Lorain is a Joke (Columbus, Cleveland: high school, living in, dangerous)

[BelieveInCleve]

Originally Posted by s_pjr

Cle440, yea some of those numbers sound a bit more accurate, I was estimating based on numbers I had seen last year. The southside of Elyria, if it were it's own city would look like crime was out of control, but like you said as a whole city it's not too bad. Canton is a rough area, but in terms of homocides it's not to bad, but drug use there is pretty bad. We can't forget Toledo either, the crime rate and murdre rate there is rising year after year.

That last part is also false too. Toledo has about 290,000 people and only had 12 murders last year...so East Cleveland with less than 1/10th the population actually had the same amount as murders as Toledo. That was well below average murders, but Toledo is not that bad with crime.

[TheCLE]

The over exagerration on this thread is hilarious, from all sides (Hamilton, Lorain, Elyria, Cincinnati, Cleveland, etc.)

Face it, everybody who has posted a "my city is tougher than yours" thread on here isn't in the street doing work. You're watching/reading from afar and talking about all the negative and ignoring the positives. Say what you want, you wouldn't be posting on here if you were doing the work. And yes, there are positives in every neighborhood, even in the "ghettos" of Lorain, Hamilton, Elyria, East Cleveland, Youngstown, whatever city has been mentioned here.

Threads like this are pointless.

For example, if I read this without having ever been there, I'd be scared to death to venture into the southside of Elyria to visit my mother and father in-law who live in the heat of "Thug City" seeing how Cle440 continually talks about the neighborhood. How did my wife ever make it from that environment? I won't say out, because we are still down there every week. We have friends/family that live in South Park. And to bring it to Cleveland, nobody from my neighborhood (130th and Bellaire) is posting how tough it is, but why can we go back there and not worry about being shot? ****, even my wife will admit, 130th and Bellaire is a tougher neighborhood than southside of Elyria.

But 440, I have to call you out more. Is the southside tough. Yes. Is it what you make it out to be. No.

Gunshots every night, or even every week? Hardly. Occassional violence, well, yes. Just like there is in the neighorbood I grew up in. You brought up the Gas USA killing. Yeah that was horrible. But that was months ago, and since then? What other murders was there?

If it was really as rough as you make it out to be gun shots would be an common occurance. It isn't. From what I've read on here, you keep on bringing up the Gas USA killing, but I already broke it down months ago, when it occurred. It wasn't somebody from the southside that did the shooting. It was a dude from Chicago. Unfortunately, there are a lot of out of towners (or first generation southsiders) that commit a lot of the crime out there, but that case doesn't exemplify the southside, as much as you want to believe it to be true. Fact is, most of the people who are from the southside CARE about their neighborhood. Believe it or not.

[BelieveInCleve]

Im sorry, but I have to call you out a little more. I actually grew up and spent half my childhood on the southside through the late 80s-early 00s. I can tell you I barely exaggerated anything on here, maybe told the bad and no good, but no exaggerations. I dont want to start snitching on myself, but at one point I was out in the street doing "work" you could say. I wouldnt consider myself a "gangster" or a drug dealer or anything but I was a "thug" by all means, it was all I knew from growing up in poverty in these areas and thats what nearly everyone in these neighborhoods my age was doing.

I should have been more specific about the gun violence on the southside. It wasnt a nightly thing, but there were "hot" periods of days or a few weeks when you could hear gunshots almost every night, I have heard several rounds of gunfire in one night many times. On the topic of the southside, you really have to be on the street to know the amount of activity that goes on out there, I can tell you when I started it was a huge shock to me. Ive seen bricks of drugs being caried around like its nothing, Ive seen ameteur hustlers pull out $5,000 on the spot from just a couple days of drug dealing, Ive seen stores robbed, others beaten up for being "white" or not from the southside (Im not joking, I got my pass because Im half puerto rican and from there, whites only got a pass if they were from there in these situations), Ive seen guns pulled out. Hell, late one night I was chased down a street off Middle Ave by a "drunk crackhead" and directly shot at several times, just because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was shot at two other times in my life in Lorain, and I will tell you, even though thank god I wasnt hit, It was one of the scariest moments of my life. These events did give me a lot more negative impression of both the hood in Elyria and Lorain. Im not saying the southside is the worst place in america, but Ive been off Superior/E85th in Cleveland for a short time among plent of other ghettos, and the southside is still pretty rough, but nothing compared to that. The Southside isnt unique for these activities, most actual hoods and ghettos are like that to some degree or a lot worse, but the hood is the hood. For an area as small and with as little people as the southside to average 1-3 (or even have 1) murders per year is horrible, its worse than even Clevelands average city homicide rate.

There is out of towners, because most the residents of the southside have family from bigger cities, just like anywhere. Also the southside is 70% rentals so there is people moving in and out all the time. But first hand, the majority of the crime on the southside is commited by residents and people who grew up there. Ive seen there become less and less sense of community and decency on the southside, Ive also seen the southside become less and less white, and more and more in poverty. Ive also seen the land values decrease over the years when everywhere else was increasing, and this is before the recession and everything thats going on now. Lately, to me the crime seems lower and the neighborhood is a little quieter though. I could be wrong, but thats what it seems like. One of my good friends lives near 12th street, so I still hear a lot. Central Lorain is just like the southside except the activity is a little higher and the neighborhood is a lot more decayed. To start out, this thread was just talking about the bad and with Lorain, I made it to discus that and get opinions. So I wouldnt consider any of what I said an exaggeration but I may have given the impression that that there was no good people or nothing good at all in these neighborhoods, there is still some good and good people, but it would be very wrong for me to act like none of these crimes ever happened.

[BelieveInCleve]

Here are the stats for what I was saying about the murder rate. If you check the census, the southside of Elyria (S of 6th, excluding Colonial Oaks) contained a little less than 5,000 people. Elyria has lost people, especially in the southside, so we can make a estimate of no more than 4,500 people today. The Southside averages near 2 murders a year, so that would give it an average homicide rate of 44/per 100k, the same as Detroits average rate, thats very bad. The US average rate is only 4/per 100k...Cleveland averages about 27/per 100k a year, also very bad. There were also years recently when the southside had 3 murders or more, that made the rate 67/per 100k. Also, compared to the Elyria city average, thats horrible. The entire city of Elyria averages about 3-4 murders per year, at a rate of 6/per 100k. Im not trying to make the southside look worse than it is, as you can see its no exagerration.

The worst areas of Central and South Lorain average around the same rate as South Elyria. The entire city of Lorain averages about 7 murders a year making the rate 10/per 100k. This might sound like giberrish to some people, but what its doing is proving my point and that I wasnt lying or exagerrating about anything. All I was saying is that these areas are rough, because some people kept doubting it and exagerrating about other areas, without having any idea what they were talking about.

[armstrong]

hey, i grew up in berea (suburb about 10 minutes west of cleveland) and ghettos are kinda interesting to me, because i've never been exposed to them. it's a different lifestyle. i gotta few questions....

is lorain as bad as the west side of cleveland in terms of crime AND urban decay? i've been through almost all of the east side of cleveland and it is very blighted out there. i've been through some parts of the west side and it's not all that bad, but still decayed. never been through lorain or south elyria. would like to check it out sometime

also, do you guys have any photos of lorain or elyria or even hamilton for that matter?

[BelieveInCleve]

Originally Posted by armstrong

hey, i grew up in berea (suburb about 10 minutes west of cleveland) and ghettos are kinda interesting to me, because i've never been exposed to them. it's a different lifestyle. i gotta few questions....

is lorain as bad as the west side of cleveland in terms of crime AND urban decay? i've been through almost all of the east side of cleveland and it is very blighted out there. i've been through some parts of the west side and it's not all that bad, but still decayed. never been through lorain or south elyria. would like to check it out sometime

also, do you guys have any photos of lorain or elyria or even hamilton for that matter?

Lorain is not as bad as the westside of the city of Cleveland as a whole, no. Lorain does contain the worst areas in the Cleveland metro that are west of the city though. There are areas in Central and South Lorain that are comparable to the bad areas of the westside of Cleveland though in crime. The decay also. Central Lorain is very decayed, as is part of South Lorain.

If you are ever planning on seeing the areas, Ill tell you the best places to go through for what you want to see. It is the ghetto though, so you always have to be careful, be respectful, dont act like an obvious out of towner or an ignorant person, dont do anything stupid. In Lorain the worst areas are part of Central/Westside and South Lorain. The most decayed areas are in central, although there are other decayed areas throughout other areas of the city. The worst area crime-wise in Lorain is also in Central Lorain. For Elyria, the most decayed areas is tied between a more industrial area on the westside, and the southside, but its not all that bad. The worst areas crime-wise are on the southside. The southside is without a doubt the worst area overall though, but a lot of houses in the area have been fixed up so it doesnt look as bad as it did before. Decay-wise, Lorain is like 10X worse than Elyria, Elyria actually has decent people running the city unlike Lorain. Crime-wise, I did the city-data formula, and came up with about 780 for Lorain (as a whole) and about 500 for Elyria, so there is obvious differences there also. Both the cities also have decent areas though, but there are definitely official ghettos in both.

[Buckeye 89]

smh at treating "ghettos" like the zoo. remember don't feed them, they might bite

[s_pjr]

This thread is kind of pointless. THe fact is yes Lorain and Elyria have it's bad moments, sure the poverty rate is high, there are some dilapidated buildings and such, but oh well it's a part of life. As for teh person who said that the people on this thread know nothing of the streets and what not. How do you know who any of us are and where we have came from or what we have done in our lives? I know nothing about you and you know nothnig about me so lets keep it at that, don't attack someone personaly, it is completely pointless. As for the numbers, per capita is some bull****, look at total numbers. Per capita would make any place look like a ****ing warzone. If you say 67 per 100k thats great, but Elyria and Lorain don't have 100k people so. . .

[BelieveInCleve]

Yes, sadly this thread has turned very pointless. Just like most the arguments that take place in the Ohio forum, the argument that ruined this thread started because certain people had no clue what they were talking about. A few others along the way didnt know what they were talking about either, no offense. Thats why I keep stressing this so much, if you dont know what you are talking about on a certain topic or know little about it, please dont talk about it. That would save all of us in the Ohio forum a lot of time.

I may have been a little harsh on the first post of this thread, but I was really annoyed. You have to understand where Im coming from on that. I made this thread for a good reason, to discuss Lorain and the poor choices it has made and it what it could have done better. If any of you grew up in Lorain or anyplace similar to it that made very similar poor choices, you would understand very well the reason I feel this way and made the thread. Also the development of the city, and what else is happening if its improving or not. Look back at the thread, it was not me who changed the subject. People just never got back on topic. On another note, I hear the bridge is back open again. At least one good thing happening in Lorain.

[Traveler87]

Originally Posted by Cle440

Yes, sadly this thread has turned very pointless. Just like most the arguments that take place in the Ohio forum, the argument that ruined this thread started because certain people had no clue what they were talking about. A few others along the way didnt know what they were talking about either, no offense. Thats why I keep stressing this so much, if you dont know what you are talking about on a certain topic or know little about it, please dont talk about it. That would save all of us in the Ohio forum a lot of time.

I may have been a little harsh on the first post of this thread, but I was really annoyed. You have to understand where Im coming from on that. I made this thread for a good reason, to discuss Lorain and the poor choices it has made and it what it could have done better. If any of you grew up in Lorain or anyplace similar to it that made very similar poor choices, you would understand very well the reason I feel this way and made the thread. Also the development of the city, and what else is happening if its improving or not. Look back at the thread, it was not me who changed the subject. People just never got back on topic. On another note, I hear the bridge is back open again. At least one good thing happening in Lorain.

LOL and this is why I made the Ohio off topic thread. People just can't get it I guess.