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I can see where someone would find Minnesota preferable to New Jersey; different people have different outdoor preferences.
But the sentence I bold-faced just underscores the point I made in the post of mine that you quoted about Newark getting a bum rap.
The following lead core cities of the 72 largest metropolitan areas in the country (the metros in the "2020 Metro Madness" tournament) all have populations smaller than Newark's 282,862:
Albany (the only core city on this list with a population under 100,000)
Akron
Allentown
Birmingham
Bridgeport
Dayton
Des Moines
Grand Rapids
Hartford (CT) and Springfield (MA) (Springfield is the larger of the two)
Providence
Richmond
Rochester
Syracuse
Toledo (just barely)
Worcester
Many of these have identifiable and noteworthy downtowns. In fact, I'd say that just about all of them have.
So does Newark. It not only has a central business district with the amenities I noted above (New Jersey Performing Arts Center; Prudential Arena; Bears & Eagles Riverfront Stadium bit the dust last year, to be replaced by a mixed-use residential-commercial development), but it also has a major corporate headquarters — that of the Prudential Insurance Company of America, which is probably as good a corporate citizen as one might want in any city. Instead of leaving Newark after the 1960s riots, it doubled down on the downtown (as its name on the sports arena should indicate).
One of Philadelphia's leading developers, Carl Dranoff, has just finished a major upmarket rental apartment building in downtown Newark, One Theater Square, located across Centre Street from NJPAC and managed by one of the East Coast's biggest and best-regarded rental property managers, Bozzuto. (Dranoff has gotten out of the rental construction business in Philly, preferring high-end condos instead.) It will be joined by that development on the ballpark site, which isn't a Dranoff project.
And not only does the city have its own airport, it also has a light metro line all its own: the Newark City Subway, opened in 1937. It also has two intercity/regional rail hubs: Newark Penn Station and Newark Broad Street Station (on the ex-Lackawanna Railroad regional system).
If you put all this someplace more than 15 minutes away from Lower Manhattan, it would be a metropolitan center in its own right. Instead, it gets overlooked, as it did here.
I didn’t overlook Newark, it’s just not much of a plus to have Newark, in my opinion. It’s a small city. It is still a largely poor city, and while it’s not hemorrhaging residents anymore, and crime has improved, it still has crime rates that are surpassed among cities > 200k pop only by Baltimore, St. Louis, NOLA, Baton Rouge, and Detroit. In other words, it’s got a long way to go before it’s presence would be a plus in my book, and it would probably need to double its population.
Those cities you listed from the Metro Madness tournament all anchor a metro making them feel bigger than they are, but really none of them would be a big plus either. There is a reason every single one got knocked out in the first round. About the only advantages Newark gives is a reasonable commute to Manhattan, some NHL Hockey, and a big airport that most people dislike.
New Jersey is a fine place to live, but there is still no big metro that is anchored in the state.
I didn’t overlook Newark, it’s just not much of a plus to have Newark, in my opinion. It’s a small city. It is still a largely poor city, and while it’s not hemorrhaging residents anymore, and crime has improved, it still has crime rates that are surpassed among cities > 200k pop only by Baltimore, St. Louis, NOLA, Baton Rouge, and Detroit. In other words, it’s got a long way to go before it’s presence would be a plus in my book, and it would probably need to double its population.
Those cities you listed from the Metro Madness tournament all anchor a metro making them feel bigger than they are, but really none of them would be a big plus either. There is a reason every single one got knocked out in the first round. About the only advantages Newark gives is a reasonable commute to Manhattan, some NHL Hockey, and a big airport that most people dislike.
New Jersey is a fine place to live, but there is still no big metro that is anchored in the state.
My point is, that's only because Newark lies within New York's commutershed.
Put Newark where Springfield, Mass., is, and give it suburbs like those of other similar-sized Northeast metropolises, and it becomes a metropolitan center.
Okay, I'll grant you that it probably wouldn't have survived the first round of Metro Madness either. But I am saying that it could stand on its own.
I consider Providence a plus, btw. Ditto Richmond and Des Moines. Providence and Richmond are paired in the first round, so one of them will advance to Round Two; there's currently a tie-breaker runoff posted to City vs. City.
My point is, that's only because Newark lies within New York's commutershed.
Put Newark where Springfield, Mass., is, and give it suburbs like those of other similar-sized Northeast metropolises, and it becomes a metropolitan center.
Okay, I'll grant you that it probably wouldn't have survived the first round of Metro Madness either. But I am saying that it could stand on its own.
I consider Providence a plus, btw. Ditto Richmond and Des Moines. Providence and Richmond are paired in the first round, so one of them will advance to Round Two; there's currently a tie-breaker runoff posted to City vs. City.
You are correct on Richmond making the second round. My mistake. But it won't make the third.
California vs. NEVADA - Even though it's a beautiful state, Californians tend to look down on everybody else
TENNESSEE vs. Alaska - love Tennessee
GEORGIA vs. Hawaii - Surprise, surprise, I'm going Southeast
NORTH CAROLINA vs. New Hampshire - See above
New York vs. NEW MEXICO - Friendlier folks
Washington vs. WISCONSIN - They drink more beer
PENNSYLVANIA vs. Oklahoma - Not big on tornadoes
Virginia vs. COLORADO - As noted above, DC has taken this state down a notch
TEXAS vs. Iowa - Both friendly places, I'll take the warmer one
Massachusetts vs. MISSOURI - Tough one here, maybe depending on my mood
Ohio vs. KENTUCKY - Just got back from Cincinnati, it was fun. The trees and hills of Kentucky win this one
Michigan vs. SOUTH CAROLINA - The Mitt is nice, but not as nice as The Cack de Sur
FLORIDA vs. Utah - For now, but I don't know how much longer
ARIZONA vs. Maryland - I just like Arizona better
Illinois vs. OREGON - The two biggest cities, are a lot different then the rest of the state.
New Jersey vs. MINNESOTA - I have friends from both places, and surprisingly, the Jersey folk are also nice
You are correct on Richmond making the second round. My mistake. But it won't make the third.
No, it won't, because it's up against New York.
But frankly, I don't think it would have made it out against any of the top seeds in this second-round bracket: so far, the votes have run almost unanimously NYC-Boston-DC-Philly, though there have been a few people who picked Hampton Roads (Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Chesapeake) over Philadelphia.
But that doesn't make it (a) not a metropolitan center (b) not an attractive, interesting and desirable city to live in. I think you would find lots of the voters in this bracket saying nice things about the Virginia capital and what it has to offer. It's just not in the same league with those big dogs.
I don’t think many people voting for CO have actually visited or spent time with the people that live there. It’s full of survivalists and bro’s. The Front Range has been ruined over the last 20-30 years (I’ve been going about once a year since 1986 to visit family, see nephews graduate, watching nieces get bat mitzvahed, weddings...). It has become one of the trashiest looking places in the country (200 hundred miles of fracking sites, asphalt plants, strip malls and junk yards).
Downtown Denver is very nice, very midwestern in its built firm, which I like. But it’s museums were built for dumb people. The art museum is probably the worst of any I’ve visited. The western part of the state is very pretty and back on the Front Range, Ft Collins is my favorite city in the state but both areas are populated with goofy and awkward people with zero fashion sense and terrible taste in music.
The mountain towns are tourists traps (inauthentic) but obviously the views are amazing. Everything else about the state is mediocre at best.
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