Phillipsburg --- What's Holding Back Its Revival? (Union, Hoboken: apartment, insurance)

[GiantRutgersfan]

It's in the middle of nowhere. There are hardly any jobs. It's not within 20 miles to any area which has significant amounts of jobs unless you go to PA (and if your gonna work in PA, might as well live there and pay lower taxes).

Non rush hour with no traffic, your looking at at least 1.5 hours into NYC. It's not really a place to live if your working in NY at all. nightmare commute. You could maybe find work in the suburbs like Raritan or Somerville, but its still an hour commute with no traffic.

I agree it is really cheap, but theres hardly any jobs.

[Calico696]

Originally Posted by ScranBarre

As I said for me personally schools are a non-issue.

I made the comment about the schools as an explanation of what is keeping P'Burg down. It is an Abbot district, so families many families are not interested in sending their children to school there.

Originally Posted by ScranBarre

As I said the "crime" doesn't concern me, as I still think the odds of someone walking down Main Street and getting shot at random in the face as part of a gang initiation are probably worse than winning the PowerBall jackpot back-to-back.

Agree, the personal crime in P'burg is not of the "random" variety.

Originally Posted by GiantRutgersfan

It's in the middle of nowhere. There are hardly any jobs. It's not within 20 miles to any area which has significant amounts of jobs unless you go to PA (and if your gonna work in PA, might as well live there and pay lower taxes).

Non rush hour with no traffic, your looking at at least 1.5 hours into NYC. It's not really a place to live if your working in NY at all. nightmare commute. You could maybe find work in the suburbs like Raritan or Somerville, but its still an hour commute with no traffic.

I agree it is really cheap, but theres hardly any jobs.

Agree, not many jobs. I live about 10 miles east of P'Burg and I travel 50 miles one way to work and my husband 35.

It may work well for you Scranton, I'm just offering explanations as to why many people would avoid it.

[joe moving]

Interesting. I see a lot of Abbot districts in towns I would have thought are OK. Not great but OK.

[BobKovacs]

It's not possible for every town in the state to be "revitalized" or "gentrifying"- you've got to have some towns that are run-down, so-so, or "not desirable". It sounds odd, but if every town was desirable, there wouldn't be any towns that were affordable for blue-collar and/or lower income folks.

In the dreamland of modern town planners, the poor and the wealthy all live in the same town, only blocks (or even houses) away from one another. In the real world, there's far more stratification of income levels and living arrangements, and P'burg just happens to be one of the areas that serves the lower end of the spectrum.

I admire your drive and desire, Paul- I really do. But you're going to have to come to grips with the fact that many places will never "turn around". P'burg may actually be a great choice for you, since you don't need the schools and aren't adverse to having an occasional car or home break-in- but you're going to have to accept the fact that it'll likely remain just like it is for years to come. Personally, if I was young and single, I'd probably look at P'burg or someplace similar just to be able to snag a house for $100k rather than having to rent or pay $300k for a house. I'd do so with the realization, though, that eventually I'd have to move if I wanted to start a family and give them a great environment.

[ScranBarre]

Originally Posted by GiantRutgersfan

It's in the middle of nowhere. There are hardly any jobs. It's not within 20 miles to any area which has significant amounts of jobs unless you go to PA (and if your gonna work in PA, might as well live there and pay lower taxes).

Non rush hour with no traffic, your looking at at least 1.5 hours into NYC. It's not really a place to live if your working in NY at all. nightmare commute. You could maybe find work in the suburbs like Raritan or Somerville, but its still an hour commute with no traffic.

I agree it is really cheap, but theres hardly any jobs.

I suppose coming from an area where my 7-mile commutes can easily take 45-50-minutes in gridlock due to the lack of efficient mass transit the prospect of commuting 60 minutes each way for a white-collar career opportunity isn't quite so horrible. I'm not looking to score a BMW, a mansion in Alpine, and have a maid/butler on-staff. All I want someday is to have that $129,000 "orgasm house" that I posted above in a close-knit community where I can get to really know my neighbors, throw community backyard barbecues, help organize annual block parties, participate in a town council or other leadership position (perhaps with the Chamber of Commerce), etc. Living here in Fairfax County has been a huge step backwards for my quality-of-life. Yes, there are jobs bursting at the seams, but the cost-of-living is so oppressive that I'd be better off earning $40,000 in Pittsburgh or Phillipsburg and purchasing a small home (which is achieveable) than earning $65,000 in DC and still live in a 1-BR apartment with maintenance issues. So many people never factor in the cost-of-living difference when looking at higher salary points. I never thought I'd be looking into a part of NEW JERSEY as being "cheap."

Thousands upon thousands of people commute from NEPA (including some people I know in Scranton) to NYC daily, so a Phillipsburg ===> Florham Park (or other employment concentration center in Northern NJ) commute should be tolerable.

Originally Posted by Calico696

I made the comment about the schools as an explanation of what is keeping P'Burg down. It is an Abbot district, so families many families are not interested in sending their children to school there.



Agree, the personal crime in P'burg is not of the "random" variety.



Agree, not many jobs. I live about 10 miles east of P'Burg and I travel 50 miles one way to work and my husband 35.

It may work well for you Scranton, I'm just offering explanations as to why many people would avoid it.

True, but then again you don't necessarily need throngs of young families to revitalize a community. New Hope, for example, seems to be bursting at the seams with the LGBT community, artists, bohemians, etc. with very few families with children (who mostly live in subdivisions in adjacent townships). In this sense Phillipsburg could house a lot of young professionals, artists, blue-collar workers who are priced out of the suburbs, the LGBT community, etc. while the subdivisions popping up in places like Lohatcong and Pohatcong Townships house all of the families. Granted that's not an "ideal" situation, but it is one way that a community with a horrible public school district can try to turn itself around.

"Random" violent crime would be all that would concern me. I could live with the occasional vandalism, car break-in, graffiti-tagging, etc., and I'd also not be very worried about one lowlife gunning down another lowlife over a drug deal gone bad. As far as my research can tell Phillipsburg may have THESE issues, but if you don't poke your nose into the errant side of the law the odds of you becoming a random violent crime statistic are practically non-existent.

As I said a 35-mile or 50-mile commute each way is becoming the "norm" nowadays in many major metropolitan areas. I commute 7 miles each way, and that commute often takes me 45 minutes. A 60-minute commute wouldn't be something I'd necessarily be opposed to, although as I said I'd also consider taking a lower-paying full-time job ($30,000) in my field somewhere in the immediate Phillipsburg area and supplementing that with $15,000-$20,000 additional income working at Lowe's or Home Depot on the weekends and a couple of weekday evenings, with my former multiple years of sales experience there hopefully netting me an $11/hr. wage.

As I said I'm not trying to "argue" with anyone, as your concerns are all valid and you all have different reasons for totally avoiding Phillipsburg to move into Hope Twp., Allamuchy Twp., Lopatcong Twp., Harmony Twp., Pohatcong Twp. or other suburban areas, but I'm just trying to put my finger on just as to why Phillipsburg and Easton---two cities with a plethora of history and charm---are continuing to fail, when their character and soul, coupled with their generous housing prices, should have them serving as magnets to blue-collars who want to be homeowners and those early-20-somethings like myself who want to live a comfortable lifestyle on the cheap.

Originally Posted by joe moving

Interesting. I see a lot of Abbot districts in towns I would have thought are OK. Not great but OK.

Same here. I attended a sub-par public school district myself, and I think I turned out just fine. Friends of mine are well en route to pursuing their Doctorates. This just proves that even with bad schools if parents are involved enough in guiding their children, then academic excellence can still be achieved. No, I can't remember an alumnus of my high school ever going to Harvard, Princeton, or Yale, but then again my Bachelor's Degree from a school nobody ever heard of afforded me the same career opportunities as those who paid thrice as much for degrees from "esteemed" institutions of higher learning. I plan to pursue my MPA (Master's in Public Administration) from another "unheard of" college, and I'm once again not worried. There's more to life than impressing people with where we went to college or what car we drive (even if that's not the case in places like Fairfax County, VA).

Originally Posted by BobKovacs

It's not possible for every town in the state to be "revitalized" or "gentrifying"- you've got to have some towns that are run-down, so-so, or "not desirable". It sounds odd, but if every town was desirable, there wouldn't be any towns that were affordable for blue-collar and/or lower income folks.

In the dreamland of modern town planners, the poor and the wealthy all live in the same town, only blocks (or even houses) away from one another. In the real world, there's far more stratification of income levels and living arrangements, and P'burg just happens to be one of the areas that serves the lower end of the spectrum.

I admire your drive and desire, Paul- I really do. But you're going to have to come to grips with the fact that many places will never "turn around". P'burg may actually be a great choice for you, since you don't need the schools and aren't adverse to having an occasional car or home break-in- but you're going to have to accept the fact that it'll likely remain just like it is for years to come. Personally, if I was young and single, I'd probably look at P'burg or someplace similar just to be able to snag a house for $100k rather than having to rent or pay $300k for a house. I'd do so with the realization, though, that eventually I'd have to move if I wanted to start a family and give them a great environment.

I totally understand where you're coming from in that every state must have some affordable areas to serve as a safe haven for the service workers that keep our economy running smoothly on relatively low salaries. However, I don't understand why these communities need to be reserved only for blue-collars and why suburban housing developments need to be inhabited only by white-collar families. I don't at all like the socioeconomic segregation that has been plaguing MOST of this country (not only NJ) because when you concentrate poorer people near other poorer people crime issues tend to worsen (see Section 8 housing projects) because children grow up in an environment where they're never exposed to people working hard and being successful so the cycle of "this is how life must have to be" and turning to drugs or gangs as a result always perpetuates itself. If the poor were more interspersed amongst stable middle-class and upper-middle-class households, then people could see that there is hope and there are options available to better themselves.

I see Phillipsburg as having the potential to be a "mixed" community like this. As of the 2000 Census the community was 92% white, so some of the "closet racists" who live in the suburbs and don't like to visit "diverse" towns for fear of what they don't understand in terms of race relations (not saying ALL white upper-middle-class suburbanites are like this, but many I've known talk this way behind closed doors) shouldn't have much to be concerned about there. Childless couples, single young professionals, and we in the LGBT community love to pounce upon homes like that $129,000 one I posted the link to above because we don't mind living in "transitional" neighborhoods if we can find a great deal on a beautiful home with character because we don't have to worry about the welfare of children and how much more difficult (though not impossible as I explained above) it would be to steer them to academic success in a below-average school district.

I would hope that more educated middle-class white-collar people would follow my example and consider "taking the plunge" in hopes of restoring towns like Phillipsburg that could be so much better if people didn't just favor abandoning it. If throwing block parties and organizing reduced-price trips for neighborhood families to take a bus to see Yankees or Phillies games, go see a museum, go see a Broadway show, etc. results in a tighter-knit community, then you'll also start to see test scores improve and crime ebb as people take more pride in where they live and decide they, too, want to work hard to be successful and make the town they've grown to love over the years so much better. I can think of plenty of thriving old towns that are mostly inhabited by blue-collar folks, and I don't know where along the line some people (not you) got the notion that "blue collar = undesirable." While having a population with a higher proportion of college graduates betters your chances at attracting higher-paying jobs, those higher-paying jobs are a double-edged sword---in the short-term you can live like a king making $75,000 and living in a $100,000 home, but in the long-run prices will rise to match those salary levels, meaning that you're living barely better on your higher salary than you were at the lower salary while your blue-collar neighbors are being priced out due to the rising cost-of-living. This is exactly what's happening to Monroe County, where a lot of native PA blue-collar residents have been moving to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre (which is now showing population growth) to find affordable housing now that their taxes continue to spike.

[cyntmac]

An older blue collar community with a town center has the character that you just won't find in endless newer sprawlburbia. If it's in a relatively low crime area and you can get to a job within a reasonable time frame- it might just be worth a shot. Just have realistic expectations about the future.

[chrismaya]

I don't think it's the best place in NJ, but I wouldn't go so far as to discourage someone from living there if they truly liked it.

[Phish Head]

As a resident of P-burg (technically of the surrounding area), its getting a little tiring of listening to people putting the town down. I happen to like P-burg quite a bit and I think it is a very underrated place to live. It's cheap, by NJ standards, and I've never once felt threatened by crime. In fact, the only way you might be a victim of crime is if you walked downtown in the middle of the night looking for trouble, or if you were a scantily clad woman looking and acting provacatively. In my experience, you really have to seek out problems to be involved in a random crime event here. Everyone in this country is so afraid of everything.

I choose not to live downtown because I am a country boy and I like to have a small house but plenty of land. You can do that here easily- there's still open space. Or choose from many friendly small town locations (Alpha, Stewartsville, Bloomsbury, Belvidere, or Milford), a densely packed hometown suburb (Lopatcong), and rural townships (Pohatcong, Harmony, Greenwich). There are some big box stores, but frankly not many. Lehigh Valley has tons of them. You can avoid them easily and I prefer to shop at the smaller stores when possible. There are still independent grocery stores here. There are still a few general stores left- its not all Wawa's yet, and there are even coffee shops that aren't Starbucks or Dunkin D's! On the natural side, we have rivers galore, plus many forested areas and farmland, parks, vineyards, low mountains, lakes, you name it. Old stone houses and bridges are common here, as are Victorian homes. There are tons of intact downtown areas with churches and small ice cream shops. I guess I just can't understand how people can say that this area is depressed when I find so much joy here.

We are certainly not in the middle of nowhere, most people here are educated and have a "Live Free or Die" attitude- 50% democrat and 50% republican but trust neither, rely on themselves and more independent. Many people live here because they choose to live here and be removed from the rat race that dominates most of this state. If you are a member of the LGBT community, you would be welcome here and will have few, if any, problems (if you walk down the street in pink Speedos, you might raise an eyebrow....obviously I'm joking and I know you don't do that!)

If you decide you want to live here, let me know and I'll give you a tour. I'm not much older than you and I chose to live out here for many of the same reasons you mention. Being a little older, I've lost some of the idealism that you write about regarding revitalization, but I believe this area to be very vibrant and conducive to a high quality of life. Its a hidden jewel in NJ and I hope not too many people discover it, IMHO.

As an aside, I worked in Fairfax County, VA for a short time and you couldn't pay me to live there. Tyson's Corner....

[lastinshow]

Originally Posted by ScranBarre

I don't at all like the socioeconomic segregation that has been plaguing MOST of this country (not only NJ) because when you concentrate poorer people near other poorer people crime issues tend to worsen (see Section 8 housing projects) because children grow up in an environment where they're never exposed to people working hard and being successful so the cycle of "this is how life must have to be" and turning to drugs or gangs as a result always perpetuates itself.

Best quote in your post. I couldn't agree more.

[wileynj]

Originally Posted by Calico696

It's a very depressed and depressing area. The schools are not good.

Not anymore... it really is improving. They have so many new and different restaurants coming in.. Indian, Portuguese, thai - it's making a come back. Same with Easton. I agree with scran... it has alot of potential and some very nice historic areas.