Great Lakes Cities

[Steely Dan]

^ most people everywhere are abject idiots when it comes to geography.

Hell, I wouldn't even be surprised if most Chicagoans couldn't correctly point out Lake Huron on a blank map of north America.

[iheartthed]

I grew up in Michigan, and I'm probably 90th percentile level good at geography, and even I have to think for a second about where Huron is located. It's like the Jan Brady of the Great Lakes.

[subterranean]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ most people everywhere are abject idiots when it comes to geography.

Hell, I wouldn't even be surprised if most Chicagoans couldn't correctly point out Lake Huron on a blank map of north America.

True. However, I work in a field where both me and my coworkers use geography daily for our jobs and even they struggle with Midwest geography.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by subterranean

I have a theory that west coasters are so convinced that they live in the best place in the US that literally nowhere else matters, so they just have no interest in learning.

I've heard people remark that San Francisco transplants seem to be the most insufferable of all, since the region has never really recovered from being surpassed in size and importance by Los Angeles. LA doesn't even care. It's a completely one-sided rivalry. So SF takes its anger out on the rest of the United States. It's similar to how Boston people like to point out the things they have that NYC does not.

[mrnyc]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

It's similar to how Boston people like to point out the things they have that NYC does not.

what would that be other than casual racism?



its a joke !

[The North One]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I grew up in Michigan, and I'm probably 90th percentile level good at geography, and even I have to think for a second about where Huron is located. It's like the Jan Brady of the Great Lakes.

Are you serious? Huron is enormous. Extremely obvious on a map of NA.

[Crawford]

To me, Michigan and Huron are the most prominent Great Lakes. They were always the yin and yang Great Lakes, growing up in MI. Visiting the Great Lakes meant Michigan or Huron. Michigan was for the professional class, Huron for the working class.

Superior is in the middle of nowhere and unswimmable, beautiful but way too far from everything, Erie is a polluted pond, and Ontario is fine but geographically located too close to the ocean and too far from the Great Lakes core for regional prominence.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

To me, Michigan and Huron are the most prominent Great Lakes. They were always the yin and yang Great Lakes, growing up in MI. Visiting the Great Lakes meant Michigan or Huron. Michigan was for the professional class, Huron for the working class.

For me it was lakes Michigan and Erie. Yes, Erie was a polluted mess, but it is also the closest Great Lake to the Detroit area. Honestly, I didn't know people actually visit Huron for recreation. I've only ever seen it on trips to Mackinac Island.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

For me it was lakes Michigan and Erie. Yes, Erie was a polluted mess, but it is also the closest Great Lake to the Detroit area. Honestly, I didn't know people actually visit Huron for recreation. I've only ever seen it on trips to Mackinac Island.

Really? Lake Huron, much moreso than Lake Michigan, even, is basically an unbroken corridor of cottages for much of its length. Those cottages are mostly owned by families from Metro Detroit, often passed down over generations. Towns like Tawas, Oscoda, Harrisville are cottage country.

Lake Michigan has much more protected lakefront, and doesn't really have lots of beachside cottages, at least not Up North.

I never heard of Michiganders having cottages on Erie. Growing up, it didn't even feel like a "real" Great Lake. It was more like Lake St. Clair. A super shallow lake with dubious water quality. That giant nuclear power plant was the biggest Erie landmark.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Really? Lake Huron, much moreso than Lake Michigan, even, is basically an unbroken corridor of cottages for much of its length. Those cottages are mostly owned by families from Metro Detroit, often passed down over generations. Towns like Tawas, Oscoda, Harrisville are cottage country.

Lake Michigan has much more protected lakefront, and doesn't really have lots of beachside cottages, at least not Up North.

Yeah, my family's property was in the northwest LP. We had neighbors that owned a farm somewhere outside of Port Huron, but otherwise I've never spent much time east of I-75 and north of I-69.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

I never heard of Michiganders having cottages on Erie. Growing up, it didn't even feel like a "real" Great Lake. It was more like Lake St. Clair. A super shallow lake with dubious water quality. That giant nuclear power plant was the biggest Erie landmark.

Yeah, there are no cottages on Erie to my knowledge. But if you go to Cedar Point every summer it's kind of hard to miss.

[jmecklenborg]

The islands out in the middle of Lake Erie are a lot of fun, and Cedar Point of course is one of the most unique places in the United States. Otherwise, I haven't seen any spot on Lake Erie (or Lake Ontario) that equals the three upper lakes.

I haven't been there but many blue bloods in Ohio once owned small islands on the Canadian side of Lake Huron: https://www.google.com/maps/place/La...16zL20vMGRnbTA

I heard from a descendent of one of these families that in the late 1800s and up until about WWII, many of the wealthy families took a two week vacation at the same time, with the whole group having dinner on different islands every evening.

Obviously, Lake Huron was much closer to Ohio than the famous east coast vacation areas, but one of my great-grandmothers was a nanny to a wealthy family in Cincinnati for about 15 years and they owned a vacation home in Rhode Island that she traveled to many times.

This really illustrated to me how the wealthy families in the Midwest were at a networking disadvantage back then since traveling to Rhode Island, Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, etc., was a major trip. By comparison, no wealthy families from NYC or Boston was vacationing on the Great Lakes.

[Wigs]

First off, Crawford, to compare Lake Erie to Lake St. Clair. gimme a break
Might want to check a map to see the size difference. Yeah the depth is shallow, but unless you're into deep lake diving for shipwrecks does it matter?
It's still great for boating and fishing, even swimming...if one stays away from the Western end in the vicinity of Toledo.



Erie was a polluted mess, now the major source of pollution is agricultural fertilizer runoff that ends up getting into the Western end of the Lake near Toledo and causing algae blooms! Thanks Indiana/Michigan/Ohio

On the North shore of Lake Erie it's always been a popular beachfront. A lot of larger lakefront cottages/homes routinely sell for over $1 Million. The most expensive ones can go for upwards of $3M-$4M.
Near Fort Erie at one time the cottages had a high percentage of owners from Buffalo/Western NY.
Even today they have a century old plus gated community called Point Abino. It's a source of contention because the Point Abino lighthouse access is within the gated community and only open to the public a handful of times a year.

https://www.monroenews.com/story/new...d/69858414007/


The Maumee River watershed is a major source of the agricultural runoff causing algae blooms on the western end of Lake Erie

https://www.researchgate.net/publica...ake_Erie_Basin

It should be noted that the Lake's water retention time is the shortest, so if pollution is cleaned up elsewhere Lake Erie will have a fresh supply of clean water every 2.6 years


mongodb import geojson
https://www.researchgate.net/publica...ake_Erie_Basin

[Wigs]

once in a blue moon I'll buy a "dream ticket" for the lottery when the jackpot goes up high in Canada (say $70M CAD). odds are 1 in 33,300,000 as opposed to America's Powerball 1 in 292,000,000 "I'll get 292 million tickets please"

Abino Hills (not the gated Point Abino) in Niagara would be where I'd build my dream estate away from the riff raff
• Video Link

https://goo.gl/maps/bsJU243pxerp7JEW6

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Crawford

To me, Michigan and Huron are the most prominent Great Lakes. They were always the yin and yang Great Lakes, growing up in MI. Visiting the Great Lakes meant Michigan or Huron. Michigan was for the professional class, Huron for the working class.

Superior is in the middle of nowhere and unswimmable, beautiful but way too far from everything, Erie is a polluted pond, and Ontario is fine but geographically located too close to the ocean and too far from the Great Lakes core for regional prominence.

In Ontario, the relationship is flipped. Lake Huron is considered the recreational lake, since we're on the leeward eastern side with the nice beaches and the evening sunsets. It's like what Lake Michigan is for Michiganders. Also, there's a distinction between Lake Huron and Georgian Bay, which is even more recreation-focused.

Lake Ontario is the central lake, given where the population is, but it's the industrial lake that you want to look at but not swim in. There are beaches, but they're on the eastern end. A lot of cities on Lake Ontario turn their back to the lake and line their lakefront with industry or abandoned land.

Lake Erie doesn't have as many negative connotations for us as it does on the American side. There are no major towns on the Canadian side, and there are some underrated beaches that most Torontonians don't bother going to. I think it plays a similar role to Lake Huron for Michiganders.

Superior is the same: the giant, beautiful, far away lake and Lake Michigan is, of course, completely off our radar.

[subterranean]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

In Ontario, the relationship is flipped. Lake Huron is considered the recreational lake, since we're on the leeward eastern side with the nice beaches and the evening sunsets. It's like what Lake Michigan is for Michiganders. Also, there's a distinction between Lake Huron and Georgian Bay, which is even more recreation-focused.

Lake Ontario is the central lake, given where the population is, but it's the industrial lake that you want to look at but not swim in. There are beaches, but they're on the eastern end. A lot of cities on Lake Ontario turn their back to the lake and line their lakefront with industry or abandoned land.

Lake Erie doesn't have as many negative connotations for us as it does on the American side. There are no major towns on the Canadian side, and there are some underrated beaches that most Torontonians don't bother going to. I think it plays a similar role to Lake Huron for Michiganders.

Superior is the same: the giant, beautiful, far away lake and Lake Michigan is, of course, completely off our radar.

Great points!

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Superior is the same: the giant, beautiful, far away lake and Lake Michigan is, of course, completely off our radar.

The problem with Lake Superior is that you have to drive past a lot of other great things to get to it. It's just too far to do a weekend there for most people.

I know a fair number of people who have been to Isle Royale, and one of my relatives worked as a ranger on the island one summer. It is incredibly far away from everything - 200 miles from the Mackinaw Bridge and 500 miles north of Chicago.

If you're in Chicago, it basically takes two days to get on the island - a day to drive to Copper Harbor, then all morning on the ferry to get out there by noon or so. Then you only have a few hours to hike before you have to set up camp. It's not worth going through all of that to camp for just one or two nights.

[subterranean]

Weird thing about Isle Royale is that although it certainly is super far away from most places in Michigan, it's only about 30 miles away from Thunder Bay and 23 miles from Grand Portage, MN.

When I was planning a road trip a couple of years ago I was considering it as a destination and I definitely would've come at it from the Minnesota/Canada side. It seemed like the remotest place in the lower 48 to me until I realized that.

[suburbanite]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

In Ontario, the relationship is flipped. Lake Huron is considered the recreational lake, since we're on the leeward eastern side with the nice beaches and the evening sunsets. It's like what Lake Michigan is for Michiganders. Also, there's a distinction between Lake Huron and Georgian Bay, which is even more recreation-focused.

Ya it is crazy to hear the Michigan perspective if you grew up in Ontario. I think it would be fair to say that Huron makes up like 75% of Great Lakes related recreation for Southern Ontarians. Not to mention Georgian Bay is basically a separate Great Lake in of itself (and the best part of all of them in my unbiased opinion of course). From Grand Bend to Sauble Beech to the Bruce Peninsula and from Wasaga beach to Parry Sound up on Georgian Bay, it dominates the summer recreational season. Even in the winter Collingwood is probably one of the biggest destinations in the province with Blue Mountain.

[subterranean]

I guess Wisconsinites probably view Lake Michigan as Michiganders view Lake Huron and Ontarians view Lake Ontario since Wisconsin doesn't have a leeward side? But maybe since it's their only lake they appreciate it all the same.