Boston (the city) Has Lost Its Allure for Me (Framingham: place to live, professionals)

[lrfox]

Originally Posted by bricka

imagine being under 35 and actually moving to worcester from boston

all of your friends still live in boston, but they will definitely move out to worcester eventually! they'll see that it's much cheaper and it's very dense!.

You're trying really hard convince us all that Worcester is a terrible place and I do admire the effort. But it should go without saying that the data you've cherry picked doesn't exactly tell the whole story and I would think (or hope) that you know that. Because if it did tell the whole story and you did your homework, you'd know that Framingham is even better than Boston in those categories. And, according to you, Framingham is a poor working class city where nobody would ever want to live. So those poor 20 and 30 somethings in Boston must be dreaming of escaping to Framingham. Also, Worcester beats Providence in almost all of those metrics too, so Providence must be REALLY awful even though you yourself said that it's a standalone city with history and culture that's DEFINITELY gentrifying.

[bricka]

Originally Posted by massnative71

And imagine being under 35 and actually moving to worcester from boston


most of your friends started out in Boston, but being at that age where people set out on their own, start families, buy houses, etc. they are now scattered. A few already live in Worcester, some in Shrewsbury, Leominster, Hudson, Franklin, Holliston, etc. who you already only saw on an occasional weekend anyways since everybody is working and doing their own thing the rest of the time. That is unlikely to change, although you will now be closer to some of them. Some of them might still live closer to Boston...oh well, you can still get together on your days off.



As for you, you once worked in Boston but now work in Marlborough. You are thankful for an easier, toll free commute. You are also thankful to own your home with a private back yard, on a shaded street with NO unsavory characters out and about since you could afford a nice area as opposed to a sketchier part of Worcester. It certainly beats that lead painted 3 decker you used to rent, with noisy neighbors and the rent going up every year.

haha - fair enough. i respect the counter-story

[bricka]

Originally Posted by lrfox

You're trying really hard convince us all that Worcester is a terrible place and I do admire the effort. But it should go without saying that the data you've cherry picked doesn't exactly tell the whole story and I would think (or hope) that you know that. Because if it did tell the whole story and you did your homework, you'd know that Framingham is even better than Boston in those categories. And, according to you, Framingham is a poor working class city where nobody would ever want to live. So those poor 20 and 30 somethings in Boston must be dreaming of escaping to Framingham. Also, Worcester beats Providence in almost all of those metrics too, so Providence must be REALLY awful even though you yourself said that it's a standalone city with history and culture that's DEFINITELY gentrifying.

i actually don't disagree with anything there - i'm sure you understood the post was a joke meant to show that worcester has been barely treading water for the past 10 years.

you can manipulate statistics to tell all kinds of stories.

i think the unique problem w/ framingham that makes it different than all the other sub-cities we mentioned is that its not attractive from an urban density perspective. it's not really walkable. so it has to take the "good public schools suburb route" to attract families.

i guess we'll see if it can mimick natick, or if it will be a woburn.

[msRB311]

I keep hearing worcester is getting nicer...i'm not sure why anyone would have a problem with that if it was?

[massnative71]

Originally Posted by bricka

i actually don't disagree with anything there - i'm sure you understood the post was a joke meant to show that worcester has been barely treading water for the past 10 years.

you can manipulate statistics to tell all kinds of stories.

i think the unique problem w/ framingham that makes it different than all the other sub-cities we mentioned is that its not attractive from an urban density perspective. it's not really walkable. so it has to take the "good public schools suburb route" to attract families.

i guess we'll see if it can mimick natick, or if it will be a woburn.

Framingham will never be an upscale suburb, precisely because it DOES have some ghettoish areas that drag the rest of the town down. But a poor city it absolutely is not and many people (including in your yuppie demographic), are fine living there. Because it's not Natick, Wayland, Sudbury, Sherborn, etc., does not make it a bad town. I'm personally not a fan of it, but I would still pick it all day long over an "actual" ghetto place (including those in and around Boston). You seem like you grew up west of Boston, and are unaware of the reality that many in the city live (as well as north of Boston like Chelsea, Revere, Lynn, etc.). Framingham beats any of those as a place to live.

[msRB311]

I think that's the problem is that there's so many nouveau riche and old rich towns to choose from that how can anyone possibly mention Framingham

[massnative71]

Originally Posted by msRB311

I think that's the problem is that there's so many nouveau riche and old rich towns to choose from that how can anyone possibly mention Framingham

The strange thing about Framingham is that it's literally surrounded by a sea of extreme wealth. So even though it's not at all poor, it can seem that way when put up against its neighbors. It also leaves it as the last "affordable option" for one looking to live in that area, which has actually priced it very high for what it is.

[bricka]

Originally Posted by massnative71

Framingham will never be an upscale suburb, precisely because it DOES have some ghettoish areas that drag the rest of the town down. But a poor city it absolutely is not and many people (including in your yuppie demographic), are fine living there. Because it's not Natick, Wayland, Sudbury, Sherborn, etc., does not make it a bad town. I'm personally not a fan of it, but I would still pick it all day long over an "actual" ghetto place (including those in and around Boston). You seem like you grew up west of Boston, and are unaware of the reality that many in the city live (as well as north of Boston like Chelsea, Revere, Lynn, etc.). Framingham beats any of those as a place to live.

eh nobody can escape their own perspective, you have one as well.

perhaps working class poor was a bit harsh for framingham, it's middle class and it certainly stands apart from worcester/lowell/lawrence/haverhill because, as we both agree, it has to try to be a suburb and get families to move there.

the lots in most of framingham are super small apart from the very very far west part of the town. i mean many of the neighborhoods are basically stacked on top of each other, BUT it still doesn't have the walkability that you would hope for with density. so it's like the worst of both worlds.

families who are moving to the burbs want a decent sized lot, that's why they're going to the burbs.

also the center of the town might be the largest strip mall in the greater boston area.

[lrfox]

Originally Posted by bricka

i actually don't disagree with anything there - i'm sure you understood the post was a joke meant to show that worcester has been barely treading water for the past 10 years.

you can manipulate statistics to tell all kinds of stories.

i think the unique problem w/ framingham that makes it different than all the other sub-cities we mentioned is that its not attractive from an urban density perspective. it's not really walkable. so it has to take the "good public schools suburb route" to attract families.

i guess we'll see if it can mimick natick, or if it will be a woburn.

Household income numbers in larger cities are always going to lag behind growth, even when the city is gentrifying, simply because of the sheer population numbers. Worcester was one of the fastest growing cities in New England (and one of the hottest midsize urban real estate markets in the country several times) between 2010 and 2020 (outpacing even Somerville or Cambridge), but even adding 26k new residents (most of whom were from the Boston area) isn't going to be enough to cause the HHI to jump all that much considering the city's population was over 180k in 2010. It'll take decades for the current influx of new residents to make up a sizeable enough chunk of the overall population to significantly impact those figures. So needless to say, some metrics matter more than others. And again, seeing is believing. You can actually see the growth and change in Worcester when you're there.

Framingham is definitely a lot more like Natick or Norwood (though not nearly as nice, even now in 2022) than Worcester or Boston. More suburban with a built up center on the commuter rail. I personally think the transit access in the center will have it trending more toward Natick than Woburn where the city center is neither on transit or the major highways (or even many of the most primary roads), but we'll see how it plays out over time. Certainly the suburban areas of Framingham are of growing interest to many buys (true of Woburn too).

[massnative71]

Originally Posted by bricka

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the lots in most of framingham are super small apart from the very very far west part of the town. i mean many of the neighborhoods are basically stacked on top of each other, BUT it still doesn't have the walkability that you would hope for with density. so it's like the worst of both worlds.

families who are moving to the burbs want a decent sized lot, that's why they're going to the burbs.

Right but problem is most people can't afford a house in the burbs on a larger lot at the moment. They settle for what they can get. A small SF on a smaller lot still beats an apartment, again for "most" buyers. I also don't see the denser suburban neighborhoods of Framingham of being at all atypical for the Boston area. Lots of similar in Weymouth, Braintree, Randolph, Holbrook, Dedham, Norwood, Woburn, Peabody, etc.. But again, it only looks downscale because you are comparing it to towns like Wayland or Sudbury.