[kidyankee764]

Originally Posted by skytrekker

West Hartford center, still epitomizes a New England town center. The Town Hall, library, and Church are quintessential New England. The region of La Salle Rd. South Main street, & Farmington Avenue, with its shops also is very New England.
I see no 'NY elements'.

I agree regarding WH center. But I think there is a big difference between Connecticut NE and the rest of NE. With regards to 'NY elements' I disagree. Many in Boston and northern NE view CT as an extension of NY - while I beg to differ with that view, I can see why people think that. Overall, CT is NE. No doubt about that. JMHO

[Stratford, Ct. Resident]

Originally Posted by bluecountry

I would think NY would have a dominant influential pull all over CT except E of metro Hartford.

I was going to do a long-winded post, but i can answer you just based on your above statement. The dominant influential pull isn't NY, nor is it MA. Nobody tells the people of CT what to do or how to act. We are mavericks(not a Weicker liker) who march to our own unique beat. JMHO.

[JayCT]

Connecticut (even southwestern) is definitely New england. From the highway or along the main commercal roads, it looks like any other American city or town. This is true in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and even New Hampshire and Maine. But the real essence of New England is off the busy commercial areas. It is the town green with the stately buildings and homes and the white steepled churches. It is the back country roads lined with trees and stone walls. It is the expanse of space between homes and buildings. This is found throughout Connecticut even in Fairfield County. I should say especially in Fairfield County where New Yorkers will pay a premium to live with high home prices and longer travel times into the city. So to answer the OP's question, do not judge Connecticut by what you see passing through on the highway. Get off into the heart of the towns and you will see that Connecitcut is truly New England. Jay

[pmeek2309]

I must say that it seems as if there are two CTs just from reading your posting boards. The NY side of Conn seems to be anti-Boston and the MA side seems to be anti-New York and both sides seem a little bitter toward the other. I am not sure why. Connecticut is its own state, and a beautiful one. Why feel the need for associations?

Connecticut does have a New England feel of course since it is New England. In Oxford and Monroe where we visited the towns are very New England with the rock walls and church steeples. I did find the accents to be similar to New York rather than Boston but that is to be expected.

Now I have to ask the Hartford area residents, why the obsession with Boston? You are about halfway and the NY suburbs are closer to you than Boston's like Waterbury according to statistical metro and micropolitan areas. Same goes for people in Litchfield or Madison who claim to be part of NY when they are 2 hours away. When I lived in New Jersey I never experienced the animosity between Philadelphia and NY that I notice here on the city data board. Can it be an elitist CT thing? It is not something I have noticed so much on this thread as I have on others. I am just not getting it.

[RadishArt]

Originally Posted by pmeek2309

I must say that it seems as if there are two CTs just from reading your posting boards. The NY side of Conn seems to be anti-Boston and the MA side seems to be anti-New York and both sides seem a little bitter toward the other. I am not sure why. Connecticut is its own state, and a beautiful one. Why feel the need for associations?

Connecticut does have a New England feel of course since it is New England. In Oxford and Monroe where we visited the towns are very New England with the rock walls and church steeples. I did find the accents to be similar to New York rather than Boston but that is to be expected.

Now I have to ask the Hartford area residents, why the obsession with Boston? You are about halfway and the NY suburbs are closer to you than Boston's like Waterbury according to statistical metro and micropolitan areas. Same goes for people in Litchfield or Madison who claim to be part of NY when they are 2 hours away. When I lived in New Jersey I never experienced the animosity between Philadelphia and NY that I notice here on the city data board. Can it be an elitist CT thing? It is not something I have noticed so much on this thread as I have on others. I am just not getting it.

I would wager it's a sports rivalry thing, choosing between Yankees and Red Sox, Giants or Patriots. And once you align yourself with a team, you feel somewhat closer to its community.

[Lincolnian]

Originally Posted by pmeek2309

I must say that it seems as if there are two CTs just from reading your posting boards. The NY side of Conn seems to be anti-Boston and the MA side seems to be anti-New York and both sides seem a little bitter toward the other. I am not sure why. Connecticut is its own state, and a beautiful one. Why feel the need for associations?

Connecticut does have a New England feel of course since it is New England. In Oxford and Monroe where we visited the towns are very New England with the rock walls and church steeples. I did find the accents to be similar to New York rather than Boston but that is to be expected.

Now I have to ask the Hartford area residents, why the obsession with Boston? You are about halfway and the NY suburbs are closer to you than Boston's like Waterbury according to statistical metro and micropolitan areas. Same goes for people in Litchfield or Madison who claim to be part of NY when they are 2 hours away. When I lived in New Jersey I never experienced the animosity between Philadelphia and NY that I notice here on the city data board. Can it be an elitist CT thing? It is not something I have noticed so much on this thread as I have on others. I am just not getting it.

I think this is true more in regard to sports than people. Yeah you have Yankee vs Sox and Giants vs Pats mentality but most people, like me, recognize that we are close to both important nearby cities, Boston and NYC. Despite that proximity we have our own identity. Hartford is the "city" for central Connecticut. Although many don't actually go there very often Hartford, not Boston or NYC, is what people identify with when referring to the city. In Southern Connecticut, people in an around New Haven have similar attachments. As you move down I-95 toward NY then people's views of "the city" obviously gravitate more toward NYC.

[missionhill]

Connecticut and Massachusetts are not so different and CT is a lot more like MA than NY. CT and MA are more like each other than upper New England too, because they're older and more built up. The view from the road thing is interesting and misleading--after all, the idea that NJ is some kind of industrial nightmare comes from driving the NJ Turnpike. (Had they known what the turnpike would do to the state's reputation they might have found a different route.) Driving to and from Boston on the Mass Turnpike is very misleading: west of the Weston toll the suburban strip development seems to stop, creating the impression that the Boston suburbs are contained within Route 128. If you drive instead on State route 9 (once known as the Worcester Turnpike), you get the full suburban treatment all the way to Westborough. Lesson? The MassPike near Boston was routed through high-income towns (especially Weston) that did not permit any commercial development near the road. MassPike also has very few exits--only 14 I think between the NYS border and Route 128. I-84 east of Hartford and 91 south of Hartford have a lot more development along them because the land was available, there are plenty of exits around which to build, and the towns allowed that kind of development.

My other thought on this is that Hartford and Boston have a similar settlement history--rather than a single settlement that grew into a single big city, they both began with scattered settlements. In the Massachusetts Bay colony, Boston, Cambridge, Charlestown, Watertown, Roxbury, Dedham, and Lynn were all going as early as 1640. That history of independent towns within a single colony was duplicated in the Connecticut Valley with Hartford, Wethersfield and Windsor, then New Britain, Berlin, Meriden, Middletown, etc. leading (as in the Boston area) to a relatively small central city and many other sizeable cities and towns in the region. In the 19th century Boston annexed a few of those early towns but didn't get very far with the project, so some of the most urban parts of the Boston region today aren't even within the city of Boston.

Interesting thread recently in the Louisville, Ky, forum started by someone arguing that Louisville is so much more successful a city than Rochester, NY (where the OP spent his teaching career) because Louisville merged with its suburbs creating a single metropolitan government while Rochester grew poor as its independent suburbs grew rich. You can make the same observation about Hartford and Boston--why have 50 different municipal governments in a single city region, with most (or all) of the middle class not citizens of the central city, rather than a consolidated metro government? That would even out all the unfair differential in resources for schools and other public services. The most New England thing about CT and MA (outside of the landscape itself) is that thing of municipal independence, town meetings, etc. No one wants metro government no matter how unfair or inefficient town-by-town governance may be.

[JayCT]

Originally Posted by missionhill

Interesting thread recently in the Louisville, Ky, forum started by someone arguing that Louisville is so much more successful a city than Rochester, NY (where the OP spent his teaching career) because Louisville merged with its suburbs creating a single metropolitan government while Rochester grew poor as its independent suburbs grew rich. You can make the same observation about Hartford and Boston--why have 50 different municipal governments in a single city region, with most (or all) of the middle class not citizens of the central city, rather than a consolidated metro government? That would even out all the unfair differential in resources for schools and other public services. The most New England thing about CT and MA (outside of the landscape itself) is that thing of municipal independence, town meetings, etc. No one wants metro government no matter how unfair or inefficient town-by-town governance may be.

Huh? Boston has not devoured its suburbs into a single metropolitan area. IT is a pretty small city area wise in comparison to large cities out west. Cambridge, Brookline, Newton, Needham, Dedham and others are still independent towns and I doubt you will find a more prosperous city than Boston. Hartford is a lot smaller than Boston. It alwasy has been and probably always will be. Just the cards that Hartford was dealt. Merging the suburbs into the city will do nothing more than dillute the problems that Hartford itself faces and obliterate 300 years of history. Changing to a metro government will allow polititians to hide behind a large faceless government and not make them accountable to residents. JMHO Jay

[JViello]

Oh boy...this debate again.

I agree that going to a county system or a mass annex over 169 cities and towns with redundant services/government etc is a better idea. It would also be nice if the city's political influence actually involved those outside of the tiny city limits since we are all attached to it like it or not.

We've already discussed this ad nauseum..

[ronson]

Blue Country,

I always got that same feeling but driving through Roxburry and Jamaica Plain MA, NE feel? Just making a small tongue in cheek comment. In my humblest opinion, each NE State and subsequently each region of that State has its own feel. Just look at the differences between Charlestown and the North End, and you can throw a stone between those two. Or the North Shore and West of Boston near Wellesly and Newton.