Hypothetical Question about the future (Atlanta, Jackson: crime, employment, movies)

[arjay57]

I've been reading about the decline of once great cities like Cleveland and Detroit. They actually seem to be doing better of late, but there's no denying they both took massive hits from the 1950s onward. Both of them lost around 60% of their population. When you visit, you see large areas that have been decimated.

Obviously a great deal of that had to do with the decline of manufacturing.

Contrast those situations with Atlanta. Yes, the city proper lost about 20% of its population after 1970, but we are now close to recovering that. And despite that, I always had the sense that we were on the upswing. We had a huge influx of new businesses and corporate headquarters, new pro sports teams, a spectacularly booming skyline, massively growing suburbs, our huge airport, a new subway, the ascendancy of our universities, advances in science, the arts, media, and entertainment, and major growth on almost every other front. We had the Olympics. Crime decreased.

So here's what I'm getting at. Could the ATL experience something like the big Rustbelt cities, where the props were basically kicked out from underneath them? Do we have an Achilles heel that makes us vulnerable to that kind of collapse? If so, do we need to be doing something to prevent it? Are there lessons to be learned?

[ATLTJL]

Of course it could. It happens, it's just the way the pendulum swings.

Millennials won't remember the way people like you and I do....New York was not always the hip place it is today. I mean, I think there are certain artists and musicians and others that never left the city...but in the 1970s it was seen as a complete cess pool of crime and danger. Watch the Death Wish movies for a pretty good vision of New York's reputation during that time.

But then it became hip again...probably due in no small part to Giuliani cleaning it up. Even though I don't personally agree with everything he did, there's no denying: IT WORKED.

The point is, every city goes through ups and downs. Maybe some cities like San Francisco never lose their romantic sides, but even it goes through changes. Remember when parts of Los Angeles was a city divided by race and violence? Listen to old NWA and Public Enemy records for a time capsule on that. In those days, you lived near the Sherman Oaks Galleria for the American Dream. Who lives in the San Fernando Valley now? Probably not many people realizing the dream!

So I think it's inevitable that things change over time. Atlanta WILL lose its luster. Then, it will get it back again. That's just the way it rolls.

Personally, I think our biggest threat comes in the form of small cities that offer great qualities of life like Charleston and Asheville. And someday, if Jacksonville ever figures out how to get out of its own way, it could pretty much crush us with it's immense port, downtown on a huge river, and awesome beaches within city limits. All it really lacks is culture and things to do...from an objective standpoint, it's superior to Atlanta in every natural measure unless being an hour away from some mountains is a deal maker for you. It also lacks transit, but it doesn't really need it (yet).

I've also noticed anecdotally a heckuva lot of people leaving for Tampa. I'm not as familiar with what it offers, but I know it has beaches and summers that are just longer (but really, no less brutal) than Atlanta's. In exchange, you get winters where temperatures below 50 are rare and the threat of snow or ice simply does not exist.

So yeah, I think Atlanta is at risk from our neighbors that offer better weather and easier lives for people. But it remains to be seen whether they can actually compete effectively.

The good thing about Atlanta is the employment base is diverse, so we aren't one industry drying up away from complete disaster the way Detroit completely relied on auto manufacturing. So I wouldn't foresee a change as severe or dramatic as what they experienced any time. I think it would be more a slow burn, where over 20 or 30 years, people just sort of start moving away. Or I should say, the people who make the city run and contribute to the economy.

[DJDeadParrot]

I really think you answered your own question in noting that, for Cleveland and Detroit [throw Pittsburgh in there, too], a decline in manufacturing had catastrophic, decades-long, effects on the well-being of those cities. Post-WWII suburbanization only facilitated this decline. Remember, too, that those cities experienced extremely rapid growth in the early 20th century as newly arrived immigrants moved westward from already overcrowded east coast cities.

[cqholt]

Our Achilles tendon is lack of water supply and traffic congestion.
Atlanta also experienced deindustrialization during the same period.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by cqholt

Our Achilles tendon is lack of water supply and traffic congestion.
Atlanta also experienced deindustrialization during the same period.

I think you are right about the water supply in particular, cq. Traffic may be a PITA at times but without water you die.

If this climate change thing turns out to be real we could be in deep you-know-what.

[bryantm3]

New York used to be awesome, legendary. Not safe, but you had all these enclaves of people of many different cultures speaking all kinds of languages, a million different cuisines, art everywhere, even in the midst of decay. Now it's a lot safer, but it's whitewashed. It's boring. Like Disneyworld or something. And it's getting more boring and more homogeneous all of the time. And the same thing is happening to a lot of Atlanta now.

Honestly I think globally, we're forcing this economic situation to a head. It's not sustainable and it's not going to last forever— at some point the bottom is going to drop out, whether it's in 5 years or 25 years. At that point, who knows what's going to happen. That's why I think we need to start reorganizing our city around what makes the ties between us stronger, what makes the people that live here have better lives and be more supportive of each other, rather than going down this hole of trying to pull in money and fame, because that stuff is like sand, it runs through your fingers and it's gone before you know it. It's not a good foundation to base a community off of, because if it's the only thing keeping the metro together, everyone will move away at the first sign of economic distress— like what happened to Detroit.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by ATLTJL

Personally, I think our biggest threat comes in the form of small cities that offer great qualities of life like Charleston and Asheville. And someday, if Jacksonville ever figures out how to get out of its own way, it could pretty much crush us with it's immense port, downtown on a huge river, and awesome beaches within city limits. All it really lacks is culture and things to do...from an objective standpoint, it's superior to Atlanta in every natural measure unless being an hour away from some mountains is a deal maker for you. It also lacks transit, but it doesn't really need it (yet).

I've also noticed anecdotally a heckuva lot of people leaving for Tampa. I'm not as familiar with what it offers, but I know it has beaches and summers that are just longer (but really, no less brutal) than Atlanta's. In exchange, you get winters where temperatures below 50 are rare and the threat of snow or ice simply does not exist.

So yeah, I think Atlanta is at risk from our neighbors that offer better weather and easier lives for people. But it remains to be seen whether they can actually compete effectively.

The good thing about Atlanta is the employment base is diverse, so we aren't one industry drying up away from complete disaster the way Detroit completely relied on auto manufacturing. So I wouldn't foresee a change as severe or dramatic as what they experienced any time. I think it would be more a slow burn, where over 20 or 30 years, people just sort of start moving away. Or I should say, the people who make the city run and contribute to the economy.

Very good points, ATLTJL. A lot of these smaller cities offer an excellent quality of life that in some ways is a better urban experience than you get in a huge metropolis.

I bet it is kind of a sad feeling to live somewhere that you know is inexorably going downhill. That's bound to have an effect on people's moods and emotions.

It also seems like crime tends to go up when cities are in decline, and that of course just causes more decline.

[ATLTJL]

A lot of these smaller cities offer an excellent quality of life that in some ways is a better urban experience than you get in a huge metropolis.

When I visited Charleston, I struggled to think of a city it reminded me of. The closest I could come up with was New York. I loved walking around that town!!!

[primaltech]

I love Atlanta, but Charleston blows Atlanta away in terms of urban. I spent a week vacation with my lady friend just walking around and exploring that city, didn't even use the car once, and it wouldn't have even been useful if we did. Just kept it parked at the inn the whole time.

I mean, just look at this incredibly density:

https://www.google.com/maps/@32.7809107,-79.9327882,19z

It's a critical mass of retail right around that whole area. Downright European.

I came back from that trip jealous. Atlanta obviously is a whole lot bigger and has a whole lot more, but I just wish we could take everything that the metro has, and compact it into a much smaller area.

[Cameron H]

Turns out economic diversification and adaptability are good for cities. Charleston was the fourth-largest city in the U.S. in 1776, after Philadelphia, New York and Boston. It was completely dependent on a peculiar industry, though, which ended up missing the Industrial Revolution and then taking a big hit in the mid-19th century.