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Kensington?? I went on a pretty long walk around there a couple months ago and saw a total of one hipster. He really stood out. Is there a hipster population center I missed? Are they stealth hipsters?
i am pretty sure for the purposes of this thread, "hipster" can mean "yuppie" "transplant" "young college grad" etc.
Theres a newish building on Ocean parkway right near 18th avenue, that I presume is getting some kind of young professionals. Maybe Orthodox jewish ones? I don't know.
I'd have to disagree with anon's statement...maybe it applies in Brooklyn, but certainly not the Southern Bronx. There continues to be an influx of all kinds of residents (From 163rd south). Hipsters are certainly not the driving force in the Southern Bronx, as it is predominantly working/middle class colored folks, however the Hipsters continue to come in. It may be that neighborhoods like Bushwick have already incorporated jacked-up pricing even before the nabe gets nice, so could be people are choosing not to pay the inflated prices and looking elsewhere, like the Southern Bronx.
Also I found it funny that you stated "recently it definitely seems to be more mixed as if the native locals have finally accepted what is around them and no longer seem to be scared of living next to the white transplants/hipsters." I don't think anyone has ever been scared to live around Hipsters....I think it is more like the Hipsters were scared to live around the "natives" and are not any longer. If anyone has accepted their surroundings, it is the Hipsters..
You and your neighborhood are young and naive when it comes to the hipster movement... Trust me bro, there was a time where the thought of being outbid in their own neighborhood for apartments terrified the native locals... Prejudice towards these hipsters/transplants was way worse 3, 4 years ago in these neighborhoods than it is now... Thing is you'll hear about it more today only because it's more spread out...
LOL at the 'New Gardenia' comment... Wouldn't be surprised if the one hipster that lives on that block gives his area that nickname... Still doubt there will be any hipsterfication in that area at all... The neighborhood right now as it stands has the lowest white population it's ever had... The immediate area of East NY/Brownsville/Woodhaven/Ozone Park, etc. isn't gaining white population (hipsters/yuppies) included, it's losing the white population... In addition, the crime rate only continues to rise over the last few years... It's just too far and too grimy of an area to ever make any significant noise... Reason why other hoods that were on par or even in those times, were worse areas than ENY now changed was due to their proximity to Manhattan... That isn't the case with this neighborhood...
From the multi convos, honestly, there do not seem interested with the neighborhoods east of the Junction, a lot do not have knowledge of that particular area at all, only know it's 'dangerous'. It all appears the bulk are just interested currently with Bushwick, and that area of Bushwick around Flushing-Myrtle. A lot of that is due to it's proximity to places like Greenpoint and WB. Speaking of Ozone Park there seems to be a growing Muslim population, likely Bengali ? Woodhaven is not as bad as some folks play it out, quite a mixed neighborhood and I like it. ENY and BV is another story.
From my knowledge 'New Gardenia' are the nabes south of the parks (Highland Park and Forest Park) and cemeteries. Cypress Hills, Woodhaven and Richmond Hill along the J/Z line. Don't ask but heard it from me first, when it begins to circulate around blogs and twitter or whatnot.. lol
I think we all can understand the possibility of not being able to afford to live in "our" neighborhood. Just because I am higher income than some, does not mean I am not impacted also.
The bottom line is this: Why do you believe someone should live somewhere forever, at the price that is affordable to them regardless of what is happening in the real world? Heating bills gone up? Taxes skyrocketing? Repairs costing more? "NOT MY PROBLEM....I deserve to live here and I can't afford to pay anymore so too bad." And if you do try to get other people in the building you are racist, and gentrification blah blah blah. And I am supposed to have sympathy because? If I can't pay ever increasing expenses + mortgage because I can't get tenants into the building to pay for everything, guess what happens? The bank takes the building...that's the real world.
Hipsters, like the natives, need a place to live. If they want to live in Bushwick, so be it. If it inconveniences the "natives", or causes them stress...SO WHAT. Why is it their problem? Should everyone choose to live places based on convenience of others, or their own circumstances/needs/requirements/likes? Leave the Hipsters alone.
Life ain't fair..trust me I know! It isn't "your" neighborhood anymore than it is the person's who just moved in 2 weeks ago...you don't own NYC!
I agree SobroGuy. Look natives, put down your pitchforks and take a deep breath. Just because you saw a group of young creative transplants from The New School wandering through your neighborhood DOES NOT MEAN your neighborhood is on the verge of being "Williamsburg-ified". Williamsburg was an extreme exception (not to mention the most dramatic areas of change is a small segment of the big neighborhood, and so many of these condos are on previously underutilized properties like warehouses, big loss huh?).
So looking ahead... now that Williamsburg, which once upon a time made it possible to live in one of the highest cost of living cities in the US for a fraction of the price is no longer an option, what are all the creative young kids gonna do? Pretty much what geoking66 said (the 2nd reply in this thread), transplants will be dispersed and assimilate throughout the 5-borough area since it all has relatively EQUAL APPEAL at this point (or soon enough in the next 5-10 years). Be it Sunset Park, Sunnyside, Washington Heights, Jersey City, and so on (and at this point there are other cities in the US with comparable appeal for type sort of crowd).
Lastly, for those of you who are still afraid/angry of this imaginary impending doom of "your" neighborhood being taken over, how about taking some personal initiative? Start a community revatilization group to improve the quality of living for you and your neighbors, keep learning/improving your business skills to keep up with the increasing cost of living (which is happening almost everywhere by the way), build relationships with landlords/property owners and make them feel like there's no reason to sell their property to non-natives anytime soon. But then again, things change, especially in the biggest city in the US, how about embracing the excitement and enjoy all that comes with the change?
I am just unclear as to all the fascination, fixation, and vitriol towards this group. I mean who really cares? If you want to blame your problems on someone else or some other group, well that's really your problem and nobody cares. Hate the Hipsters all you want, but the reality is they are not the ones raising rents, it is the Landlords and nothing more than basic economics...increased demand + limited supply = raising rents, nothing more.
Don't hate the players, hate the game! And to put it more simply, if you had a car you could sell for $500, but someone came along and offered you $1,500, what would you do?
I am just unclear as to all the fascination, fixation, and vitriol towards this group. I mean who really cares? If you want to blame your problems on someone else or some other group, well that's really your problem and nobody cares. Hate the Hipsters all you want, but the reality is they are not the ones raising rents, it is the Landlords and nothing more than basic economics...increased demand + limited supply = raising rents, nothing more.
Don't hate the players, hate the game! And to put it more simply, if you had a car you could sell for $500, but someone came along and offered you $1,500, what would you do?
Your last statement proves my point... And it's the sole reason why these rents have skyrocketed... I'll get to your other points in another comment but in regards to this one alone, as i said before, I could care less whether hipsters make Bushwick/ENY/Bedstuy/Brownsville another Williamsburg... I don't live in these areas and as long as it's done the right way and others are not being forced out by LL or owners who cut off power, heat, air conditioning, etc. to the point where renters are forced to move... I'm good...
Problem is, that's not happening... Whether it's the previous owners or those they sold it too... What ends up happening in so many of these cases and I know this first hand from family experiences (not mine, but close relatives) is that they do one or all of three things... They'll either take the bad owner route and cut off the heat in the winter-time and tell the renters F off and if they don't like it they can move... 2) They'll make tons of unnecessary renovations to the exterior and interior instead of fixing major problems to make the building more aesthetically pleasing to the eye to then justify an insane jump in rent... Or the classic option which was done ad nauseam in areas like Williamsburg 10-15 years ago is to pay them off to leave... And for this I blame 100% the native locals of these areas who were dumb enough to believe that 5,000 or even 10,000 dollars 10 years ago and are now broke in much worse conditions than if they were to stay (not all cases, but many of them)...
Finally, while it's of no direct fault to them that many hipsters tend to be dumb and accept the fact that 4500 for a converted 5 bedroom loft in East Will/Bushwick area is worth it... These rents skyrocket across the board because of lack of common sense... And due to this lack of common sense by so many, rents continue to rise... It is their fault due to their own inexperience and lack of knowledge that these rents are accepted... If majority of them would actually think about what they are paying for and realize how QOL is so far below the COL for these areas... we wouldn't have the problems we are currently having with these ridiculous rents...
Again, let it be known for the 96th time... I live in the second floor of a two family owned by relatives... This problem I am describing, is not my problem... However, I see it for what it is and know that there are plenty of justifiable reasons for why hipsters (unfortunately) are hated or disliked in these neighborhoods...
From the multi convos, honestly, there do not seem interested with the neighborhoods east of the Junction, a lot do not have knowledge of that particular area at all, only know it's 'dangerous'. It all appears the bulk are just interested currently with Bushwick, and that area of Bushwick around Flushing-Myrtle. A lot of that is due to it's proximity to places like Greenpoint and WB. Speaking of Ozone Park there seems to be a growing Muslim population, likely Bengali ? Woodhaven is not as bad as some folks play it out, quite a mixed neighborhood and I like it. ENY and BV is another story.
From my knowledge 'New Gardenia' are the nabes south of the parks (Highland Park and Forest Park) and cemeteries. Cypress Hills, Woodhaven and Richmond Hill along the J/Z line. Don't ask but heard it from me first, when it begins to circulate around blogs and twitter or whatnot.. lol
I agree that Woodhaven and Ozone Park as well aren't as bad as many say on here but reality is that the area has seriously taken a nosedive at least QOL-wise... It was never a great area even when I was living there but now more than ever, issues are popping up all over Woodhaven that wouldn't have happened 10-15 years ago... Also, my main point about those areas wasn't necessarily about crime but rather loss of the white population Brownsville/ENY/Ozone Park included to combat the point about the one white hipster living in East NY...
Oh and in response to the point about the interest in Bushwick especially along the Flushing ave Myrtle ave that is absolutely correct and it's why it should that that area which is on the borderline of three neighborhoods (western bed-stuy and east williamsburg as well as bushwick borderline) is really the main area in Bushwick seeing any considerable action (hipster/yuppy/gentrification) wise... Other than that the demographics for the neighborhood have remained pretty steady since 08'...
A 12.34% increase in overall crime for the neighborhood from this year to last year...
And if you weren't paying attention to the statistics and were only listening to the biased garbage put out by so many media sources...
The crime rate last year reported an increase from the previous year... 2010 reported an increase from 09'... 08' was worse than 09' but 08' was worse than 07'... Therefore, as I have mentioned on many occasions, crime in the 83rd is not getting better, it continues to get worse...
Also if you take a look at the statistics on the bottom where they do the comparisons of previous years 1990, 93, 98, 01, and 11... you'll see that 2011 had more murders than back in 01' as well as back in 98'... It's murder rate was on par with 1995 numbers...
Those are the non-biased objective statistics for you my man...
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