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  #41  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 3:23 AM
DePaul Bunyan DePaul Bunyan is offline
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Forest Park is much more interesting than Oak Park and has better bars and restaurants.

Also living in a suburb is a perfectly reasonable and logical choice for millions of Americans.
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  #42  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 4:47 AM
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detroit is more interesting and progressive than williamsburg, or portland.
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  #43  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 11:54 AM
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Philadelphia
-Philly is the best damn city in the U.S.
-Gentrification is the greatest thing that has recently happened to the city. The people who fail to see this, are usually the newbies who didn't grow up in West Philly during the early 2000s when crime was still high and we were still losing population. That was my reality as a kid.
-The Philly School Distirct isn't as bad as people make it out to be.
-The "soda tax" is a good thing
-Best skylines (in order): NYC, Chicago, Philly, San Francisco, Seattle
-The Comcast Technology Center is the best-looking of the supertalls U/C outside of NYC.

New Jersey
-Camden probably has the most unrealized potential of any city in the state.
-South Jersey and Northwest Jersey are both better than North Jersey.
-The entire state feels like a huge conglomeration of suburbs split between NYC and Philly.

Boston
-As cool as a city that Boston is, it is slightly overhyped.
-The T pales in comparison to other transit systems I have used.
-Cambridge, Brookline, and other "suburbs" should probably be incorporated into the city proper.
-Downtown seemed a little underwhelming.

New York City
-Not as pedestrian-friendly as people say it is.
-SEPTA, WMATA, and the T have cleaner stations than the MTA.

Baltimore
-Outside of rowhomes, I just don't see all of the similarities to Philly that people say exist.
-There is no possible way to justify the riots of 2015. That behavior is inexcusable.
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  #44  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 12:41 PM
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As far as Philadelphia goes, the emphasis on it being a "blue collar town"--which I guess is leftover from the city being the "Workshop of the World"-manufacturing mecca of the late 19th/early 20th century... is way overblown. While Philly is still way more affordable, and definitely more "blue collar" than Manhattan, SF, or Boston (overall) -- go walk the neighborhoods of Rittenhouse Square/Fitler Square, Society Hill, Old City, Fairmount, Queen Village, Washington Sq. West -- and you will find some of the most historic, charming, beautiful, quaint, architecturally interesting, walkable, and yes -- white collar, rich to wealthy urban neighborhoods in America.
So it's not all "Yo Philly!" - "blue collar", stereotypical "Eagles fans" types that the national media likes to make Philly out to be.
(btw - Philly looked amazing for the NFL Draft, the city does major events very well on the Parkway).
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  #45  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 3:04 PM
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Detroit is turning the corner and is becoming very vibrant in its DT and adjacent neighbourhoods. Violent crime is down and new residents are moving in once again.
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  #46  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 3:39 PM
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Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan View Post
Boston
-Cambridge, Brookline, and other "suburbs" should probably be incorporated into the city proper.
I agree with this, but you've got snobs in Cambridge who say things like "I've never even been to Boston!". I don't think they'll ever let go of their designated city status.

Quote:
-Downtown seemed a little underwhelming.
It's one of the most handsome and walkable downtowns in the united states with great connectivity with the harbor. What underwhelmed you?

Quote:
New York City
-Not as pedestrian-friendly as people say it is.
Honestly curious about this, what part was less walkable than you expected? New York doesn't have a neighborhood like Beacon Hill or the North End so it lacks in European-esque pedestrian streets (which is part of why I think Boston is better than New York) but objectively it's the most walkable city in the country by sheer size.

Quote:
Baltimore
-Outside of rowhomes, I just don't see all of the similarities to Philly that people say exist.
-There is no possible way to justify the riots of 2015. That behavior is inexcusable.
They're both old, great colonial cities with very similar urban fabrics and similar troubles and history. I wouldn't hold Baltimore's riots against the city, it's not really up to you to deem the riots justifiable or not.
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  #47  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 5:21 PM
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Originally Posted by The North One View Post
I wouldn't hold Baltimore's riots against the city, it's not really up to you to deem the riots justifiable or not.
Baltimore is bigger, geographically, than those who haven't been there seem to think and the "riots" were very confined to a small area. There remain parts of the city that are entirely free from anything like that and where, if you live there, you'd be unaffected by them. Like the "riots" of earlier decades in cities from Washington DC to LA, this was minority people trashing their own neighborhoods.
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  #48  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 5:33 PM
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I don't know if this opinion is unpolular of not but I think Canadian real estate prices are unsustainable. Anyway, I did a double take this weekend when I ran across this:

Quote:
Down 65%, Home Capital Shares Could Go Lower
April 29, 2017

After years of defying stock market critics, Home Capital Group’s shares collapsed quickly. The Toronto-listed stock of the Canadian subprime-mortgage lender fell 65% on Wednesday, following Home Capital’s warning that it would miss earnings targets after securing a costly line of credit to offset a run on deposits. It said that savers bolted after April 19, when the Ontario Securities Commission charged Home Capital and several top managers with having misled investors in 2014 and 2015 by failing to disclose that the lender’s slowing growth resulted from Home Capital’s discovery of large-scale fraud among its mortgage brokers and underwriters . . . .
http://www.barrons.com/articles/down...mod=BOL_hp_mag

The 2008 deja-vu was overwhelming. Canada largely escaped that but will they have their own version soon?

My concern doesn't seem to be just mine so maybe it isn't unpopular:

Quote:
Ontario Government Plans Action Against Speculation in Toronto Housing Market
https://www.wsj.com/articles/ontario...ket-1492551515

and most of us know Vancouver has already put a tax on foreign purchases of housing.

The US, of course, has its expensive cities and I live in one. But it also has many pretty inexpensive ones. I'm not aware of any Canadian cities that remain inexpensive on the same scale as so many in the US and that mystifies me.
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  #49  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 5:55 PM
Buckeye Native 001 Buckeye Native 001 is offline
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Downtown Phoenix (Central Phoenix as a whole, including Midtown) is in a better place now than it's been in the past 50 years.
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  #50  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 6:02 PM
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Originally Posted by Buckeye Native 001 View Post
Downtown Phoenix (Central Phoenix as a whole, including Midtown) is in a better place now than it's been in the past 50 years.
And you can make a living frying eggs on the sidewalk.
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  #51  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 9:16 PM
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Originally Posted by The North One View Post
I agree with this, but you've got snobs in Cambridge who say things like "I've never even been to Boston!". I don't think they'll ever let go of their designated city status.
That's hilarious! Last year, I visited Boston for the first time in July. I stayed with a good friend of mine at her apartment in the Fenway neighborhood. She was studying at BU over the summer and suggested that I should come up and see Boston, which is something I had always wanted to do at that point. Anyway, walking along both Commonwealth Avenue and Beacon Street was confusing; although I was in "suburban" Brookline, the urban fabric continued almost seamlessly after Park Drive (I believe that's the Boston/Brookline border).

Quote:
Originally Posted by The North One View Post
It's one of the most handsome and walkable downtowns in the united states with great connectivity with the harbor. What underwhelmed you?
Tbh, I spent a lot of time around Boston during my visit. I arrived at South Station and walked along Atlantic Avenue until my friend arrived. We then ate in Chinatown and took the B trolley to her place. Over the next few days, I visited Brookline, Cambridge, Chestnut Hill, the Esplanade, Salem, Revere Beach, Newbury Street, Downtown Crossing, and Boston Commons. On the last evening I was there, I took the Red Line to Dorchester, connected with the Mattapan Trolley, and turned around. I got off at Savin Hill and walked from Southie to the North End to try Regina's Pizza. I guess all of that was a really long way of saying that I didn't see too much of Downtown. I can't wait to see more of it when I return, however! Despite what I stated about Downtown, I think that Philly and Boston are the best cities in the U.S.

Quote:
Originally Posted by The North One View Post
Honestly curious about this, what part was less walkable than you expected? New York doesn't have a neighborhood like Beacon Hill or the North End so it lacks in European-esque pedestrian streets (which is part of why I think Boston is better than New York) but objectively it's the most walkable city in the country by sheer size.
I have been visiting NYC for years, but recently started going by myself. Midtown has a problem similar to the western portion of Center City: wide one-way streets. NYC is undoubtedly the most walkable U.S. city, but the avenues are really wide!


Quote:
Originally Posted by The North One View Post
They're both old, great colonial cities with very similar urban fabrics and similar troubles and history. I wouldn't hold Baltimore's riots against the city, it's not really up to you to deem the riots justifiable or not.
I don't hold the riots against the city. Ultimately, a minority of Baltimoreans committed those atrocious acts. As someone who grew up poor in West Philadelphia and Chester, I know not to hold things against a city. The VAST majority of people within a city are hard-working, innocent people who are just trying to survive like the rest of us; however, the less than 10% of criminals attempt to make life hard for the others.

Regardless of everything, Baltimore is an interesting city that I still intend to visit and explore this summer. I have only stayed in the Inner Harbor area, and I would love to see more of what the city has to offer.
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  #52  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 9:20 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pedestrian View Post
Baltimore is bigger, geographically, than those who haven't been there seem to think and the "riots" were very confined to a small area. There remain parts of the city that are entirely free from anything like that and where, if you live there, you'd be unaffected by them. Like the "riots" of earlier decades in cities from Washington DC to LA, this was minority people trashing their own neighborhoods.
Baltimore is way bigger than people who simply happen to pass through on I-95 think. It extends as far north as the Northern Parkway, as far as I am aware. I know Baltimore, and I am aware that it was confined to a small area. I blame the actions on the people, not the city.
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  #53  
Old Posted Apr 30, 2017, 11:18 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan View Post
I don't hold the riots against the city. Ultimately, a minority of Baltimoreans committed those atrocious acts. As someone who grew up poor in West Philadelphia and Chester, I know not to hold things against a city. The VAST majority of people within a city are hard-working, innocent people who are just trying to survive like the rest of us; however, the less than 10% of criminals attempt to make life hard for the others.

Regardless of everything, Baltimore is an interesting city that I still intend to visit and explore this summer. I have only stayed in the Inner Harbor area, and I would love to see more of what the city has to offer.
Next time you are there, visit an area outsiders never seem to mention, my old stomping grounds (much changed now) in Charles Village. This is among the areas I was thinking of (and the adjacent Roland Park/Guilford) that would ask, "Riots? What riots?" Charles Village centers on Johns Hopkins U.'s arts and sciences campus (the medical school is across town in an area that traditionally provided more patients needing charity care). But this is where you'll find the undergrads and non-medical graduate students.

No riots here:


By the way, if you've seen the movie about Facebook "The Social Network," you've seen the Hopkins campus: Harvard doesn't allow on-campus movie-making so they used Hopkins.
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  #54  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 12:26 AM
montréaliste montréaliste is online now
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Pedestrian View Post
I don't know if this opinion is unpolular of not but I think Canadian real estate prices are unsustainable. Anyway, I did a double take this weekend when I ran across this:


http://www.barrons.com/articles/down...mod=BOL_hp_mag

The 2008 deja-vu was overwhelming. Canada largely escaped that but will they have their own version soon?

My concern doesn't seem to be just mine so maybe it isn't unpopular:


https://www.wsj.com/articles/ontario...ket-1492551515

and most of us know Vancouver has already put a tax on foreign purchases of housing.

The US, of course, has its expensive cities and I live in one. But it also has many pretty inexpensive ones. I'm not aware of any Canadian cities that remain inexpensive on the same scale as so many in the US and that mystifies me.

Well Toronto's rise in home prices hit 33% last year. Both Toronto and Vancouver are overpriced.

Imagine if you will, a similar rise this year or next. The real estate sharks are milking it for what they can, and the insanity is promoting a bulge in value that primarily favors the institutions who lend and the ecosystem around the buyers and sellers. Montreal is still much more affordable and is more in line with pricing in other markets on the continent.

If Torontonians were hit with a tax hike on property valuation or an income tax raise at the level they experience in property values, a big stink would be raised, but the mirage of high demand and high return for sellers reduces them to shut up mode. Overheated means just that: overvalued.
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  #55  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 12:09 PM
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So what if Columbus is the largest city in the US without any type of rail service. We really don't need it-too expensive and fixed in place. We should concentrate on improved bus service, BRT, and free bus circulators(like the one downtown)...better return on investment, less expensive, benefits more actual residents, and the costs are not fixed in place. Other technologies and changes will also make rail too expensive and not worth the massive $$$$ fixed in place investment.

So what if Columbus only has pro soccer and pro hockey. We have minor league baseball, but that is a dying sport so who cares? Plus we have OSU for football and basketball, and Buckeye football fills 105,000 seats every game, is worth One billion dollars(nearly as much as a pro team), and the Buckeyes are not going to demand a two billion dollar stadium paid by local funds, or threaten to become the Boise Buckeyes. We don't pay sh$t for them-the rest of the State and the students(from everywhere)pay for them and we benefit! Thanks Cleveland, Cincinnati, rest of Ohio..etc. as we enjoy the team that you help pay for, besides paying for your own teams. Plus Cincy and Cleveland are close enough that we can enjoy your teams and occasionally go up(or down)there for games..and we can be fair-weather fans and be fickle with who we support depending on who is playing well lol. Go Cavs!(for now) LOL!

So what that we are flat and there is no big body of water around. Flat means easier driving on snowy/icy roads in winter, less sprawl because of physical barriers, and who needs to be next to a river that is basically a series of sedimentation ponds created by locks and dams, or next to a lake that is basically an agricultural sewer. And what is really so bad about flat land and corn and soybean fields?




*I don't necessarily agree with all of this...just saying lol.
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  #56  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 2:43 PM
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I don't think of Columbus as being all that flat, but most of my journeys to and from the city were heading north/south on 71 between Columbus and Cincinnati. The western Columbus metro (Hilliard, Dublin etc) is pretty flat, but southern and eastern Columbus kind of lie just outside of Appalachian Ohio.
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  #57  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 4:35 PM
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Possibly unpopular opinion: Bay Area public transit is fucked and will always be fucked until they solve their land use issues.
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  #58  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 4:49 PM
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1. There is absolutely nothing wrong with urban public schools in the U.S. in general. If the youngish parents who move to the suburbs "for the schools" just enrolled their kids in the city school in their neighborhood, the kids would have functionally identical life outcomes. Our entire system of valuing neighborhoods based upon school districts is a sham.

2. Streetcar suburban neighborhoods are boring and interchangeable across a huge swathe of the country. In much of the U.S. real urban neighborhoods stopped being built closer to 1890 than 1950, or even 1920.

3. Walkability is great if you can afford it, but not the end-all for urbanity. I think being in a neighborhood without great commercial amenities but solid transit links to your job is more transformative than one which is a walkers paradise but where you need to use a car to get to work.

4. It's possible to overdo both historic preservation and street trees.

5. We need to develop a paradigm of walkibility which goes beyond access to formalized commerce.
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  #59  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 6:05 PM
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Possibly unpopular opinion: Bay Area public transit is fucked and will always be fucked until they solve their land use issues.
and their mass robbery issues too!
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  #60  
Old Posted May 1, 2017, 6:11 PM
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Originally Posted by eschaton View Post
1. There is absolutely nothing wrong with urban public schools in the U.S. in general. If the youngish parents who move to the suburbs "for the schools" just enrolled their kids in the city school in their neighborhood, the kids would have functionally identical life outcomes. Our entire system of valuing neighborhoods based upon school districts is a sham.

2. Streetcar suburban neighborhoods are boring and interchangeable across a huge swathe of the country. In much of the U.S. real urban neighborhoods stopped being built closer to 1890 than 1950, or even 1920.

3. Walkability is great if you can afford it, but not the end-all for urbanity. I think being in a neighborhood without great commercial amenities but solid transit links to your job is more transformative than one which is a walkers paradise but where you need to use a car to get to work.

4. It's possible to overdo both historic preservation and street trees.

5. We need to develop a paradigm of walkibility which goes beyond access to formalized commerce.
1. kind of disagree. i guess it depends on the neighborhood. urban education is complex.
2. not all are boring but agree.
3. see your own number 2.
4. yes. completely agree. a tree canopy might be nice in hot places but in city likes mine, it clogs drains and makes more of a mess than anything. oceans process more oxygen than trees anyway. historic buildings in the PNW are a hazard also, brick buildings in seismically prone areas = bad news. we don't have legislation on the books to force owners to retrofit them either. its going to be bad when the big one hits Portland.
5. you mean, we need something else to walk to besides a place to spend our money? mm, I guess I agree. but I think that's already changing anyway. retail will become 50 percent internet based and neighborhood commerce will shift to entertainment and service type businesses. or things you may immediately need, like stuff at the hardware store. boutique businesses will see a resurgence too.
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