Is Chicago where NYC was 25 years ago?

[UPChicago]

Originally Posted by aquablue

Chicago won't ever follow NYC's trajectory. The South is the future for business and population growth and the NE is safe due to historical/trade reasons and NYC's presense. Chicago needs to find a way to make itself an appealing destination for tourism I believe as the future of business is the South. I don't see it as an inernational hub of investment due to the winters. If it reinvents it's image, addresses South African style segregation and crime, and develops some 'sex appeal' based on some cultural developments, I think it will have a brighter future. Cultural, artistic, etc is a good way for a city to become vibrant and reinvent itself. Great architecture can help, look at Bilbao. So, become hipster I suppose. Copy Brand Brookyn, etc.. Everyone loves a good hipster town.

you're kidding?

[creamcityleo79]

Originally Posted by UPChicago

you're kidding?

Right?!? I can't with the "South African style segregation"...clearly an ignorant comment!!! Yes, there is segregation in Chicago. But, there are diverse, thriving, booming, and up and coming neighborhoods, to be sure. Chicago needs to continue working on cleaning up the bad parts of the South Side Nd the West Side.

The best thing about Chicago is that it doesn't need me or anyone else to defend it! It is, to me, the quintessential American big city! It has it's problems and it's working on them. People are still dreaming big and people are still doing big things! Chicago isn't NYC and it doesn't have to be! Chicago has it's own brand and it's own trajectory...and, to me, that trajectory is mostly up!

[aquablue]

Originally Posted by creamcityleo79

Right?!? I can't with the "South African style segregation"...clearly an ignorant comment!!! Yes, there is segregation in Chicago. But, there are diverse, thriving, booming, and up and coming neighborhoods, to be sure. Chicago needs to continue working on cleaning up the bad parts of the South Side Nd the West Side.

The best thing about Chicago is that it doesn't need me or anyone else to defend it! It is, to me, the quintessential American big city! It has it's problems and it's working on them. People are still dreaming big and people are still doing big things! Chicago isn't NYC and it doesn't have to be! Chicago has it's own brand and it's own trajectory...and, to me, that trajectory is mostly up!

It's on the up you say now, but will it stay UP? I.e, French people still associate Chicago with Al Capone and Slaughterhouses. I saw that when Olympics were bidding and they interviewed the average Frenchman about Chicago. Is that the image you want the world to know you by? People overseas think of Chicago as a smaller NYC without the sex appeal known for its crime and pizza. You need a bilbao moment. Olympics, you should try again. Or build some big ass musuem with a starchitect's name on it. Do some radical urban adjustments, make it impossible for the global set to ignore you. Studies have shown that people are moving south to warmer climes and i'm sure the business will follow. chicago will retain it's large GDP and business base for a long time, but how long can it attract new business. People are biased towards warmer winters. To make sure Chicago's future is safe, and to really thrive in the future it needs to regenerate its image as a cultural hub, not just a business one. A tourism hub could form in Chicago if people overseas began to see it as a 'cool' city, not just the city of gangstesr, pizza, etc. The Spire being built is the first step, the second is developing and marketing your own "brand brooklyn' to the world. Chicago must become a focus for international investment, not just domestic, if it wants to become more than it is today and a true global city.

[mrnyc]

somewhere over on skyescraeperchronicles dot com there is a is manchester where london was 25yrs ago thread.

[memph]

I don't think starchitecture will help much. I think outside architecture circles, the Guggenheim is not that well known, maybe 75% of people don't know about it, 20% only know it's in Spain, 4% known it's in Bilbao and 1% known it's in Bilbao and know more about other aspects of the city as a result. Maybe it's more well known in Europe, but I think I've described relatively accurately what the situation is in Asia and in the Americas.

I would say that 80% of people who have access to a computer know that Chicago is a big American city, though they might not know much more. I don't think the crime issue is that well known outside Al Capone, but that was almost a century ago so most people (non-Americans) probably don't know if it's still an issue. Probably the only American city that non-Americans know for having crime is Detroit. Maybe New York because of all the NYPD/crime shows and maybe an out of date image of the city from the crack epidemic days. Even Canadians probably don't know much about the crime problem, it's more like Canadians know that crime can be an issue in most American cities, so if they're already planning on going to Chicago they might do a little research to check out what areas to avoid.

The big thing (imo) that makes a city well known is movies and tv. Especially for NYC, and especially since NYC has many noteworthy and memorable things to include in movies or make movies about.

I still think that Chicago and New York have many similarities, even if they're different. The difference between Chicago and the 2nd city of the mid-west (Detroit? St Louis? Minneapolis?) is huge, about the same as New York vs the 2nd cities of the Northeast. That's a pretty big deal, since the Midwest actually has a bit more people than the Northeast (although arguably New York is equally prominent over most than just the Northeast). Still, the Midwest has about 60-70 million people. That's also more than the area dominated by Atlanta (about 40 million). The rest of the USA (West, Texas, Florida) don't really have regionally dominant cities in the same way.

[Capsule F]

Originally Posted by i_am_hydrogen

Have you been to Chicago recently? Didn't think so....

Yes he has so whats your point?

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by memph

The rest of the USA (West, Texas, Florida) don't really have regionally dominant cities in the same way.

population wise, maybe not. but denver lords over a vast surface of the continent, and arguably seattle has traditionally been the capital of cascadia prior to the 90s resurgence of the dank port city on the columbia from being a rubbish strewn mill-town and that quaint canadian western milemarker built a few skyscrapers.

dallas has a hinterland over a portion of south-middle america that arguably extends across oklahoma into the sw end of missouri, which is a good spread.

i don't know how california works out, but one could get meta over los angeles.

[the urban politician]

Chicago makes Italian beef sandwiches and hot dogs better now than New York does now, and Chicago made Italian beef sandwiches and hot dogs better 25 years ago than New York did at the time.

So Chicago is ahead of the ball in that regard.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Chicago makes Italian beef sandwiches and hot dogs better now than New York does now, and Chicago made better Italitan beef sandwiches and hot dogs better 25 years ago than New York did at the time.

So Chicago is ahead of the ball in that regard.

(as new jersey donkey punches chicago)

[lio45]

Originally Posted by aquablue

I don't see it as an inernational hub of investment due to the winters.

I don't see a huge difference between NYC winters and Chicago winters in that aspect... I mean, if winter weather is that important to you, you'll be looking at places like San Diego and Miami. If not, then weather is not a primary concern.



"I couldn't bear Chicago winters any more, so I relocated to the Sunbelt" makes sense.

"I couldn't bear NYC winters any more, so I relocated to the Sunbelt" makes sense.

"I couldn't bear Chicago winters any more, so I relocated to NYC" makes no sense.

[Centropolis]

no, but there's a running joke in new york that "our winters weren't bad enough, so we built chicago."

it means nothing from an investment standpoint. just a bar joke.

[UPChicago]

Originally Posted by aquablue

It's on the up you say now, but will it stay UP? I.e, French people still associate Chicago with Al Capone and Slaughterhouses. I saw that when Olympics were bidding and they interviewed the average Frenchman about Chicago. Is that the image you want the world to know you by? People overseas think of Chicago as a smaller NYC without the sex appeal known for its crime and pizza. You need a bilbao moment. Olympics, you should try again. Or build some big ass musuem with a starchitect's name on it. Do some radical urban adjustments, make it impossible for the global set to ignore you. Studies have shown that people are moving south to warmer climes and i'm sure the business will follow. chicago will retain it's large GDP and business base for a long time, but how long can it attract new business. People are biased towards warmer winters. To make sure Chicago's future is safe, and to really thrive in the future it needs to regenerate its image as a cultural hub, not just a business one. A tourism hub could form in Chicago if people overseas began to see it as a 'cool' city, not just the city of gangstesr, pizza, etc. The Spire being built is the first step, the second is developing and marketing your own "brand brooklyn' to the world. Chicago must become a focus for international investment, not just domestic, if it wants to become more than it is today and a true global city.

I'm not sure what a "bilbao" moment means but Chicago already has a Frank Gehry, maybe you are ignorant to that fact? Chicago is also home to many "starchitects". Have you ever been to Chicago or New York?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

murders in Chicago are broadly distributed in the S and W sides. NYC or DC have had much higher murder rates than Chicago in the very recent past, yet the cities continued to thrive as most areas were nonviolent and safe.

Could you cite any point in time when the murder rate in NYC was higher than the murder rate in Chicago?

Because I don't think that was ever true. NYC has always had consistently lower crime and lower homicide rate, at least since we had reliable stats.

[streetline]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Could you cite any point in time when the murder rate in NYC was higher than the murder rate in Chicago?

Because I don't think that was ever true. NYC has always had consistently lower crime and lower homicide rate, at least since we had reliable stats.

The FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting DB says New York's murder rate was higher 1987-1990 (although they caution that comparisons between different cities may not be valid). It wasn't until the mid-90s that the murder rates really noticeably diverged.
And even Chicago's current rates are about half of what they were in the early 90s, it's just that New York has improved even more.
And Washington's murder rate is worse every year but 2012.

Murder rate*
Agency		1985 	 1986 	 1987 	 1988 	 1989 	 1990 	 1991 	 1992 	 1993 	 1994 	 1995 	 1996 	 1997 	 1998 	 1999 	 2000 	 2001 	 2002 	 2003 	 2004 	 2005 	 2006 	 2007 	 2008 	 2009 	 2010 	 2011 	 2012 
Washington	23.5	 31.0	 36.2	 59.5	 71.9	 77.8	 80.6	 75.2	 78.5	 70.0	 65.2	 73.1	 56.9	 49.7	 46.4	 41.8	 40.6	 45.9	 44.0	 35.8	 35.4	 29.1	 30.8	 31.4	 24.0	 21.9	 17.5	 13.9
Chicago		22.2	 24.8	 22.8	 22.0	 24.8	 30.5	 32.9	 33.1	 30.3	 33.1	 30.0	 28.6	 27.4	 25.6	 22.7	 21.8	 22.9	 22.1	 20.6	 15.5	 15.6	 16.4	 15.7	 18.0	 16.1	 16.0	 15.9	 18.5
New York	19.3	 22.0	 23.0	 25.8	 25.8	 30.7	 29.3	 27.1	 26.5	 21.3	 16.1	 13.4	 10.5	 8.6	 8.9	 8.4	 8.9	 7.3	 7.4	 7.0	 6.6	 7.3	 6.0	 6.3	 5.6	 6.6	 6.3	 5.1

[LouisVanDerWright]

Lol at this thread. For one thing, Chicago is not currently located on the island of Manhattan so, no, it literally isn't where NYC was 25 years ago. They are totally different cities with wildly different histories and strengths.

Now if you are asking if Chicago is poised for a renaissance like New York has had over the past 25 years then the answer is "maybe???". Chicago undoubtedly has the potential to boom or even explode over the past 25 years, but, as many have said, it would/will look totally different than what NYC has seen.

Chicago's biggest strength is in it's diversification and any boom will likely leverage that advantage. NYC has seen decades of growth driven by 1920's like financial debauchery. That is the primary driver of the NYC boom. If Chicago is to see 25 years of plummeting crime rates and widespread gentrification, then it is going to be much much more broad based than what NYC has seen and hopefully benefit a much larger portion of the population than the 1% driven boom in NYC.

Where I see the biggest potential here is the coming wave of integration between technology and the real world. Chicago has a lot of dominoes lined up to lead the digitization of the real world. I'm not talking social media bullshit, but rather the integration of computers into every aspect of modern life. This is what Obama's advanced manufacturing institute is focusing on. This is what a lot of Chicago tech startups are focusing on. Chicago has by far the most diversified economy out of any alpha city in the world and is the logical place for a mixing pot of industry and technology. Such a boom would mirror the boom that built this city in the first place and we certainly have the bones (infrastructure) to support it.

Of course any such boom along these lines would look absolutely nothing like the explosive revival of NYC over the past few decades and would certainly produce wholly unique results. As such, the premise of framing Chicago's next 25 years in the context of NYC's last 25 years is patently absurd.

[aquablue]

Chicago needs to market itself better to the rest of the world. You're not going to get tourists going to Chicago from around the world when they can just go to NYC or LA.

[Shawn]

Originally Posted by aquablue

Chicago needs to market itself better to the rest of the world. You're not going to get tourists going to Chicago from around the world when they can just go to NYC or LA.

This is the truest statement I've seen in this thread. At least from an APAC point of view.

We were recently tasked with promoting Nagoya to North American businesses. My first and last contribution to that engagement was "Nagoya is the Chicago of Japan." Some blank stares and silence follows, eventually someone says "where is Chicago?" I showed the Chicago skyline on our meeting room's projector. No recognition at all. "Uhhh, Michael Jordan? The Bulls? The Cubs?" That got some head nods.

These are all graduate degree holders who speak fluent English, btw. Chicago has no profile in this part of the world. Places like Boston and Vegas have substantially larger brands.

[10023]

Originally Posted by aquablue

Chicago won't ever follow NYC's trajectory. The South is the future for business and population growth and the NE is safe due to historical/trade reasons and NYC's presense. Chicago needs to find a way to make itself an appealing destination for tourism I believe as the future of business is the South. I don't see it as an inernational hub of investment due to the winters. If it reinvents it's image, addresses South African style segregation and crime, and develops some 'sex appeal' based on some cultural developments, I think it will have a brighter future. Cultural, artistic, etc is a good way for a city to become vibrant and reinvent itself. Great architecture can help, look at Bilbao. So, become hipster I suppose. Copy Brand Brookyn, etc.. Everyone loves a good hipster town.

Good idea. If only Chicago had some notable architecture like Bilbao.

This might be the single stupidest post I've ever seen in City Discussions. Carry on...

Originally Posted by Shawn

This is the truest statement I've seen in this thread. At least from an APAC point of view.

We were recently tasked with promoting Nagoya to North American businesses. My first and last contribution to that engagement was "Nagoya is the Chicago of Japan." Some blank stares and silence follows, eventually someone says "where is Chicago?" I showed the Chicago skyline on our meeting room's projector. No recognition at all. "Uhhh, Michael Jordan? The Bulls? The Cubs?" That got some head nods.

These are all graduate degree holders who speak fluent English, btw. Chicago has no profile in this part of the world. Places like Boston and Vegas have substantially larger brands.

I think that's generally true, but there isn't that much that a city can do, unfortunately. There are Chicago tourism billboards in the tube and elsewhere in London... and attracting more European tourists, especially Brits, is probably a better bang for the buck than trying to get the Japanese to the Midwest.

And really, secondary cities don't attract tourists anywhere... few tourists from outside of Europe go to Lyon, or to Hamburg, or to Manchester. Chicago is larger than all of those, and the US is big enough that it has more than one globally significant city, at least from an economic point of view. But a tourist that's flying over to "see America" and only has a week or two to travel probably isn't going to Chicago unless it's their second or third visit to the US. I don't see that changing - it's largely a product of being in the middle of the country. I also don't think it's terribly important to the overall health of the city.

[Kenmore]

no, Chicago's arrow is very clearly pointing down

[M II A II R II K]

People are more likely to hear about Chicago in a country where they speak English.