Dunkirk or Fredonia NY (Buffalo, Syracuse: estate, for sale, trip)

[RadioBroadcaster2008]

I think the thing or two to remember here....

What is one Man's tash, is another man's treasure.

When someone doesnt like a town and has a bad expierience or doesn't like what they see, it automatically gets labled as bad and horrible without further consideration and they think that town is bad no matter what.

Just take one person's opinion with a grain of salt and weigh it against what everyone says.....

What one person hated or something that didn't work for them............. someone else may love and it may work for them.

Paul

[judicookie]

I just have to reply to the inquiry re Fredonia...

I live in Fredonia..raised my children here and now my grandchildren. I live in the village...a wonderful, college town. Yes there are college kids all around, I live beside college house and across the street from four college houses...they do not bother me at all, in fact I love to keep in touch with the younger generation. Only a few times a year, homecoming, etc are we bothered by the noise, which I must say the police keep a good tab on. the college inside has some of the best musical, theater performances I have ever seen. I compare them to the off broadway shows that I have seen in NYC
The village has many community activities for the entire family. I just took my grandhchildren to the earthfest activities last weekend. Many activities for children, a free concert, food and just a great old time. This is just one of many many community actitivities that they have. It is one of the best places to raise and have children. In additional, as stated the arts are highly respected in this town..with the college and the Opera House, a lovely old restored opera house, that has many shows, movies, concerts, etc.
As for Dunkirk, which is 3 miles away...yes it is very hispanic...mainly PR...but so what? Crime is very low both in Fredonia and Dunkirk. Dunkirk is trying to reclaim their place after being severly econonimcally hit, closing of many good paying factory and steel worker jobs. I have to laugh at other comments re second street...oh yes it is a very poor, drug infested, but after living many other places in this country, this is nothing! I would even walk down second street at night by myself without fear! Could you say that about most other towns? The mayor of dunkirk, who I have known most of my life, is doing a great job I think in restoring the town. Jobs are hard and people are struggling, but they are also so giving to each other and caring.
Taxes are high....very high...I do have several friends who upon retirement moved out of state.
We do have many gyms...lots of good nightlife, and a wonderful old time small town atmostphere.
I LOVE it here.

[sunnyinfla]

I live in so. florida there is a major street here called US1 (aka federal hwy.) to the east (beach) there are thousands of $4 million and up homes and condos. to the west (1/4 mile from beach) there are tens of thousands of south americans, none of which speak english. Violent crime happens here daily and i'm not talking about 2 drunks having a punch up infront of OMI. There are millions of visitors here every year and for the most part everyone loves it here.
So if there are PR on second street and pot heads in fredonia so what they're every where. deal with it.
Fredonia always had business owners, bankers and farmers. Dunkirk always had plant foreman and factory workers. Now that the factories are gone there are less jobs, without getting into the economics of it or if fredonia better than dunkirk, or dunkirk better than fredonia. lets take a look at the weather. Why would anyone choose to move to a place that has the worst weather out of any where in the country. at least in denver when it snows everyone is happy because they all ski and participate in outdoor sports. in fredonia there are so many bars because the most popular sport up there is casual drinking daily and the same goes for the private clubs in dunkirk. Its naturally depressing in that area and its not because of 2nd street,and the PRs, the power plant, the pot heads ect. it because the weather sucks. its known across the country that buffalo has 2 seasons. winter and the 4th of july.

[sc_girl_in_ny]

I recently moved to Cassadaga, NY from SC. We are less than 15 minutes from Fredonia and any necessary shopping, but on the opposite side of town than Dunkirk. Dunkirk really is not that bad for running errands, but not somewhere you would want to live. I love the laid back way off life here. The only negative comment I have is that there seems to be no choices for eating out. The only really good selections are about an hour away.

[giffman]

This sums it up. Fredonia is predominantly white. Dunkirk has a disproportionate number of minorities. Draw your own conclusions.

[ryanmar]

Originally Posted by ironmom

Hello,
We live in Seattle and my husband has been online researching info on Dunkirk and Fredonia NY. Any good or bad things to say about these towns?
Looking for small town feeling but not "dead" after hours. Need a good gym also.

people who do not like dunkirk and fredonia have most likley never lived anywhere else in their narrow minded lives as if they had they would realise that these are two beautiful towns with many functions at the collage and nearby bars and restrants. Dunkirk sits on beautiful lake erie and would be hard to beat as far as the local businesses and people who almost always welcome with open arms. I lived in md,fl,calif,and pa. over 18 years came to dunkirk for a one year contract and fell in love with the place that was 20 years ago and would never consider moving.

[ndou2]

Originally Posted by itSmellsBAD

Fredonia is almost part of Dunkirk....they touch each other and both have negative population growth. Don't listen to the Real Estate Agent hacks who lie to you. do your own research and come out for a visit to see the dirtiest coal fired plant in the entire USA for yourself. You can see the 400 foot tall stacks that are on the shore of Lake Erie for miles. The dust is so bad that they have been sued by NY State to clean up but have delayed this for years. English is not the primary language in dunkirk. Fredonia is a college party town. Fredonia also has a military style boot camp prison that can be seen from the NYS Thruway (most expesive toll road in the USA). Lots of party type potheads all over the place and large number of bars in town that cater to them. The cops look the other way. Urinating teens and 20 somethings are the norm all over town on the weekends. Your front yard will be a toilet. Just so you know. Oh and yes, taxes are about as high as they get in the entire nation. Again, why you'd want to move here when this area has negative population growth is beyond me.

the prison (medium security) is in brocton, about 8-10 miles away from fredonia. your lack of facts show your bias and are making you lose credibility...

i currently live in denver, which i love and will not be leaving, but i attended college in fredonia and lived in the area for about 15 years. fredonia is a beautiful town. the majority of the area is not conducive to "partying" as its not even walking distance from downtown. the actual strip (literally two streets) of downtown fredonia is noisy and full of bars, and some of the main streets (center, lambert, newton, temple) are full of college housing and can get noisy, but you could literally draw a circle around these streets and the outskirts are nothing but quiet family homes. furthermore the place actually has a lot of bars for a small town, so if partying every once in awhile is your thing then fredonia has that covered as well.

dunkirk's not anywhere near as bad as it reputation is amongst he rest of the rural area. i mean this is city-data, check the statistics for yourself. during the last 5 years it scored well below the national crime average. it's certainly not as " ghetto " as a lot of the high school students there want it to be. with that said though, it is really economically depressed, and it shows. the downtown isn't much, and neither is the waterfront. the energy plant (name escapes me) is an absolute eyesore.

personally the choice for me would be extremely obvious in that i'd choose fredonia without a second thought if you already have a job lined up. the surrounding countryside is also beautiful and really just about as cheap. if you don't have a job and are planning on looking for one, then i would quite honestly ignore the area entirely and head to buffalo.

[ndou2]

Originally Posted by oktaren

Every city has a bad part of town, that doesn't make the city bad.


second street isn't exactly nice, and neither are lord or the streets in that section, but its not like it has the crime of any real city. i have no problem with walking down that 'horrid' second street at 2 in the morning, and im a white male in his 20s. In all reality I have never been to a city where the races and classes mingle so well. I don't see that as a bad thing.

Every city has a bad part of town, that doesn't make the city bad.

are you currently living in dunkirk? because alot of work has been done in the past six months!

it's really not that bad, i agree. the proof is in the stats, which is what this website is about. you've got to watch yourself, but if you know how handle yourself nobody is really going to mess with you. most of the wannabe "thugs" are 16 years old. there's actually a youtube video that i found of a bunch of white kids acting hard in dunkirk and it's absolutely hilarious (wish i had it). just about every city i've been to and lived in since leaving the WNY area has sketchier parts than dunkirk, including the relatively nice denver suburbs. dunkirk has like 13,000 people, so honestly, how bad can it really be?

[ndou2]

Originally Posted by itSmellsBAD

I'll be heading down there next week. I'll post some photos of the trash on the streets, the spanish gangs of unemployed losers hanging out on the street corner dealing drugs and drinking malt liquor, the worst polluting coal fired power plant in the entire USA, the strip bars in Fredonia, the drunk college kids smoking pot and urinating right in front of the bars, etc. I suggest you pay this area a visit before you move here. As far as population growth, the only people moving into this area are those on Public Assistance. Pay us a visit and PM before you come here. I'll give you a tour of the area that no real estate agent (crook) would ever give you.

again, it's really not this bad, but i see the posters point. i wouldn't suggest moving here unless you have a really set job or reason for coming. the decision to move away from the area for me was not about these aforementioned problems, which really pale in comparison to any real city, but it's because the area has no real cultural, economic, or social opportunities.

[ndou2]

Originally Posted by CrissCT

You can get the data right here on City-Data.com. The crime index for Dunkirk is 259.9 (not what I personally would consider good) and it is 117.0 for Fredonia. So which side of the rr tracks would you rather live on?

and yet the NATIONAL AVERAGE is only 323.2, which means that "horrible wrong side of the tracks dunkirk" is literally only 3/4 as bad as any average town in america. the economy there sucks, but any actual crime is relatively non existent when you compare it to just about any place outside of chautauqua county. the reputation exists soley because the surrounding area is dotted with villages full of 800 people who are all from the same ethnic and religious background (i lived in one. i know what i'm talking about) and they fear the fact that dunkirk actually has diversity and ethnic minorities. it's sad, but it's the truth.