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Thanks for posting this. I didn't realize clicking on it would download a document - hopefully you didn't include any malware? The article is interesting (with some nice crisp b&w photos of PC, which still looks the same), but I assume the information contained in it has been known to everyone. As mentioned in most of my threads, a real estate company from Manhattan had bought a large part of one of the neighborhoods mentioned in this link, and has been rehabilitating it for the past 20 years. That includes anti-crime measures such as maintaining a security force, screening of residents, and enforcing numerous condo association rules. The population of this neighborhood is essentially entirely non-white (except when I am there, I suppose), but some form of safe suburban family life has been recovered in Spanish, Bengali, Amharic, Mandinka etc. non-English languages :-). So, the "safe suburb" thing is not related to any race or any presence/absence of expressway, but it IS related to cultural values of the local population.
Question: Why is the Cross Bronx blamed as the major factor for the decline? For instance, why is the Cross Bronx blamed for the decline of, say Mott Haven or Morrisania that are nowhere near the Cross Bronx??
And how come the BQE did not produce the same effects in Sunnyside, Jackson Heights and Elmhurst??
Also, the Hutchison River Parkway did not make Pelham Bay and Morris Park less desirable, so how come?
Right. I'm sure the Robert Moses stuff didn't help, but it clearly is nowhere near being the number one cause for the decline of the Bronx. The Bronx also had its worst days in the mid to late 70s, years after the Cross Bronx was built. And most Bronx neighborhoods are not split up by expressways.
Right. I'm sure the Robert Moses stuff didn't help, but it clearly is nowhere near being the number one cause for the decline of the Bronx. The Bronx also had its worst days in the mid to late 70s, years after the Cross Bronx was built. And most Bronx neighborhoods are not split up by expressways.
At least the bad neighborhoods are not all split by expressways, Riverdale is split in half by one, it is still as wealthy on one side as it is on the other. Expressways run throughout wealthy parts of Westchester County, and they were never like the South Bronx. Sounds like an easy excuse.
At least the bad neighborhoods are not all split by expressways, Riverdale is split in half by one, it is still as wealthy on one side as it is on the other. Expressways run throughout wealthy parts of Westchester County, and they were never like the South Bronx. Sounds like an easy excuse.
There are more than just the construction highways/expressways responsible for the decline of the South Bronx. It long pre-dates the highway. After the Great Depression, huge housing projects were built in the Bronx, mainly because there were large tracts of land available to do so and a high concentration of that in the South Bronx.
The middle class in those areas moved across the Bronx into areas like Morris Park, Throggs Necks, Pelham Bay, Van Nest, West Farms. My grandmother has pictures of TN when she first moved there in the late 40s from Mott Haven. There was still a trolley at Bruckner Blvd/Tremont and she had to walk from there to her home near what is now the foot of the TN bridge. The gap in vacancies in the SB left by the middle-class fight was filled by low-income folks, often those on the dole.
Housing policies were a large factor along with drastic cuts to the FDNY under Lindsey. Yes, arson was an issue but so were poorly maintained buildings due to rent control. Many landlords didn't bother to properly maintain their properties, many fires were attributed to poor maintenance, often electrical fires.
Factor in that Lindsey in '71 told the FDNY to cut spending by several million, which led to the closure of over a dozen fire companies, several of them in the South Bronx. That, in turn, led to longer response times. Interestingly, the city hired a company to look at the statistics of fires vs response time as part of the funding cuts. That program never accounted for two huge pieces of the pie- the impact of traffic on response times and worked under the assumption that fire companies were available at all times to respond to calls. (Absolutely ludicrous, imo)
There are more than just the construction highways/expressways responsible for the decline of the South Bronx. It long pre-dates the highway. After the Great Depression, huge housing projects were built in the Bronx, mainly because there were large tracts of land available to do so and a high concentration of that in the South Bronx.
The middle class in those areas moved across the Bronx into areas like Morris Park, Throggs Necks, Pelham Bay, Van Nest, West Farms. My grandmother has pictures of TN when she first moved there in the late 40s from Mott Haven. There was still a trolley at Bruckner Blvd/Tremont and she had to walk from there to her home near what is now the foot of the TN bridge. The gap in vacancies in the SB left by the middle-class fight was filled by low-income folks, often those on the dole.
Housing policies were a large factor along with drastic cuts to the FDNY under Lindsey. Yes, arson was an issue but so were poorly maintained buildings due to rent control. Many landlords didn't bother to properly maintain their properties, many fires were attributed to poor maintenance, often electrical fires.
Factor in that Lindsey in '71 told the FDNY to cut spending by several million, which led to the closure of over a dozen fire companies, several of them in the South Bronx. That, in turn, led to longer response times. Interestingly, the city hired a company to look at the statistics of fires vs response time as part of the funding cuts. That program never accounted for two huge pieces of the pie- the impact of traffic on response times and worked under the assumption that fire companies were available at all times to respond to calls. (Absolutely ludicrous, imo)
Now that’s a more thorough explanation than just summing it up to the Cross-Bronx. I knew the story of “once upon a time all these neighborhoods were great then Robert Moses built the Cross-Bronx and it all went to hell” made absolutely no sense.
Thanks for posting this. I didn't realize clicking on it would download a document - hopefully you didn't include any malware? The article is interesting (with some nice crisp b&w photos of PC, which still looks the same), but I assume the information contained in it has been known to everyone. As mentioned in most of my threads, a real estate company from Manhattan had bought a large part of one of the neighborhoods mentioned in this link, and has been rehabilitating it for the past 20 years. That includes anti-crime measures such as maintaining a security force, screening of residents, and enforcing numerous condo association rules. The population of this neighborhood is essentially entirely non-white (except when I am there, I suppose), but some form of safe suburban family life has been recovered in Spanish, Bengali, Amharic, Mandinka etc. non-English languages :-). So, the "safe suburb" thing is not related to any race or any presence/absence of expressway, but it IS related to cultural values of the local population.
Response: Opinion
Careful ...........
I downloaded the read .....and sure enough crashed my P.C.
Thank goodness for Linux/ Backup..........................Run antivirus check to be safe Windows users.
You don't have to download it to read it as a pdf file.
It downloaded automatically when I just clicked on the link. I have an Android phone, and nothing crashed, but this forum does not go through a secure connection, so such an automatic download worries me a bit.
Anyway, that is a technical side-issue of the thread itself. The Bronx areas mentioned in the link were changed beyond recognition after the increasing crime in these neighborhoods caused displacement of the original population of first occupants that lived there at the time those neighborhoods were built, and for a couple of decades later. This increase in crime was the only reason for the decline of quality of life in the neighborhoods - there is no reason to invent highways and other preposterous "reasons" for the change. It was crime, nothing else.
People who originally resided in these neighborhoods loved living there, and would have never left (expressway or no expressway) if they had not been forced out by crime. Hundreds of folks who grew up in Parkchester in the 1950s and 1960s (and 1940s if they are still alive :-) fly from everywhere for periodic very emotional reunions, marked by tremendous nostalgia for the neighborhood of their childhood. Just google "Parkchester reunion". It even has a Facebook page, though I think it might be a closed group.
But urbanistic/architectural trends go in and out of fashion all the time. These neighborhoods in the Bronx could be revitalized only if there is a major resurgence of interest in mid-century architecture/design, and the 1950s ways of family living in NYC. I don't see that happening, but nothing is ever either expected or impossible when it comes to trends and fashions - unpredictability of periodic loss of interest in something, or return of interest in it, is the essence of trends and fashions.
Last edited by elnrgby; 11-03-2020 at 06:27 AM..
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