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I lived in a pretty rough part of Oakland for six months in '07, corner of San Pablo and Mead. It was an interesting experience to say the least, and one I'd prefer to never rehash.
Uh. None of the above?
The question is very widespread - but I think I get what you're asking.
The only city who's ghettos I am even remotely familiar(and by ghetto I mean "in the process of gentrifying", I don't think I've set foot in the most dangerous areas) is Philly's. If I had to live in what is typically considered a "dangerous neighborhood", I'd feel safest(though not really safe) in Kensington/fringier areas of Fishtown, or around the Temple area.
In Kens/Fishtown the area is fairly racially diverse, and I would not stick out like a sore thumb - which would liken my chances of becoming a target. Additionally, the violence is concentrated to the drug trade - which is a huge problem and there is still incidences of random violence, but I feel like as long as you isolated yourself from that, you'd have less of a problem.
I go to Temple, and the area on campus is safe. Even directly off campus there are whole blocks of students who have rented houses - I know a few who even live outside these student blocks and while it's not exactly a cakewalk(floodlights, security system, bars on window are necessary), they have not run into problems. I feel like I could deal with this, especially because I know the area fairly well block by block.
Camden, though? Nah. The two areas above are on the rise, albeit slowly - universities are a great way to pump revenue and development into an area, and Fishtown is gentrifying very very rapidly, prices are rising, and people have already spilled over into the fringe areas and Kensington in search of cheaper housing, so it's pretty inevitable that the gentrification will spill over too.
In terms of living in a ghetto/slum period I would avoid some place that had a large gang problem or large instances of random violence - Philly does not really have a gang problem. Though a couple of my friends were riding bikes and were approached by a bunch of teenagers stating they were in a gang and wanted to "race them" for their bikes LOL(hey, that's a lot more polite than the alternative).
Where do I feel the safest? I guess plenty of suburbs and rural areas that I've been to, especially some that are heavily middle to upper class...though there are too many to name (I don't even remember all the names). Basically, the kind of places where violent crime is a rare thing, and where you can leave possessions in the front yard and know they will likely still be there in the morning...which excludes basically all big cities and tons more suburbs/smaller cities.
But, my threshold for relative lack of "safety" is pretty high compared to what i consider the"safest", otherwise I wouldn't be able to live anywhere aside from a shack in the woods with my own personal medical team and bodyguards.
I haven't been to many of those cities, but Houston's ghettos feel like a walk in the park compared to others.
I always wondered what Houston would look like if they had zoning and their city limits was as large as regular cities. What would 5th Ware and most of Northeast Houston inside the loop look like.
I always wondered what Houston would look like if they had zoning and their city limits was as large as regular cities. What would 5th Ware and most of Northeast Houston inside the loop look like.
NE Houston looks a mess; I believe 5th Ward didn't look as rustic as it does today back than.I've seen older pictures of it. NE Houston appeared to be more developed. The ghettos of Houston are nothing like what they were years ago [which is great; less crime]. I knew about 5th Ward/Gulfton from personal experience, but I heard 3rd Ward and other parts of SE Houston were bad as well.
NE Houston looks a mess; I believe 5th Ward didn't look as rustic as it does today back than.I've seen older pictures of it. NE Houston appeared to be more developed. The ghettos of Houston are nothing like what they were years ago [which is great; less crime]. I knew about 5th Ward/Gulfton from personal experience, but I heard 3rd Ward and other parts of SE Houston were bad as well.
I remember going to 5th Ward/ and South Park/Sunnyside back in the 90s all the time. They were bad. But they didn't touch Baltimore or DC or New Orleans of that time period. I guess the less density you have, the better it looks. Could be wrong.
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