Where Is The Rust Belt?

[suburbanite]

Originally Posted by Austin55

Dumb question but whats the geographic difference in the rust belt vs the midwest?

Rust belt stretches further East into Upstate New York. Midwest goes further West to cities that don't fit the rust belt label like Minneapolis, Des Moines, Omaha, etc.

[mrnyc]

Originally Posted by suburbanite

Rust belt stretches further East into Upstate New York. Midwest goes further West to cities that don't fit the rust belt label like Minneapolis, Des Moines, Omaha, etc.

canada falls in there too. like hamilton rust belt and toronto an eastern midwest city and maybe like winnipeg a western one. after that, calgary and edmonton are western cities and ottawa, montreal eastern. then on to the coastal cities.

of course its all kind of generalized, but one thing is for certain and that is the rust belt region is well over and its long overdue for that label to go away. someone said use 'legacy cities' over the rust belt moniker and i like that better, its more positive and fitting.

[suburbanite]

Originally Posted by mrnyc

canada falls in there too. like hamilton rust belt and toronto an eastern midwest city and maybe like winnipeg a western one. after that, calgary and edmonton are western cities and ottawa, montreal eastern. then on to the coastal cities.

of course its all kind of generalized, but one thing is for certain and that is the rust belt region is well over and its long overdue for that label to go away. someone said use 'legacy cities' over the rust belt moniker and i like that better, its more positive and fitting.

Hamilton as a rust belt city is an interesting debate because while it exhibits some of the stereotypical surface-level features, it also never declined in population from its industrial peak. Going back to the earlier discussion regarding immigration, it continues to receive a diverse array of immigrants from the most common destinations. The steel industry has declined, but given that it's the only large steel production center in the region, it received considerable government support and you don't see the abandonment that you do in a place like Youngstown.

McMaster University is an extremely beneficial institution to the city that anchors it with a large population of young people that provide a baseline level of activity and demand for centrally located housing. More and more of those students are sticking around afterwards as well to take advantage of more affordable housing.

Hamilton might be a small glimpse into what some other rust belt cities would look like if there wasn't a Sunbelt to lure hordes of people away. A city that had obviously passed its heyday and features the social problems arising from the loss of numerous manufacturing jobs, but also never saw mass exodus or the abandonment that leads to urban prairie in the city centre.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by suburbanite

Hamilton as a rust belt city is an interesting debate because while it exhibits some of the stereotypical surface-level features, it also never declined in population from its industrial peak. Going back to the earlier discussion regarding immigration, it continues to receive a diverse array of immigrants from the most common destinations. The steel industry has declined, but given that it's the only large steel production center in the region, it received considerable government support and you don't see the abandonment that you do in a place like Youngstown.

McMaster University is an extremely beneficial institution to the city that anchors it with a large population of young people that provide a baseline level of activity and demand for centrally located housing. More and more of those students are sticking around afterwards as well to take advantage of more affordable housing.

Hamilton might be a small glimpse into what some other rust belt cities would look like if there wasn't a Sunbelt to lure hordes of people away. A city that had obviously passed its heyday and features the social problems arising from the loss of numerous manufacturing jobs, but also never saw mass exodus or the abandonment that leads to urban prairie in the city centre.

A lot of those mid-size southwestern Ontario cities feel similar to places across the border in Michigan or New York that would be considered Rust Belt, and some even look "rusty". It's actually kind of interesting that the most economically dynamic region in Canada shares the region with some of the most stagnant areas in the U.S.

[suburbanite]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

A lot of those mid-size southwestern Ontario cities feel similar to places across the border in Michigan or New York that would be considered Rust Belt, and some even look "rusty". It's actually kind of interesting that the most economically dynamic region in Canada shares the region with some of the most stagnant areas in the U.S.

That's what I mean though, it goes back to the debate on whether Rust Belt is purely a visual classification, ie. does the place look rundown and rusty? or does it go deeper to underlying demographic changes and other factors?

You can drive by something like this in London and obviously it would draw fair comparison to Toledo or Detroit.



but that doesn't really tell you the whole story that London is a relatively healthy metro overall with a Downtown core that is growing (and was never really abandoned in the first place). London doesn't even receive that much immigration, and demographically it behaves much more like a comparable American rust belt city. If there was a Canadian version of Atlanta or Dallas maybe it would have cleared out and look much similar to Akron?

One other advantage that Southern Ontario has is that it acts as the De Facto "Education Belt" in Canada. London, Kitchener-Waterloo, Hamilton, Guelph, Toronto are all within 100 miles of each other and each feature student populations of 40,000+ (except for Guelph). These universities and affiliated colleges are large employers that are relatively recession-proof, and feature large student bodies that like to go to bars and restaurants downtown. Columbus also continues to be a strong rust belt performer in no small part to it's educational presence.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by suburbanite

One other advantage that Southern Ontario has is that it acts as the De Facto "Education Belt" in Canada. London, Kitchener-Waterloo, Hamilton, Guelph, Toronto are all within 100 miles of each other and each feature student populations of 40,000+ (except for Guelph).

while the rust belt certainly isn't america's "education belt", it's no slouch in the higher education department. in addition to some of the better public universities with the big 10 giants (U. of Michigan, U. of Wisconsin, U. of Illinois, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, etc.), the region is also home to some top notch private universities as well (U. of Chicago, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Cornell, Washington U., Carnegie Mellon, U. of Rochester, Case Western Reserve, Syracuse, U. of Pittsburgh, etc.).

[suburbanite]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

while the rust belt certainly isn't america's "education belt", it's no slouch in the higher education department. in addition to some of the better public universities with the big 10 giants (U. of Michigan, U. of Wisconsin, U. of Illinois, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, etc,), the region is also home to some top notch private universities as well (U. of Chicago, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Cornell, Washington U., Carnegie Mellon, U. of Rochester, Case Western Reserve, Syracuse, U. of Pittsburgh, etc.).

No doubt, and the cities that feature the prominent universities have clearly performed better than their counterparts. One would think that Ohio State is a massive contributor to why Columbus continues to grow while the other Ohio cities have stagnated. There are just way more cities along the U.S. rust belt that obviously all can't feature large educational institutions. Whereas in SW Ontario, every major city along The 401 from Windsor to Toronto has a school with students and faculty that makes up a sizeable portion of the population. There aren't any Erie, PA sized cities that missed the boat so to say. Funny enough, the largest town on the 401 corridor that doesn't feature an independent school, Brantford, is also probably also the most visually depressed.

edit: My comparison was off, because it turns out Brantford is almost exactly Erie-sized.

[Razor]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

A lot of those mid-size southwestern Ontario cities feel similar to places across the border in Michigan or New York that would be considered Rust Belt, and some even look "rusty". It's actually kind of interesting that the most economically dynamic region in Canada shares the region with some of the most stagnant areas in the U.S.

Ya it is kind of weird when you think of it..I think it can be attributed to Canada's relatively small economy..There isn't really a lot of choices..There isn't a sunbelt to drain away talent. so people are more apt to stay put.That's why maybe a city like Hamilton never really stagnated, and made it work for itself. That, and a city like Toronto acts like a "turn key"everything city and is diversified as a result..Movies, fashion, music, theatre, finance are all there. We don't have a music city like Nashville, nor silicon valley..High tech is spread out amongst a few cities here. I dunno, I'm just throwing it out there as to why some Southern Ontario cities ,while rusty, don't have the same blight and abandonment. As far as urban area choices, our freedom of movement is a double edge sword if you have nowhere to go to.

Originally Posted by suburbanite

Hamilton might be a small glimpse into what some other rust belt cities would look like if there wasn't a Sunbelt to lure hordes of people away. A city that had obviously passed its heyday and features the social problems arising from the loss of numerous manufacturing jobs, but also never saw mass exodus or the abandonment that leads to urban prairie in the city centre.

Exactly!

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Razor

Y I dunno, I'm just throwing it out there as to why some Southern Ontario cities ,while rusty, don't have the same blight and abandonment.

I think there are some pretty obvious differences.

No Sunbelt, less "winner take all" social darwinism, no black-white issues and white flight, no school issues, and higher rates of immigration. Hamilton, Windsor, Niagara Falls are still fairly poor and deprived, relatively speaking, but there's no obvious reason why people would flee. For what purpose? And where?

But even in the U.S., there are relatively few metros that have actually shrunk. Youngstown and a few others. Most of the rusty metros are just long-term stagnant.

[north 42]

Originally Posted by Crawford

I think there are some pretty obvious differences.

No Sunbelt, less "winner take all" social darwinism, no black-white issues and white flight, no school issues, and higher rates of immigration. Hamilton, Windsor, Niagara Falls are still fairly poor and deprived, relatively speaking, but there's no obvious reason why people would flee. For what purpose? And where?

But even in the U.S., there are relatively few metros that have actually shrunk. Youngstown and a few others. Most of the rusty metros are just long-term stagnant.

Windsor and those other cities are far from poor and deprived, especially compared to some of the rust belt cities in the States. They are all growing with relatively healthy economies. Metro Windsor is growing faster than it has in 30 years, adding about 5,000 new residents a year now. It was the third fastest growing metro in the country last year, with a 2.5% growth rate.


https://windsorstar.com/news/local-n...-latest-census