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Which Rust Belt city will make a big comeback first?


Which city will be first?  

72 members have voted

  1. 1. Which city?

    • Buffalo, NY
      1
    • Detroit
      13
    • Syracuse, NY
      0
    • Pittsburgh
      27
    • Cleveland
      9
    • Dayton, OH
      1
    • Flint/Saginaw, MI
      0
    • Newark, NJ
      4
    • Milwaukee, WI
      6
    • Toledo, OH
      0
    • New Haven, CT
      5
    • Gary, IN
      0
    • Other
      6


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Which rust belt/blue collar/industry city is going to make a serious comeback first???

These are rust belt cities that having been losing people, jobs, companies, etc. for years. Typically high crime rates. By comeback I mean serious comeback, not that they just stop losing population, but they become serious contenders in population, job growth, etc. They return to their 'glory days'...People, businesses start leaving places like Atlanta, Charlotte, Phoenix, Nashville, etc. to move there!

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I think New Haven has left it's rust belt history and has found a niche for itself as a college town. Downtown New Haven is home to Yale University and soon Gateway Community College and New Haven is home to Albertus Magnus College & Southern CT State University. And in West Haven is the University of New Haven and in Hamden is Quinnipiac University.

Yale has turned New Haven around. By becoming downtown New Haven's largest landlord Yale has attracted hundreds of new shops, clubs, theater, bars and restaurants to downtown New Haven. Tenants are even turned away by Yale and tenants have to meet certain guidelines such as staying open till at least 9:00pm. On a saturday afternoon downtown New Haven is filled with students, suburbanites, tourists and residents who are walking around...yes walking not driving and shopping, eating and visitng the theaters & museums.

New Haven has lost and continues to lose many manufactoring jobs....Winchester Repeating Arms offically closed a little while ago. The New Haven business scene is not as strong as it could be but it also never was...major corporations and a strong business scene are more of a Hartford, CT thing and the arts & cultural scene is now more New Haven.

A major project that will bring jobs to New Haven is the construction of a new Yale New Haven Hospital Cancer Center. New Haven is also home to the Gateway Redevelopment Project which will bring Gateway Community College to downtown. A few years ago IKEA opened. And downtown is home to hundreds of apartments & condos that werent started with a big public investment.

An article from the Boston Globe on New Haven's retail success.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/connectic..._of_its_dreams/

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Grand Rapids. I'm surprised it's not on the list, but maybe that's a good thing, since GR has never really been "down and out" to have to make a "comeback". You really shouldn't have Flint/Saginaw together, since they're not considered in the same Metro. Saginaw is traditionally grouped with Midland and Bay City.

But you probably already knew that. :D

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I was under the impression, also that Pittsburgh had been fairing rather well as of late. Especially downtown Pittsburgh.

Pittsburgh is at the tipping point. A couple new stadiums in the past few years were added. A couple proposals for a gambling complex and or new arena are in the works. It's going in the right direction. A couple more projects and things could really take off. None of the projects have been draws for many new residents or business yet. If a couple of those things happen then an official turning point will have been reached in my opinion.

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Is New Haven even a Rust Belt city?

I saw New Haven on the list so I responeded about it....I am not truly sure myself if New Haven is a rust belt city since rust belt cities are between New York City and Chicago. Although New Haven as well as Hartford were both big CT manufactoring cities that over the years have lost these jobs....some used to see a smoke cloud rise over Hartford from west of the city and other still remember the Pratt & Whitney rush hour (Pratt & Whitney is still in E. Hartford and is still part of Hartford based United Technologies). These were both big manufactoring cities but New Haven is a major educational base and city of the arts and Hartford has a big insurance/finanical services base of corporations so they have moved on whether are or aren't rust belt cities

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These were both big manufactoring cities but New Haven is a major educational base and city of the arts and Hartford has a big insurance/finanical services base of corporations so they have moved on whether are or aren't rust belt cities

That just made me think of another thread... If the two cities and surrounding metros were combined into one we'd have one GREAT city on our hands..

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Is New Haven even a Rust Belt city?

Yeah I wasn't too sure about that one, but since CT is heavy manufacturing and a lot of the cities have suffered over the years much like the well-known rust belt cities. I'm not even sure if New Haven would be the best pick out of CT, maybe more like Hartford? Maybe I should've added a second poll...New England Manufacturing Cities...

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Grand Rapids. I'm surprised it's not on the list, but maybe that's a good thing, since GR has never really been "down and out" to have to make a "comeback". You really shouldn't have Flint/Saginaw together, since they're not considered in the same Metro. Saginaw is traditionally grouped with Midland and Bay City.

But you probably already knew that. :D

Grand Rapids I've never really put in the same category as the others. They diversified a long time ago and haven't had anywhere near the problems of the other cities. I look at Lansing the same way, though I think Lansing is more like Flint/Sag/Detroit than GR, though it is a heavy manufacturing town, they have the capital and MSU so I don't think they would ever fall as bad as a true rust belt city can/has.

Yeah yeah I know Flint and Sag-nasty are diff metros, but I figured more people have heard of Flint, plus they're pretty close together and I think Sag has much more in common w/Flint than w/Midland and Bay City, and for the sake of less choices ;)

I did consider adding Kalamazoo/Battle Creek also...

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That just made me think of another thread... If the two cities and surrounding metros were combined into one we'd have one GREAT city on our hands..

Better yet if New Haven, Hartford and Springfield as well as their surrounding metros were combined we would have a great big city....we would have all the major corporations that are located in these cities as well as their suburbs, have great musueums, parks, and educational institutions

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BTW, the Rust Belt isn't a location, rather the economic focus of a city. There are rustbelt cities in every part of the country.

As for my pick, I don't really have a pick overall. There are quite a few aspects that will (or has) determined the comeback of these cities including public schools, downtown redevelopment, how well the neighborhoods have been kept up or invested in...these cities are ahead in some categories over others, and behind others in different categories.

For downtown redevelopment and revitalization, Cleveland (for the bigger cities) seems to have started theres quite a few years before the other big ones, and is thus further ahead. But, that's only one category.

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Didn't Cleveland alread come back once? Or was that just hype.

Hype. The Census Bureau named it the poorest city in the country last year. There have been efforts to improve downtown in recent years... but results have been mixed. Most of the city neighborhoods have remained in poor shape.

They did have a wonderful marketing campaign in the 90s, however. I'm sure Cleveland has experienced all-time highs in tourism in the last 10 years thanks to the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame (overrated), improved Cleveland Indians squad, new stadiums... and the city does have a rich theatre district.

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Pittsburgh is practically there already.

Agree. I am a bit biased because I live there, but that also means I see what's happening. The city's economy is quite diversified, and besides the stadiums we also have a new convention center, riverfront park, and a lot of other development. Most notably the downtown housing market is starting to really take off. The city is also a leader in "green" buildings.

I also think the population loss has leveled off. The numbers still show a small loss every year, but if you break it down, that isn't because people are leaving. It's just that we have a higher than average elderly population, so (not to sound morbid) more people are dying.

I keep hearing about people moving here from places like California to take advantage of the lower cost of living. That will almost certainly continue to happen, and possibly at a faster rate as more housing is added downtown.

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St. Louis maybe?

I wish I could edit the post, I would remove New Haven and add St. Louis.

My 1st natural homer choice would be Detroit. Reasons; SO SO SO MUCH potential...rich history, architecture, culture, etc. Lots and lots of money AROUND the city, in the burbs. GREAT sports teams, Super Bowl, etc. Going to be forced to diversify their economy, also just what they plan to do w/Tiger Stadium alone I think will be a huge boon to the area! Proximity to that other Michigan school in Ann Arbor. Negatives; the politicians who have largely been responsible for keeping the city down for so many decades, the indifference and apathy from the burbs, the us vs. them mentality, and the general declining state of the rest of MI.

Flint/Saginaw I would say similar reasons as Detroit but they are much smaller so some may be easier to make turnaround faster, but at the same time probably harder to attract the industry needed.

Other cities on the list, Milwaukee proximity to Chicago, proximity to Madison, on the lake...Seems to be doing pretty well already. Cleveland, they've done some great things to attract people, I don't think things are horrible there, but I think they're stuck in a status quo, I don't see any big turnarounds or booms there anytime soon. Pittsburgh, like previousely mentioned I think Pitt is already doing pretty decent, plus real estate being SO LOW there is a big plus. It has to be one of the best cities in the country to get real estate right now for a middle class family. Same for Syracuse & Buffalo. Toledo, Dayton, Gary, etc. really can't comment on, I would think Gary would turn around at some point being so close to Chicago, but I really don't know much about those cities as far as what they're doing for their future.

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I think the Pittsburgh housing situation is a little misunderstood. Yes you can get a cheap house but the reason may be because there is such a large stock of older homes there, including many rowhouses. I think if you look at prices for new homes and condos as opposed to the entire stock, or just existing homes, it is not nearly so cheap compared to other cities. So yes you can get a cheap house there, but you may not like it.

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I think the Pittsburgh housing situation is a little misunderstood. Yes you can get a cheap house but the reason may be because there is such a large stock of older homes there, including many rowhouses. I think if you look at prices for new homes and condos as opposed to the entire stock, or just existing homes, it is not nearly so cheap compared to other cities. So yes you can get a cheap house there, but you may not like it.

True.

It's still cheaper than most areas of the country, but not as cheap as it is reported to be.

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I voted for Newark because NYC and now even the NJ gold coast is getting too expensive to live there. Since there is a direct connection to NYC from Newark Penn Station, this helps the reinssance Newark is going through! Projects such as the McCarter Blvd resurfacing project/PNC arts center, Passaic River waterfront re-development and the new Devils arena is helping to put Newark on the right track.

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I voted for Newark because NYC and now even the NJ gold coast is getting too expensive to live there. Since there is a direct connection to NYC from Newark Penn Station, this helps the reinssance Newark is going through! Projects such as the McCarter Blvd resurfacing project/PNC arts center, Passaic River waterfront re-development and the new Devils arena is helping to put Newark on the right track.

I can see that....cities and towns near and far benefit from NYC. Cities in northern New Jersey such as Newark, Jersey City and Hoboken benefit greatly from their close proximity to the city, people commute from towns and cities in northern & central new jersey. In CT cities such as Bridgeport, Stamford and New Haven all benefit from their direct connection to midtown via the metro north railroad.

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