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The stats for Philadelphia aren't all that different:
City of Philadelphia: 44.8% White (34.3% non-Hispanic), 43.5% Black/African American, 15.2% Hispanic/Latino, 7.8% Asian, 0.9% Native American, 0.2% Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (2019 Census estimates)
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE MSA: 61% non-Hispanic White, 20% Black/African American, 10% Hispanic, 6% Asian, rest less than !% each (2018 Census estimates)
I don't know what the demographic breakdown is for the Millennials who moved into the city in droves in the 2000s (Philadelphia's Millennial population surged by about 40% in that decade, the largest percentage increase of any of the country's largest cities), but I strongly suspect the overwhelming majority were white.
As of now, gentrification has hit two predominantly Black neighborhoods: Francisville in North Central Philadelphia, where local community leaders welcomed it, and Point Breeze in South Philadelphia, where many fought it. Philadelphia's answer to Dudley Square is the intersection of Broad Street with Erie and Germantown avenues, an intersection roughly resembling Times Square in physical layout, and while gentrification appears a ways off, there is some development, most notably the conversion of an abandoned 13-story office building into a hotel (rumored to be a Marriott run by an iconoclastic hotel operator; I don't know whether the COVID outbreak has put these plans on hold), and one now sees white tourists popping up occasionally at Max's Steaks here, which had a cameo in "Creed," Sylvester Stallone's reboot of the "Rocky" franchise.
The South End had a rough name in 2005?
In the late 1970s/early 1980s, it seemed to me that the South End enjoyed a rising reputation; it also contained a sizable number of LGBT residents, and while most of the clubs were in the Back Bay, in terms of residents, it was Boston's Gayborhood (a term first used in Philadelphia in the early 1990s).
Well yeah, as recent as 2003 Mass Ave and Tremont was home to a lot of local gang activity and held a bad rap just with a quick Archive dig from the Globe. Which technically was the South End. Parts of the South End gentrified more rapidly than others. The LGBT population arrived decades prior into the brownstone communities which revamped the area. However, in just the past 10 years the South End (Primarily Along the Harrison Ave Stretch) has seen nearly 2.3 billion dollars in redevelopment projects including InkBlock, 345 Harrison and all of those other brick projects. With the Flower Exchange under construction that's another 700 million in project. That area wasn't exactly gentrified or pristine 10 years ago.
I'm pretty much agreeing with you, I just wish Boston better tailored their shiny, new areas (Like the Northern Harrison Part of the South End) to POC. I'm sure it happens it other cities as well. But this ties back to the post because this is where I think Boston is extremely overrated. Rents beyond high
Well yeah, as recent as 2003 Mass Ave and Tremont was home to a lot of local gang activity and held a bad rap just with a quick Archive dig from the Globe. Which technically was the South End. Parts of the South End gentrified more rapidly than others. The LGBT population arrived decades prior into the brownstone communities which revamped the area. However, in just the past 10 years the South End (Primarily Along the Harrison Ave Stretch) has seen nearly 2.3 billion dollars in redevelopment projects including InkBlock, 345 Harrison and all of those other brick projects. With the Flower Exchange under construction that's another 700 million in project. That area wasn't exactly gentrified or pristine 10 years ago.
I'm pretty much agreeing with you, I just wish Boston better tailored their shiny, new areas (Like the Northern Harrison Part of the South End) to POC. I'm sure it happens it other cities as well. But this ties back to the post because this is where I think Boston is extremely overrated. Rents beyond high
There are still gangs and shooting in the south end..like as of last month. I’m just saying...
The unreasonably high rents means even well paid young professionals need parental help-this is a major barrier to POC professionals. More so in Boston than most cities. It’s that expensive.
Gentrifying and making desirable black areas in Boston is really difficult because there’s very very little turnover residentially... people stay in those neighborhoods for generations and they just sit on the houses and then so many of the houses are section 8 or some other type of subsidized living. add to this that there’s no nucleus of bars and nightlife in Boston’s POC areas..
The only thing that could change this is in Boston and Massachusetts rapidly over all their liquor licensing system and zoning but that’s not gonna happen anytime soon Despite the efforts of Governor Baker and Mayor Walsh To loosen those things up.
Until then everything new and fancy in Boston for me serve of trust fun kids tacky an international students from Asia
Last edited by BostonBornMassMade; 07-13-2020 at 11:56 AM..
That biotech money funds Masshealth so they can afford eyeglasses or isulin for the impoverished people in those neighborhoods. Something that 0 other states have 17 years later. Massachusetts is a pretty decent place to be poor compared to the rest of the country. Which is why despite “gentrifucation” Boston isn’t losing low income or minority households unlike Chicago (a much cheaper city)
Yea but it’s not practical for non urbanophiles, or the middle class. Unless you’re grandfathered in. Which is why massachoicetts and I left. ..To our dismay I think. And why Boston and Mass lose domestic population and rely on international growth like NJ NYC CA
That being said Roxbury very much is a decent place to live if you like Black people abs don’t mind some crime. It’s definitely a place I love.
Fwiw, I’m also one that was priced out of Boston, and I’m now living about an hour outside of the city by the NH border. Affordability is one of the city’s biggest problems and I’d like to see the mayor and city council be more aggressive and radical in addressing it. Despite its COL issue, however, it’s still a great place. I’d move back in a heartbeat if I could.
Agreed. would move back if I could but looks like I might have a good shot at this job I applied to in Roxbury! I’m hopeful
That being said Roxbury very much is a decent place to live if you like Black people abs don’t mind some crime. It’s definitely a place I love.
^FRoxbury^RGermantown
That sentence applies 100% to the Philadelphia neighborhood I call home.
And I also point out two things about it to others:
While it did not take a stand against white flight like the residents of Mt. Airy* just up the road did, not all the whites fled in Germantown: they account for about 15 percent of its residents.
And there is no other low-income neighborhood in the city (Germantown's MHI: ~$27,000/year) where five percent of the residents earn $125,000 or more a year. (Some of those Germantowners are Black, and they live on my less-affluent side of the neighborhood in a pocket of affluence about four blocks from my house. You may have heard of one of them: Marc Lamont Hill, prominent Black intellectual and frequent TV commentator. He owns the coolest coffee shop and bookstore in Germantown, which I can't wait to return to once the city enters the "green" phase of reopening fully. Yes, We're Acquainted; we usually speak if we're both in the shop at the same time.)
I wonder if such a neighborhood exists in Boston.
(Not long after I moved here in 1983, I wrote an article for the Philadelphia Gay News comparing the cultures and vibe of the two cities. In this, I was following in the footsteps of Penn sociologist E. Digby Baltzell, the sociologist of the upper class, whose book Puritan Boston and Quaker Philadelphia — still available from Beacon Press in Boston, IIRC — I recommend highly to anyone who wants to understand why the two cities, similar though they may be, are so different. In that story, I wrote about an encounter I had with a random Black man on Market Street near City Hall in the article. When I told him I had recently moved from Boston, he asked me what I thought of Philadelphia. Pointing towards City Hall — where Wilson Goode, the city's first Black mayor, was ensconced at the time — I said to him, "It's so much better for Blacks here." IIRC, Boston still has yet to elect a Black mayor. My hometown of Kansas City, which is about 20-25 percent Black, has elected three, as has Philadelphia. I'm not sure what this says about Boston, but in this regard, I don't think it's good.)
*The place where I first learned about Mt. Airy and its history, however, was deep in the stacks of Harvard's Widener Library, where I ran across a book written in the mid-1970s called "The Education of a WASP" while wandering through them one day in 1980. The book, which describes an upper-middle-class white woman's journey towards understanding why integration matters, ended with her and her family settling in that neighborhood. Oddly enough, even though the book's tone seems to me rather naive now, her message would resonate with lots of white folks today, if they were really interested in it.
That sentence applies 100% to the Philadelphia neighborhood I call home.
And I also point out two things about it to others:
While it did not take a stand against white flight like the residents of Mt. Airy* just up the road did, not all the whites fled in Germantown: they account for about 15 percent of its residents.
And there is no other low-income neighborhood in the city (Germantown's MHI: ~$27,000/year) where five percent of the residents earn $125,000 or more a year. (Some of those Germantowners are Black, and they live on my less-affluent side of the neighborhood in a pocket of affluence about four blocks from my house. You may have heard of one of them: Marc Lamont Hill, prominent Black intellectual and frequent TV commentator. He owns the coolest coffee shop and bookstore in Germantown, which I can't wait to return to once the city enters the "green" phase of reopening fully. Yes, We're Acquainted; we usually speak if we're both in the shop at the same time.)
I wonder if such a neighborhood exists in Boston.
(Not long after I moved here in 1983, I wrote an article for the Philadelphia Gay News comparing the cultures and vibe of the two cities. In this, I was following in the footsteps of Penn sociologist E. Digby Baltzell, the sociologist of the upper class, whose book Puritan Boston and Quaker Philadelphia — still available from Beacon Press in Boston, IIRC — I recommend highly to anyone who wants to understand why the two cities, similar though they may be, are so different. In that story, I wrote about an encounter I had with a random Black man on Market Street near City Hall in the article. When I told him I had recently moved from Boston, he asked me what I thought of Philadelphia. Pointing towards City Hall — where Wilson Goode, the city's first Black mayor, was ensconced at the time — I said to him, "It's so much better for Blacks here." IIRC, Boston still has yet to elect a Black mayor. My hometown of Kansas City, which is about 20-25 percent Black, has elected three, as has Philadelphia. I'm not sure what this says about Boston, but in this regard, I don't think it's good.)
*The place where I first learned about Mt. Airy and its history, however, was deep in the stacks of Harvard's Widener Library, where I ran across a book written in the mid-1970s called "The Education of a WASP" while wandering through them one day in 1980. The book, which describes an upper-middle-class white woman's journey towards understanding why integration matters, ended with her and her family settling in that neighborhood. Oddly enough, even though the book's tone seems to me rather naive now, her message would resonate with lots of white folks today, if they were really interested in it.
Boston has only ever elected straight white male mayors, so it s a bit deeper than a black thing.
Boston hasn’t voted out an incumbent since 1948, and that’s because he went to prisons in the last 120 years Boston has had one Italian White male mayor. The rest have all been Irish. Since 1993 Boston has had only two mayors. The current mayor only came to power when the last one died.
Massachusetts has no term limits on any level and doesn’t vote out incumbents period. In fact I don’t even know the last incumbent governor that lost an election. I don’t think there’s been one in my life time.
Since Boston has become a majority minority city there only been one vacant mayoral seat.
The last 2 elections there were more black/Latino candidates than white candidates.
The problem is the Black and Latino votes gets splintered by neighborhood and ethnicity.
Yes of course Boston has neighborhoods like Germantown-it would be the Fort Hill part of Roxbury.
What’s crazy to me is that people speak of what it’s like for blacks in Bsoton but as you and other have shown have virtually no idea what the black neighborhoods are like, how big they are, how to get there etc etc.
you have some sort of frame of reference but when I get question like “does Boston have any majority black census tracts near or in it that make 70k annual household income?” All I can do is shake my head.
I was just in Boston for two weeks andIt was fantastic. I just got done interviewing for a job based in Nubian Square where I have a few friends who work there. Both college educated black and Latino. The black woman lives in Fort Hill, Roxbury, the Latino man lives in Cambridge.
Boston has only ever elected straight white male mayors, so it s a bit deeper than a black thing.
Boston hasn’t voted out an incumbent since 1948, and that’s because he went to prisons in the last 120 years Boston has had one Italian White male mayor. The rest have all been Irish. Since 1993 Boston has had only two mayors. The current mayor only came to power when the last one died.
Massachusetts has no term limits on any level and doesn’t vote out incumbents period. In fact I don’t even know the last incumbent governor that lost an election. I don’t think there’s been one in my life time.
Since Boston has become a majority minority city there only been one vacant mayoral seat.
The last 2 elections there were more black/Latino candidates than white candidates.
The problem is the Black and Latino votes gets splintered by neighborhood and ethnicity.
Yes of course Boston has neighborhoods like Germantown-it would be the Fort Hill part of Roxbury.
What’s crazy to me is that people speak of what it’s like for blacks in Bsoton but as you and other have shown have virtually no idea what the black neighborhoods are like, how big they are, how to get there etc etc.
you have some sort of frame of reference but when I get question like “does Boston have any majority black census tracts near or in it that make 70k annual household income?” All I can do is shake my head.
I was just in Boston for two weeks andIt was fantastic. I just got done interviewing for a job based in Nubian Square where I have a few friends who work there. Both college educated black and Latino. The black woman lives in Fort Hill, Roxbury, the Latino man lives in Cambridge.
My African American friends who live in Boston just laugh when ocassionally someone says how bad it must be for them there. It's just ignorance. It usually goes along the line soft. Okay. Tell me more about how you live paycheck to paycheck in a brick apartment in the Bronx/Brooklyn/Memphis when I have a whole floor of a Victorian with park access and T passes. But outdated stereotypes like Boston being racist usually just mean that someone has not visited or spent ample time there. There's a lot to **** on Boston about, but that's a cheap shot.
But it seems you might be returning to Boston?? Working in Nubian Square, so I assume you are looking around there?
Not really. A more wealthy than Average area with a higher foreign born percentage than average would naturally lead to a better travelled region.
Okay, but does that count as an " Average Bostonian?"
How many native born residents travel more than anyone else in other large cities? If a person is a transplant then any visits to their hometown would qualify as " Travel." Same for their children if and when they settle down, but return home with spouse/kids in tow.
So whether that's to another American city or somewhere in the Caribbean or overseas it's still pretty much the patterns of a transplant anywhere.
My African American friends who live in Boston just laugh when ocassionally someone says how bad it must be for them there. It's just ignorance. It usually goes along the line soft. Okay. Tell me more about how you live paycheck to paycheck in a brick apartment in the Bronx/Brooklyn/Memphis when I have a whole floor of a Victorian with park access and T passes. But outdated stereotypes like Boston being racist usually just mean that someone has not visited or spent ample time there. There's a lot to **** on Boston about, but that's a cheap shot.
But it seems you might be returning to Boston?? Working in Nubian Square, so I assume you are looking around there?
Hopefully I am I’m in the interview process for a non profit called the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City. It’s looking good so far.
And no id be moving to Hyde Park, Malden Quincy to Stoughton. I need a two bedroom with a firm cap of 1900 per month. Dorchester might work but Roxbury would be tight.
Luckily my father is about to retire from and live in Ghana and Kenya for like 6 months.
Hopefully I am I’m in the interview process for a non profit called the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City. It’s looking good so far.
And no id be moving to Hyde Park, Malden Quincy to Stoughton. I need a two bedroom with a firm cap of 1900 per month. Dorchester might work but Roxbury would be tight.
Luckily my father is about to retire from and live in Ghana and Kenya for like 6 months.
Well congratulations and wish you the best of luck! That's pretty exciting!
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