Worcester vs Hartford (apartments, rental market, crime)

[thenewtexan]

If we're talking city vs. city, Worcester hands down. It's nearly 50 percent larger in population. It's also only 40 minutes from Boston, and is a lot safer overall, and is still growing. Hartford...not so much.

Despite only being the third largest city in CT, it still has more of an urban feel and its own identity than Worcester and its suburbs are larger and much more diverse. Worcester still seems to piggyback off of Boston, who barely knows it even exists. On the plus side if you live in Worcester, you can still commute to Boston easily.

Overall, Worcester is heading in a much better direction.

[MrGompers]

Hartford has more jobs, and more corporate headquarters. I think companies like to be located in a capital city for some reason. CT Transit (public bus system) actually operates a fairly good network of express buses into & out of Hartford daily for commuters. Don't know if Worcester has the same system.

In terms of geography, layout, and looks, I think Worcester looks just like Waterbury, CT. They could be sister cities.

[Shrewsburried]

I grew up next door to Worcester in the once beautiful (and now bloated) north side of Shrewsbury and have seen the city struggle to turn around (anyone remember the Fashion Outlets at the long defunct Galleria?). Though it has struggled, it certainly has improved greatly.

The city has attempted to curate/promote (with varying degrees of success) a more 'intellectual' presence by encouraging further healthcare and university investment (e.g., Gateway park, Mass Pharm Courtyard dorm conversion, etc.). It has also attempted to filter out some of Worcester's less "intellectual" traditions such as Moscaffian's 'Summer Nationals' which had always been populous ... good riddance.

If my profession wasn't Boston biased (med dev), I would happily move to the north side of Worcester or Holden/Paxton (which are essentially extensions of Worcester's north side) ... all contain affordable well built homes in established neighborhoods and quality pre-high schools.

I have a number of friends who live in what were the established Jewish neighborhoods off of Salisbury St. Walking around, one might mistake it for a west Metro-Boston 'burb ... beautiful tree lined roads, well kept homes of 1920-1960's vintage, and driveways littered with glistening German steel. These aren't "up-and-coming" neighborhoods ... the wealth has existed since establishment.

[Michblue]

Originally Posted by Shrewsburried

I grew up next door to Worcester in the once beautiful (and now bloated) north side of Shrewsbury and have seen the city struggle to turn around (anyone remember the Fashion Outlets at the long defunct Galleria?). Though it has struggled, it certainly has improved greatly.

The city has attempted to curate/promote (with varying degrees of success) a more 'intellectual' presence by encouraging further healthcare and university investment (e.g., Gateway park, Mass Pharm Courtyard dorm conversion, etc.). It has also attempted to filter out some of Worcester's less "intellectual" traditions such as Moscaffian's 'Summer Nationals' which had always been populous ... good riddance.

If my profession wasn't Boston biased (med dev), I would happily move to the north side of Worcester or Holden/Paxton (which are essentially extensions of Worcester's north side) ... all contain affordable well built homes in established neighborhoods and quality pre-high schools.

I have a number of friends who live in what were the established Jewish neighborhoods off of Salisbury St. Walking around, one might mistake it for a west Metro-Boston 'burb ... beautiful tree lined roads, well kept homes of 1920-1960's vintage, and driveways littered with glistening German steel. These aren't "up-and-coming" neighborhoods ... the wealth has existed since establishment.

Thank you for this post. I moved to Worcester when I was ten, and have lived here over 30 years. So many times I read posts about Worcester and can't for the life of me understand what the poster is trying to convey. It's like they are posting about some other city I have never been to. It seems surprising that it would ever compare to Hartford. But I suppose things always look different from the inside. My reality is a beautiful 1914 Craftsman Four Square in that tree lined neighborhood you mentioned. But with a glistening Odyssey instead.

[The_General]

I grew up in a Worcester suburb, and Worcester gets crapped on a lot, mostly because the city it gets compared to most often is Boston. If you compare Worcester to Boston, Worcester will look terrible. But to I disagree with thenewtexan, Worcester isn't still piggybacking off of Boston, its just starting to piggyback off of Boston. There are biotech companies are popping up near UMass Med and WPI. Boston's not a bad city to hitch your wagon to.

[Dave120]

Originally Posted by lrfox

it's similarly a satellite city of Boston with a commuter rail network,

Question about this with regard to Worcester: is there any plan to make its commuter rail faster? I was looking at the schedule times, and it's between 1.5 to 2 hours to Boston. That doesn't seem practical for anybody planning on commuting to Boston by train. Considering Providence is a bit further distance-wise, yet with service taking only about an hour by commuter rail, I would think it's doable for Worcester, no?

[lrfox]

Originally Posted by Dave120

Question about this with regard to Worcester: is there any plan to make its commuter rail faster? I was looking at the schedule times, and it's between 1.5 to 2 hours to Boston. That doesn't seem practical for anybody planning on commuting to Boston by train. Considering Providence is a bit further distance-wise, yet with service taking only about an hour by commuter rail, I would think it's doable for Worcester, no?

Yeah, there are plans to increase headways and speed. A lot of it hangs on the expansion of South Station which hinges on the sale of the USPS site next door. It'll eventually happen though. I think Worcester and a few other main lines in the network will see upgraded speeds in the next few decades. I think they'll have to for Commuter Rail to be competitive and for Metro Boston to keep expanding.

[90Cantab]

Originally Posted by lrfox

Yeah, there are plans to increase headways and speed. A lot of it hangs on the expansion of South Station which hinges on the sale of the USPS site next door. It'll eventually happen though. I think Worcester and a few other main lines in the network will see upgraded speeds in the next few decades. I think they'll have to for Commuter Rail to be competitive and for Metro Boston to keep expanding.

Should also add that the MBTA really wants to improve Worcester-line headways. They kicked around the idea of running a few lines at peak over the Grand Junction to North Station but decided it wasn't worth backing up Mass Ave and pissing off Cambridge to do so. Unlike many issues where the T has a "we'll get to it later" attitude (in all fairness, they are underfunded and overstretched in their planning work), there is a drive for better Worcester access - which is good to see because its a complicated problem with congestion at the old Beacon Park Yard and at SS.

I'm with you 100% about the need for Worcester and Boston to "find each other". And the main reason why I think Worcester has a brighter immediate future than Hartford. The cost of doing business in MA is something like 45th in the US, it's obviously a complex issue - but the single greatest inputs to that are the cost of living (primarily driven by house prices) and the cost of property. Boston, if it doesn't establish frequent and convenient transit access to Worcester (much better than what's there now) will price itself into irrelevance. Worcester, Brockton, Lowell, Haverhill - they are the keys to a strong and stable economy in Massachusetts.

Here's a question I have for someone who understands the Worcester political scene better than I do. I was always under the impression that the relative size of Worcester was a blessing and a curse - in that the primarily suburban west side wields the most political clout and has been reticent until recently to spend money on the core. Is this off-base?

[missionhill]

I will note that these upgrades to the Framingham Worcester line and to South Station would partly restore the railroad's former capacity. The old Boston & Albany line was a four-track system with express and local though Boston, Brighton and Newton (perhaps farther) until two of the tracks were sacrificed to build the Mass Turnpike extension. Same with the problem of capacity at South Station. As the railroads withered after WWII, South Station was left with a lot of unused track. Some of the track was given up to allow the Post Office to build its mail handling facility. Later, a chunk of the waiting room and railroad offices--most of the Summer St frontage of the terminal building--was demolished for a Stone & Webster office building. Guess no one foresaw that track capacity would ever be needed again.

I don't know any more about Worcester politics than 90Cantab but I'd be surprised if local elites were opposed to building up the core. In both Holyoke and Springfield, for example, the business community collaborated on downtown redevelopment schemes in the 1960s and '70s, while their downtowns were still viable. In both cases, the business and civic leadership framed the projects something needed to reverse the forces of suburbanization--i.e., to compete effectively with suburban shopping. Holyoke's project was very mall-heavy and would have demolished several existing business blocks. That project died in the late '60s. In Springfield they tried very hard but their efforts were overwhelmed by structural problems--mainly losses in the local manufacturing sector, suburbanization of both retail and offices, and racial change in the neighborhoods. Also Springfield suffered as key institutions closed or disappeared through mergers. It lost its two local department stores, the famous "Johnson's Bookstore," and other businesses that had a big stake in downtown redevelopment. To get back to infrastructure, it's hard to imagine now how dynamic the highway-building craze was and how poorly understood were its impacts. Expressways were built right through downtown Springfield, making it as easy to leave the city as to get there. By contrast, I-90 bypassed Worcester which may have been a blessing. I-91 through Holyoke completely changed the whole idea of "central business district" there which no one understood until it happened. Now Holyoke's business center is scattered around one of the I-91 exits (and is as completely unwalkable as the old downtown was walkable.)

[Shrewsburried]

Originally Posted by missionhill

I don't know any more about Worcester politics than 90Cantab but I'd be surprised if local elites were opposed to building up the core. In both Holyoke and Springfield, for example, the business community collaborated on downtown redevelopment schemes in the 1960s and '70s, while their downtowns were still viable.

While I am hardly privy to the political dealings of Worcester, a review of Worcester's development over that past 20 years shows considerable improvements to the "core", albeit with the help of private institutions (both medical and higher-ed). Main St. was an absolute pit in the late '90's and early '00's and now, thanks to both public and private investment, the strip now looks a bit more polished. Worcester is currently seeking private investment for the State Courthouse, which the city bought some years back after going unused. The downtown area is certainly undergoing a long but steady upswing.