Portsburgh or Pittsland (Pittsburgh, Highland Park, Portland: neighborhoods, living, restaurant)

[globalburgh]

I think Pittsburgh is more like Seattle. There is much more of an economic base in those two cities than there is in Portland. People move to Portland because it is cool. Then they move back because they need a job.

[I_Like_Spam]

Isn't Portland pretty much dominated by Intel nowadays? How about int'l shipping, does it have a big port as well to the far east where America gets most of its clothes and plastics?

I guess it was probably more logging and paper back in the day.

Does Intel provide a lot of decently paying jobs for people with little education?

[eccotecc]

globalburgh,

You seem to have first hand experience. Do you care to elaborate?

[eccotecc]

Spam,

Portland is highly diversified. Shipping and transportation are huge in Portland, as is high tech and agriculture in the Willamette Valley and Columbia Gorge. Not to mention tourism. Mt Hood and Hood River are year round attractions for outdoor sports enthusiasts.

[globalburgh]

Originally Posted by eccotecc

globalburgh,

You seem to have first hand experience. Do you care to elaborate?

I've lived in Seattle and Pittsburgh. I've visited Portland a few times. I'm more influenced by data and stories I read/hear. What most people don't know is how much manufacturing/blue collar economy existed in Seattle before the tech boom. Gates moves back home, to Seattle, and everything changes.

Portland has long been in Seattle's shadow. Portland is, without a doubt, the cooler of the two. Seattle is where you go to work. Same with Pittsburgh.

[eccotecc]

globalburgh,

I understand what you're saying. Ive been to the Southside on a weekend evening and it's like the cattle yards with the bulls grunting and snorting in heat. If Pittsburgh wants to change its image, then it needs to look to the future. I've been in Portland before it was gentrified. It was a dirty logging town. I mean filthy dirty. How did it reinvent itself, people with a vested interest in their small businesses voted out the old political machine. The not what you know but who you know types. With that type of elbow grease the city got cleaned up and today you have a new Portland. BTW this happened in the last 15 years..give or take.

[UKyank]

Originally Posted by eccotecc

globalburgh,

I understand what you're saying. Ive been to the Southside on a weekend evening and it's like the cattle yards with the bulls grunting and snorting in heat. If Pittsburgh wants to change its image, then it needs to look to the future

Not sure what that statement even means, but the southside is one of the most reinvented areas of the city in the past few years...

[eccotecc]

UKyank,

Southside has reinvented itself, but has the businesses become gentrified or are they stockyards at cattle call. Southside does provide a certain service, but is it truly gentrified? Does it provide that certain sense of class or sophistication? The last time I visited, the establishments I went into appeared to have their terrible towels out to dry behind the bars. Cute, but not too sophisticated.

[I_Like_Spam]

Originally Posted by eccotecc

UKyank,

Southside has reinvented itself, but has the businesses become gentrified or are they stockyards at cattle call. Southside does provide a certain service, but is it truly gentrified? Does it provide that certain sense of class or sophistication? The last time I visited, the establishments I went into appeared to have their terrible towels out to dry behind the bars. Cute, but not too sophisticated.

Southside was an industrial section, mostly poor and highly diverse 30 years ago. It did reinvent itself into an area for mostly younger folks to hang out, be entertained and many students live over there now. Not terribly sophisticated, but you like that kind of more sophisticated stuff, you can go downtown to the cultural district and see enough opera and ballet and legitimate theatre. The cultural district in town also reinvented itself from 30 years ago when it was the central point for smut, strip clubs, peepshows, massage parlors and other lower brow entertainment options.

[squarian]

Originally Posted by eccotecc

UKyank,

Southside has reinvented itself, but has the businesses become gentrified or are they stockyards at cattle call. Southside does provide a certain service, but is it truly gentrified? Does it provide that certain sense of class or sophistication? The last time I visited, the establishments I went into appeared to have their terrible towels out to dry behind the bars. Cute, but not too sophisticated.

The list of drinking establishments which might qualify as sophisticated or elegant is very short in Pittsburgh and none are on the Southside. The bar row on Carson St is DisneyBeeryland: strictly for kids and people dressed up as Goofy.