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Michigan has a few Micro-Cities (A small town with elements of a larger city). But, the one that is most familiar to me is Mount Clemens, Michigan.
With a shrinking population of just 17,000, it features a well-established downtown with several high rise buildings, and has all the neighborhoods most large cities offer:
A wealthy, white neighborhood with 1900's mansions
A mixed-race, mid-income area with vinyl-clad tract housing
A black, blighted neighborhood filled with older, run-down homes
A mid-income black neighborhood with medium-sized homes
An area dominated by housing projects
A white, middle class neighborhood, with brick ranches and two-story homes.
A low-income white neighborhood, with older, run-down homes.
The city also has an interesting political scene, like most major cities.
I think, from an economic geography perspective, small cities in sparsely populated areas often take "a load" more appropriate for a larger area. So maybe Scottsbluff, Nebraska and Juneau, Alaska are comparatively "big" for their size.
Yeah, NY has plenty of these types of cities. One near me is Auburn, a city of about 28,000. It's western half is more racially and ethnically diverse than it's eastern half. For instance, most of the Black community is located west of South street and south of the Route 5 Arterial. North of that road, you have the Polish and Ukrainian Clubs, as well as Italian American clubs that straddle both sides of that road.
On the eastern half, you have some old money type of neighborhoods, some working/middle class neighborhoods and some newer looking, if not suburban types of neighborhoods north of those working/middle class neighborhoods.
There's also some public housing in the SW corner of the city, but it is surrounded by newer looking suburban like neighborhoods. That part of the city houses a few Black based churches and a Catholic HS.
There's a Baseball stadium in the NW corner of the city and some public housing on the edge of that part of town. There's a prison just north of the Arterial road in that part of the city. There's some historic landmarks in and just outside of the city like the William Seward and Harriet Tubman homes.
It has a nice Downtown with some character, but also could be filled out a little bit more.
I'd have to say Princeton. (13,400)
It's a good distance away from both NYC/Philly, it's charming as could be, and it's pretty diverse... And of course, Princeton University.
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