Your city's "favoured quarter"

[mrnyc]

^ liberal elites despise the middle class. they don't want to know about it, much less live near that.

[McBane]

This was already touched on but as a whole Philadelphia's "favored quarter" runs west/northwest of Center City. This is by design and goes back to William Penn's days as the city oriented itself west. The introduction of trains reinforced this.

While not contiguous, the area's most affluent areas (both present and past) can be found west/northwest of Center City and include parts of West Philadelphia, notably Powleton Village, Spruce Hill, Parkside, Wynnfield, and Overbrook. The latter two neighborhoods are adjacent to Lower Merion, which is the eastermost township of the Main Line, the metro's wealthiest suburbs.

To the northwest, you have the Art Museum area, Strawberry Mansion, East Falls, Germantown, Manyunk, West Mt. Airy, and Chestnut Hill. From there, you have Whitemarsh and Whitepain Townships in Montgomery County.

You also can include Fairmount Park. Prior to it being set aside as a park, the city's wealthiest built summer mansions here, such as this one.

[memph]

Originally Posted by McBane

This was already touched on but as a whole Philadelphia's "favored quarter" runs west/northwest of Center City. This is by design and goes back to William Penn's days as the city oriented itself west. The introduction of trains reinforced this.

While not contiguous, the area's most affluent areas (both present and past) can be found west/northwest of Center City and include parts of West Philadelphia, notably Powleton Village, Spruce Hill, Parkside, Wynnfield, and Overbrook. The latter two neighborhoods are adjacent to Lower Merion, which is the eastermost township of the Main Line, the metro's wealthiest suburbs.

To the northwest, you have the Art Museum area, Strawberry Mansion, East Falls, Germantown, Manyunk, West Mt. Airy, and Chestnut Hill. From there, you have Whitemarsh and Whitepain Townships in Montgomery County.

You also can include Fairmount Park. Prior to it being set aside as a park, the city's wealthiest built summer mansions here, such as this one.

Isn't Centre City wealthier than most of those neighbourhoods at this point though (except for Chestnut Hills and the suburban ones)?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by memph

Isn't Centre City wealthier than most of those neighbourhoods at this point though (except for Chestnut Hills and the suburban ones)?

Yeah, I would think Philly has something of a gap, if that's truly the "favored quarter". There's a big gap between Center City and Main Line, and places like Strawberry Mansion are pretty much urban ghetto.

[McBane]

^ Correct. But if you re-read my post, I had said that the area between Center City and the Main Line had many historically wealthy areas. Fairmount Park, before it became a park in the mid 19th century, was full of large estates; and places like Parkside and Strawberry Mansion, which today are blighted neighborhoods were in fact quite wealthy as shown in the Google StreetView links I posted.

The point was to show that Philadelphia had always oriented itself towards the west/northwest; even as some of those neighborhoods fell into decline. And in fact some of these areas have rebounded (like Fairmount, Powleton Village, and Manayunk); while others are currently being gentrified (like Brewerytown and Mantua).

And to this day, the wealthiest suburban communities are west and northwest of the Center City.

[Docere]

Has gentrification been more pronounced in the N/NW direction from Center City? I know the area around UPenn is pretty gentrified but the rest of West Philly is rather poor no?

My basic understanding of Philadelphia social geography is as follows: S is white ethnic working class (esp. Italian), N and W are mostly Black, NE is semi-suburban white ethnic Catholic and Jewish. Center City is generally affluent and Chestnut Hill in the NW is an affluent garden suburb in the city.

[McBane]

Mostly correct in the most general terms. Most gentrification is pushing northeast actually. From Old City (1990's) and along the El into NoLibs (early 2000's) into Fishtown and now creeping into parts Kensington and even Port Richmond. There's also gentification happening in South Philly and the boundaries of "University City" is pushing west and north.

Gentrification is pushing northwest from Fairmount and the Art Museum neighborhood into Brewerytown, but it's in its infancy and still has a long way to go before it reaches East Falls. In my opinion, Strawberry Mansion, a once wealthy area, is too blighted and the area is too large to see widespread gentrification.

Most of Northwest Philadelphia is already stable and middle class, so you can't really gentrify. East Falls, Manayunk and Roxborough declined a little bit but since the 1990's have attracted college students and young professionals. Chestnut Hill has always been wealthy and so is West Mt. Airy. Germantown is starting to see a renaissance. Young professionals who are ready to purchase a home but are priced out of other neighborhoods have found Germantown to be an excellent value.

[Docere]

Yeah, I forgot about the Kensington area. I guess that's "near northeast" (as oppossed to the more suburban Far NE?)

[Docere]

Bachelor's degree or higher:

Westchester 46.1%
Fairfield 45.5%
Nassau 42.3%
Suffolk 33.5%

Graduate or professional degree:

Westchester 22.7%
Fairfield 20%
Nassau 19%
Suffolk 15.1%

College graduates (white, not Hispanic):

Westchester 56.3%
Fairfield 53.9%
Nassau 46.8%
Suffolk 37%

Per capita income:

Fairfield $49,688
Westchester $48,487
Nassau $42,949
Suffolk $33,756

Per capita income (white, not Hispanic):

Westchester $64,730
Fairfield $62,163
Nassau $51,067
Suffolk $43,285

[Docere]

Thinking of the example of Cleveland where the east side of town is poorer but the eastern suburbs are the most desirable.

Neither the west side or the east side is particularly well-off - few affluent people live in Cleveland proper. But the east side is definitely the poorer part of town. Was that always the case, or when there was still wealth in the city the east side was wealthier but just deteriorated more afterwards?

[SignalHillHiker]

It's the East End that's favored here, and I've no idea why. It's infamously foggier than other areas of the city, mostly generic suburbia, but it's the neighbourhood with the upper class, snobby reputation - and all the parody Twitter accounts, etc.



I think it's mainly because the old Central Slum (bulldozed in the 1950s) dominated the western end of the core. It had dilapidated rowhouses with dirt floors and public fountains and all of that - and it was ringed by a lot of the industrial buildings in the city.

I don't think the prevailing winds were a problem because what we consider "West" and "East" is actually just left and right of the harbourfront. It's closer to north and south.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Docere

Thinking of the example of Cleveland where the east side of town is poorer but the eastern suburbs are the most desirable.

Neither the west side or the east side is particularly well-off - few affluent people live in Cleveland proper. But the east side is definitely the poorer part of town. Was that always the case, or when there was still wealth in the city the east side was wealthier but just deteriorated more afterwards?

I suspect the East Side was wealthier back before white flight. Cleveland's East Side still has lots of big, roomy homes, likely built for upper middle class types, though most of these neighborhoods became ghetto.

I think the black population followed the Jewish population, a common pattern in many U.S. cities. Jews were upwardly mobile and more likely to rent/sell to blacks, so there was constant churn. You see the same thing on the West Side of Detroit. The traditional black movement out of the city follows the previous Jewish path.

[memph]

Euclid Ave was known for it's great mansions. Not sure if that's the whole stretch east of downtown or just a certain section of it though. University Circle and Shaker Square are still pretty desirable areas in the east side. St Clair-Superior was apparently still fairly middle class in 1970, as was Collingwood and Lee-Miles.

[Docere]

St. John's seems to be the exception to the rule in Canadian cities (though this "rule" was established before 1949).

Almost every Canadian city has a more favorable west side. The exception really is Toronto where the north was historically affluent and both the east and west were mostly working class.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by memph

Euclid Ave was known for it's great mansions. Not sure if that's the whole stretch east of downtown or just a certain section of it though. University Circle and Shaker Square are still pretty desirable areas in the east side. St Clair-Superior was apparently still fairly middle class in 1970, as was Collingwood and Lee-Miles.

It's not uncommon where the worst U.S. ghettos of today were formerly upper-middle class favored quarters. I suspect this is the case in East Cleveland (which is still the favored directional, by far).

In Detroit, some of the toughest neighborhoods are in NW Detroit, yet many of the residential neighborhoods are quite obviously built for the upper middle class. Spacious brick homes with lots of flourishes; often even accessory maids quarters and the like.

Detroit's Dexter Davison neighborhood, one of the toughest in the city, and one that was just crazy during the 1980's crack wars, still has some decent residential blocks. This was an old WASP neighborhood, then went Jewish after WW2, and after the Jews moved further out, middle class blacks replaced them (1960's). By 1985 or so, poor blacks had replaced the middle class and the neigborhood was awful.

But even today, many residential blocks in Dexter Davison show hints of past affluence. This block, while in bad shape, was obviously built for professionals, and is two blocks from perhaps the most infamous drug intersection in Detroit. If this block were off Yonge in Toronto, the homes would all go for well over $1 million, and it would be a yuppie block crammed with Audis and Lululemon moms instead of Crack Central.

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.3880...7i13312!8i6656

[Docere]

Harlem, the South Bronx, Roxbury, North Lawndale etc. used to be Jewish neighborhoods.

[Docere]

Toronto's "favored quarter" is quite evident on this map:

https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/up..._AvgFamInc.pdf

[10023]

^ Chicago isn’t much of a mystery either. Is this the most obvious of any major city?

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by Docere

St. John's seems to be the exception to the rule in Canadian cities (though this "rule" was established before 1949).

Almost every Canadian city has a more favorable west side. The exception really is Toronto where the north was historically affluent and both the east and west were mostly working class.

The affluent area of Halifax is the south end. If you consider downtown Toronto as south, it too has an affluent south although you'll see public housing next to $2-3 million homes. In the downtown core it's not uncommon to see the rich and poor living side by side but most of the downtown is affluent.

[Docere]

I don't consider downtown Toronto to be the city's south end/side or whatever.

And most of the rich aren't downtown anyway.