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One difference between Boston and Philadelphia would be when each went through its "revival". Boston after WWII was a tired, old city, its mills long gone in a struggling economy. In the sixties, Route 128 around the city was a precursor of Silicon Valley and the tech boom there reignited Boston. For Philadelphia, it happened much later. In 1986, for the first time, the gentlemen's agreement was broken and a downtown tower passed up the cap on William Penn's head to become the city's tallest. It is in this century where Philly really started to roll again
Bingo.
Philly arrived at the party later than its East Coast superstar peers.
This actually works to our advantage, for we now have the opportunity to see whether we can't reap the sort of benefits those superstar cities did without sacrificing the welfare of the people in the middle, those without college degrees (I'm of the opinion that we need to have skilled, good-paying jobs that draw on other human strengths besides the intellectual ones), and the service-sector workers who tend to the well-being of the gilded gifted in those other cities.
No less than the guy responsible for our current predicament, Richard "Rise of the Creative Class" Florida, is now in Philly on a one-year non-resident fellowship jointly held by Drexel and Jefferson universities here. The aim is to figure out how cities in general can undo the damage* and how this one in particular can avoid going too far down that path. I'm looking forward to reading my colleague Steve Volk's feature on Florida's fellowship in the October issue of Philadelphia.**
*When I read Florida's latest book, "The New Urban Crisis," my reaction was, "Richard Florida surveys the urban world his first book created and cries out, 'My God, what have I done?'"
**One other thing Philadelphia and Boston have in common: The same company publishes their respective city magazines. Those who point to Clay Felker and New York (born from the ashes of the Herald Tribune's Sunday magazine in 1967) as the pioneers of the city magazine are off base: D. Herbert ("Herb") Lipson takes that title for turning what had been a rather sleepy Chamber of Commerce regional promotional magazine into a voicey mag with a penchant for investigation in 1965. The company he established, Metrocorp, acquired Boston sometime in the 1970s, not long after it was founded. His son, David Herbert ("Dave") Lipson, runs the enterprise now. I joined PhillyMag's editorial staff full-time in the fall of 2015 after freelancing for the mag for two years; I was the first African-American member of the full-time editorial staff. Three others have joined me (on a full-time editorial staff of about 20; two more freelance, including the second African-American they hired, a few days after me) since then.
Metrocorp and the editorial offices of Philadelphia are located on the building facing both Independence and Washington squares that was built in 1910 as the headquarters of the Curtis Publishing Company. At its peak in the years between the Depression and World War II, Curtis was the leading publisher of general-interest magazines in the country; its flagship title, The Saturday Evening Post, made artist Norman Rockwell a household name. Another Philly-Boston tie: one of founder Cyrus H.K. Curtis' descendants, Derek Curtis Bok, ran Harvard University for most of the 1970s, including the years I spent there as an undergrad.
i was gonna' post a 'battle of the chestnut hills' poll. but we mite as well thread-squat here:
i say chestnut hill, ma has better subway service,
better sckools (both grade and university),
more affluent,
...
i was gonna' post a 'battle of the chestnut hills' poll. but we mite as well thread-squat here:
i say chestnut hill, ma has better subway service,
better sckools (both grade and university),
more affluent,
...
Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, has no rapid transit service, but it is served by two Regional Rail lines and the most heavily-used bus route in the city (along with two other bus routes).
I'd agree with your assessment of the educational institutions, and the household income figures are what they are.
But Chestnut Hill in Philly beats its Boston counterpart on the urbanity scale. Chestnut Hill MA's main shopping district consists of two adjacent shopping malls on a busy commuter highway. Chestnut Hill PA's is a very charming and walkable Main Street district located on one of the city's most historic thoroughfares.
Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, has no rapid transit service, but it is served by two Regional Rail lines and the most heavily-used bus route in the city (along with two other bus routes).
I'd agree with your assessment of the educational institutions, and the household income figures are what they are.
But Chestnut Hill in Philly beats its Boston counterpart on the urbanity scale. Chestnut Hill MA's main shopping district consists of two adjacent shopping malls on a busy commuter highway. Chestnut Hill PA's is a very charming and walkable Main Street district located on one of the city's most historic thoroughfares.
i appreciate the argument; but, according to city-data:
i appreciate the argument; but, according to city-data:meh ?
For like the bajillionth time on this forum, density =/= urbanity. The MA one has BC students in it, likely increasing density. But still, there is not a single urban corridor in the zip code. The MA one does not have streets that look like this or this or this or this or this. And those were only select views of Germantown Ave, which looks like that commercial strip for several blocks.
Philly at full potential will be a better city than Boston at full potential IMO, but as of now, Philly just has farther to go. Its pace is great though IMO and it has a very promising future.
What does it mean for a city to reach its “full potential”? Like what will Boston look like when it reaches that point?
What does it mean for a city to reach its “full potential”? Like what will Boston look like when it reaches that point?
I mean it's hard to say because we never know when a city will peak or anything. But I'd say when a city is a well-established cultural hub that is able to use all its strengths to its benefit. I think Boston is in that category already, but Philly is not. Boston will continue to improve, but it's no longer going to be seen as a city making a comeback like Philly is right now. So when they're both able to fully capitalize on their benefits, I think Philly will actually be the city with more benefits to offer.
Boston will continue to improve, but it's no longer going to be seen as a city making a comeback like Philly is right now.
Ok, I see what your saying. As far as comebacks go, Worcester and Providence will be more interesting to watch (hopefully) in the next 20 years than Boston will.
I mean it's hard to say because we never know when a city will peak or anything. But I'd say when a city is a well-established cultural hub that is able to use all its strengths to its benefit. I think Boston is in that category already, but Philly is not. Boston will continue to improve, but it's no longer going to be seen as a city making a comeback like Philly is right now. So when they're both able to fully capitalize on their benefits, I think Philly will actually be the city with more benefits to offer.
I actually think that Philly is in that sweet spot either at this very moment or it will be there in the very near future--say, within the next 5 years--where COL, amenities, and jobs are very well-balanced. We're usually only able to make these sorts of determinations in retrospect, but I think that's another advantage of Philly reinventing itself a bit later than its peers: you can see when that time might have been for them and make the comparison with Philly in its current trajectory. Once it starts topping these ubiquitous "best cities" lists, you'll know that moment has already passed.
As you should. I roll my eyes at people getting hung up on the stereotypical foods of each city. I have done 3 cheesesteaks in Philly. Geno's, Pat's, and Molly Malloy's. I'm glad I did them, but they're the least memorable parts of eating out in Philadelphia which has one of the best restaurant scenes in the country in my opinion. Same for Boston which has some of the best seafood in the country. You're not anywhere close to it if you just do chowder at Legal and a lobster roll at the Barking Crab.
When was the last time you were in Philadelphia? I'm asking because while I agree that Boston is definitely more polished right now, Philadelphia is booming too. There's a ton of investment going on there.
I personally haven't visited in a few years although I have a lot of family around the city. All of my assessments are just that, assessments made with my mild intuition. I know investment has only gone up in the city since about 2007, it's just a bit slower moving now compared to say, 2007-2010. As far as I am aware, Comcast is still the biggest company by far.
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