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I just had an epiphany today, driving home from church, no less!
There is the usual discussion going on the Pittsburgh forum about how (paraphrasing) 'Pittsburgh's population does not accurately represent its size as a major city', yada, yada. One point brought up is that Pgh once had a city population of almost 700,000; now it's ~300,000 (smaller than Aurora, CO, LOL!). Pittsburgh has a lot of empty housing, and housing is quite inexpensive there. However, many people are still choosing to live in the suburbs. In that city, it is not that city housing is too expensive; it is probably cheaper to live in the city than in most of the burbs. So the argument that "the system" is forcing people to the burbs is not the case, at least in that one city.
Which system do you mean?
The same is true in Baltimore. I could live in an identical copy of my house for twice (and during the boom, 3 times) as much in the suburbs. I would probably gain better regarded schools, more stability in the neighborhood, and lower taxes. With 30 years to pay... It appears to be a better deal to many people.
I'm a bit if a miser though. I wouldn't want to end up paying 750000 total cost for a darn carbon copy rowhouse. There's also nothing of interest to me in these burbs. So i feel a lot less pressure having made a relatively small investment in my cheap house.
You know, the "system" that forces people to move to the im***** suburbs in spite of their better judgement that another poster was talking about.
Oh yeah, thanks for clarifying.
I know a lot of people who feel that say simply because of the quality of life issues here alone. Small annoyances, good ol boy politics, and the inertia of this place drive many of my peers away. I dont blame them. However theyre back every weekend.
This isnt meant to be taken universally - I've lived in cities without these issues. I just happen to live in one now that isn't always sunshine and rainbows.
I know a lot of people who feel that say simply because of the quality of life issues here alone. Small annoyances, good ol boy politics, and the inertia of this place drive many of my peers away. I dont blame them. However theyre back every weekend.
This isnt meant to be taken universally - I've lived in cities without these issues. I just happen to live in one now that isn't always sunshine and rainbows.
If there is any city that practices "good old boy" politics, it's Pittsburgh. The current "boy mayor" is related to someone in the Pgh machine. They haven't elected a Republican mayor since some time in the 1930s. Of course, it's not much better in the burbs, IMO.
Ive never been to Pittsburgh. Closest I got was Jeanette I think, where the dellallo store is.
I think our dem stretch might be even longer ... Not that any modern GOP ideas have any place in this city.
Things here take a while; getting served at a restaurant, getting your groceries bagged, calling the city for any reason, etc. so it stands to reason that our improvement will also be slow, and it has been. My hope is that, by the time i die, this will again be a productive, nice place, as it was for the previous 8 or so generations of my family.
Here in CO, municipal elections are ostensibly non-partisan. That does help a bit. Of course, it's often easy to figure out what party the candidates actually belong to.
I just had an epiphany today, driving home from church, no less!
There is the usual discussion going on the Pittsburgh forum about how (paraphrasing) 'Pittsburgh's population does not accurately represent its size as a major city', yada, yada. One point brought up is that Pgh once had a city population of almost 700,000; now it's ~300,000 (smaller than Aurora, CO, LOL!). Pittsburgh has a lot of empty housing, and housing is quite inexpensive there. However, many people are still choosing to live in the suburbs. In that city, it is not that city housing is too expensive; it is probably cheaper to live in the city than in most of the burbs. So the argument that "the system" is forcing people to the burbs is not the case, at least in that one city.
All kinds of things can come into play, including schools, local crime issues, housing age, transportation availability (there are parts of most cities that lack good transit access, but also are less convenient in terms of driving than some suburbs) Anyway I don't think the argument is so much that cities are pricier than suburbs, but that pedestrian friendly areas with mixed uses and good transit are at a premium. Thats also true comparing one city neighborhood to another, and one suburb to another. I know its like that here in greater DC. Not sure about Pittsburgh.
I know a lot of people who feel that say simply because of the quality of life issues here alone. Small annoyances, good ol boy politics, and the inertia of this place drive many of my peers away. I dont blame them. However theyre back every weekend.
This isnt meant to be taken universally - I've lived in cities without these issues. I just happen to live in one now that isn't always sunshine and rainbows.
Baltimore city has higher taxes and worse schools than Baltimore county (how much of that is the pols and how much is legacy urban problems from the time when the policies under discussion effected cities, is a matter for debate) Im sure thats a driver of relative prices of SFHs on either side of the city limits. The childless folks who don't much care about schools are mostly living in central Baltimore, I think, not along the city limits.
Not sure if there are comparable issues in Pburgh.
Well, I'm pretty far from Pittsburgh now, 1500 miles away. Most of what I know about what's going on there comes from CD and my brother. I was mostly thinking about this issue that it's "the system" that drove people to the suburbs. I don't think this is true in that city, esp. now when the city population is less than half of what it was at its peak. It has the infrastructure to handle a lot more people. Another thing it wasn't is "white flight", as Pittsburgh is still one of the "whitest" cities in the US.
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