How a ‘Golden Era for Large Cities’ Might Be Turning Into an ‘Urban Doom Loop'

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Yeah Minneapolis....... Sports teams could prob use some improvement as well to help boost its national profile.

Well, the Vikings are currently 9-2, sitting atop the otherwise god-awful NFC North.

So there's that.

Originally Posted by homebucket

From growing bigger.

But it is growing respectably. The twin cities MSA grew by
10.3% last decade.

That's not white-hot growth, but very solid for a cold winter US metro area.

[homebucket]

Hmm interesting that’s pretty decent. How does that growth rate compare to that of other large (let’s say 2 million+) cold weather metros and average growth rate among all 2m+ US metros?

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by homebucket

From growing bigger. Like being one of the top 10 metros in population.

Minneapolis is growing, weather aside, the Twin Cities have one of the best qualities of life of any city, I certainly understand that is subjective and weather is a deal breaker for many, but the city is actually thriving under the radar. I don't think many living in Minneapolis want the metro to turn into some cold weather version of the Bay Area (not a knock on SF).

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

Minneapolis is growing, weather aside, the Twin Cities have one of the best qualities of life of any city, I certainly understand that is subjective and weather is a deal breaker for many, but the city is actually thriving under the radar. I don't think many living in Minneapolis want the metro to turn into some cold weather version of the Bay Area (not a knock on SF).

It sounds like you’re taking too much offense to what I said. I get that you like the weather but literally someone on the last page just said if it wasn’t so cold they would move back. Therefore that tells me that more people would be living there if the weather was warmer, since it does have all the other qualities you mention. I’m sure there’s many like you, but I’m sure there’s many like him too.

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by homebucket

It sounds like you’re taking too much offense to what I said. I get that you like the weather but literally someone on the last page just said if it wasn’t so cold they would move back. Therefore that tells me that more people would be living there if the weather was warmer, since it does have all the other qualities you mention. I’m sure there’s many like you, but I’m sure there’s many like him too.

I'm not offended, and I hate the weather (winter) here, i'm only here because my wife's family is here. My wife is born in Sweden and loves the weather. I'm off to a warmer climate as soon as my 2 year old daughter grabs her high school diploma, with or without my wife.

[AaronPGH]

Young people still want to live in cities. We are just going through a transition where the makeup of buildings and blocks are going to shift. Residential conversions could help create a lot of new housing, which would be a good thing in the end.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Hmm interesting that’s pretty decent. How does that growth rate compare to that of other large (let’s say 2 million+) cold weather metros and average growth rate among all 2m+ US metros?

Well, the first thing to note is that the twin cities are in their own category of cold among 2M+ US MSAs.

Yes, Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Boston can all get pretty damn cold too, but the twin cities' winters are another rung down on the cold ladder.


That said, here are how those 6 MSAs grew last decade:

Twin Cities: +10.3%
Boston: 8.5%
Detroit: +2.2%
Chicago: +1.7%
Pittsburgh: +0.6%
Cleveland: +0.5%

[Crawford]

A lot of northern city population loss is black population moving to the burbs or down South. Minneapolis doesn't have a big black population, and much of the black population is immigrant, with different migration patterns. So one would expect less urban outmigration.

Also, the Twin Cities have a giant geographic reach. College grads from the Dakotas, Iowa, etc. frequently end up there. There's no other big city. I don't think the cold matters when the newcomers are often coming from colder climes.

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by Yuri

Given Downtown LA behaved like this:

1990: 32,786
2000: 40,836 --- 24.5%
2010: 52,538 --- 28.7%
2020: 74,349 --- 41.5%

And we have a thread on the other section showing dozens and dozens towers rising up there, I don't see why you find it so outrageous someone saying Downtown LA is booming.

I was in downtown LA 2 weekends ago and it was totally hopping with people. Granted, I was there for the LA Auto Show and the American Music Awards just happened to be next door at the Microsoft Theater so it was a big collision of traffic and pedestrians. But the times I go downtown, there have always been enough people there to not make it look like a ghost town. And, I'm somehow able to avoid the tent villages.

[Reverberation]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

The leadership of democratic-run urban America is beyond pathetic . Fostering tent cities despite astronomical homeless spending , defund the police , babies in parks suffering from fentanyl overdoses (sf) , quality of life crimes no longer prosecuted , reduced sentencing for carjackings (dc) and petty theft because black people commit them , weed smoke at 830 in the morning (nyc) due to poorly planned mj legalization , lockdowns of schools for 1-2 years …

Re-read mau-mauing the flak catchers by Tom Wolfe to understand throw mentality . Not much has changed in 50 years

I don’t think cities are doomed , but well-run cities will crush poorly run cities in the next decade

The videos of smash and grab thieves moving up streets in SF one car at a time while the neighbors just yell at them from their windows are disturbing. A lot of the people in the PNW I know are very brand loyal to Democrats and either won’t make the connection or have convinced themselves that it’s just a normal tragic part of urban life. They don’t interact or converse with anyone outside of their cohort and live in the bubble. Basically the ultra left-wing city council level leaders are true-believers and are convinced that they are doing God’s work, so they’ll ride the wave as low as it takes us.

[Steely Dan]

well, the usual hyper-partisan axe-grinding ass-hats have dragged this one down into the CE toilet.

we've given you a toilet to vomit into to your heart's content.

fucking use it!