed, leaving thousands of investors with nothing. And the sites where those big new buildings were going to go? Today they’re parking lots.
As for the Civic Center, it was built in 1974 when the Whalers (hockey team) came to town, and there was some activity there on home game nights. Unfortunately, the Whalers moved to North Carolina a few years ago, and the Civic Center started to decline. All the stores and restaurants have closed, and the coliseum is used only a few times a year. They’re now talking about tearing the whole thing down. In 1990, the city was declared to be the “4th poorest city in America” and I doubt that’s changed much in the past 13 years.
In 1950 the population was, IIRC, 174,000. In 2000, it was about 125,000.
Hijack- Fruitbat, funny you mention H street- I bought a house on the “wrong side” about two years ago, and in that time the assessed value has tripled. When Williams was first elected I figured he’d be another Sharon Pratt Kelly but it’s amazing how immediate and visible the positive changes were. And for the record I’m within walking distance of Rayful’s old place.
I’ve been to a lot of the places that people have mentioned (funny how so few of them are west of the Mississippi) and while a lot are depressing and definitely have declined from their heydey (like Hartford, Flint, Bethlehem, St. Louis) they didn’t give me the “this place is so bad it’s scary” vibe like a Newark or Camden did*.
[sub]*or when I tried to find on-street parking near Johns Hopkins. But that’s probably similar to your off-the-beathen-path experiences in DC, weirddave.[/sub]
It breaks my heart that NYS has botched the rebirth of Niagara Falls.
What is lacking is not money but imagination. There is history, nostalgia, nature and spectacle just oozing from the place. I’m convinced that if they came up with the right promotional angle and pitched it to downstaters they could attract crowds hand-over-fist. Casinos are NOT the answer – creativity is.
(And for the record, this hard-core NYC booster thinks they should have put Niagara Falls on our state quarter, not the frigging SOL.)
no, trust me, i just went back home (buffalo area) for mother’s day, and money is lacking.
not to say imagination isn’t. but all i heard all weekend were complaints about the area’s money situation (all the recent police troubles, the sabres, etc.).
in order to revive nf, ny, they would have to commit truckloads of dollars to rip out the old crap that currently makes the city look like a graveyard (except the factory outlet mall area), and at least make it look like a place worth going to. it could use a few nice hotels, and visual landmarks other than the falls too.
let’s face it though, the canadian falls are prettier, hehe.
has anyone ever been on both sides of the border during the “festival of lights”? the disparity is really very sad.
And (I don’t think I missed any posts) none have been “western” cities. Why?
That’s OK, no one pays attention to the traffic signals at night in Detroit. But seriously, now I’m really wondering about my city. Is it really that scary, and I’m just used to it? Hell, I still hang out down around the old Tiger Stadium on Friday nights sometimes.
*Originally posted by amarinth *
I would guess it’s because much of the industrial capacity of the US has histortically been situated in the “Manufacturing Belt”, located in an around the New England , Mid-Atlantic and Great Lakes regions of the US. Once the US economy shifted from principally industrial based to service/information based, the cities largely dependent on manufacturing were hit hardest.
Even where industrial activity still takes place in the US, the regions (and cities) that have benefitted the most have been concentrated in the South and West. In addition, the population growth in the US has been highest in the South and West, largely due to massive outmigration from the Manufacturing Belt.
The only examples I can think of in the West might be smallish cities that have relied heavily on one major industry that is now in decline (for example, mining). Butte or Helena, MT perhaps?
I live in the Pacific Northwest and my guess is that most “western” cities are still relatively new when compared with the cities of the Northeast and Great Lakes regions. The economies of these cities were generally based on old industries from the 19th century and early 20th century like steel, automobiles, and textiles. In contrast, newer industries like aerospace and computers were more likely to be attracted to the newer cities on the west coast. Because the old industries and their importance to America’s economy have declined, the cities who were dependant upon them have declined too. In contrast, the newer industries–and the cities who depend upon them–haven’t been around long enough to decay.
However, that doesn’t mean there are cities west of the Mississippi that have had reversals of fortune in the last 50 years or so. The history of the West is littered with mining towns that literally dried up and blew away once the minerals were all extracted or the mineral’s price declined. For me, the one that leaps immediately to mind is Butte, Montana. Once, this was the largest city in Montana with well over 50,000 people. Now, it’s population is half that, the copper mines are mostly closed, air pollution has denuded the surrounding Rocky Mountains, and there’s huge open copper pit downtown with a toxic lake in it. (Although, to be fair, Butte does seem to have turned the corner recently. But, I wouldn’t book my vacation plans there just yet.)