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I always thought of Durham as what Fayetteville could have been if it had lived up to its potential.
Durham is doing great. It's an exciting destination for arts, culture and food. It gets written up in all those lists like best place to start a business, best place for millennials to live, etc. The cities are similar in someways, both very diverse populations, but Durham is like the big brother who does everything better. NC Central is better than FSU, Duke is way better than Methodist. Music, arts, foods, etc all better in Durham. Fayetteville does have some good spots, but it just can't really compare positively to Durham.
@poppydog those photos are amazing! I love all those old signs. It's a shame they're mostly all gone. From what I can see online, The Capitol and Horne's signs are still there. I love all the signs on the 500 block of Hay street.
Yeah, the Fayetteville Observer was a really good newspaper for a long time (might still be, I don't know) and they have some great archives online.
Other downtowns just sort of stagnated with the rise of the suburban malls, but Fayetteville's downtown just went way way downhill. I remember going to the Capitol for shoes as a kid and to the library downtown. I also remember asking my mom what The Pump House (strip club) was.
I live in Durham now, and while it is much better, there are many parts of Durham which are mirror images of Fayetteville. NC Central/East Durham is much like the Murch in Fayetteville, for example. Even Raleigh has its own "little Fayetteville" in the Capital Blvd area.
That's a given with most cities, but Fayetteville needs nicer areas and more of them to make up for the not-so-nice areas.
It's also worth noting that unlike most of the state's other larger cities, none of NC's legacy industries (tobacco, textiles, furniture) had much of a presence in Fayetteville; that would have provided the city with a better economic base to build from. The same is true of Asheville and Wilmington which are around the same size, but they have geography and a historic urban fabric as assets whereas Fayetteville doesn't.
One has to imagine how different things would be if Fayetteville were selected as the state capital in the late 18th century.
I always thought of Durham as what Fayetteville could have been if it had lived up to its potential.
As I mentioned in my previous post, Fayetteville lacked any of NC's traditional legacy industries. Tobacco and textiles were Durham's saving grace in a huge way, both historically and presently.
Fayetteville did and does have some textiles. MJ Soffe has their corporate HQ there. When I was growing up folks worked at the Kelly Springfield tire plant, Rohm & Haas, Dupont, and of course lots of teachers, nurses, doctors, lawyers, etc. Lots of civilians work at Fort Bragg. I have civilian friends who have had long careers working at Womack.
Fayetteville could have also been like Greenville NC if there weren't a big army base and if the colleges were better. What is in Greenville besides ECU and ECU-related things like healthcare?
I'm not sure what you mean by a "high amenity military city," but I'd say it's difficult to have high-quality amenities without the larger tax base to pay for and sustain them that more industry would provide. Fort Bragg provides economic benefits but it doesn't contribute to the city's property tax base as it is a military installation and a rather large one at that.
Excellent question. By high amenity I mean simply a place that people are drawn to, to live and visit. Fayetteville is already a regional hub for NC's inner southeastern coastal plain for shopping and employment, so it's a matter of building on that. While it may not be the prettiest part of the state, it seems nicer now than it did in the early 1980's for instance. The public safety aspect still presents an issue and having a large number of young men creates a different demographic challenge right off the bat than if it was a wealthy retirement community.
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Originally Posted by hey_guy
I'm from the area and I know the hairs you're trying to split about Democrats quite well but it's kind of a distraction they're conservative Dems
I'm going to stick to my statement that it does matter because the political affiliation forms the worldview of the people that residents vote in to represent them in various local efforts, whether they're fiscally conservative or not, what gets funded, and what doesn't, what books get placed in schools and libraries, how much is budgeted towards parks versus other projects, how law enforcement agencies form their priorities, etc. Even if it's for an office which is technically non-partisan race, it does make a difference in what tone is set for the community. Just my opinion.
Fayetteville did and does have some textiles. MJ Soffe has their corporate HQ there. When I was growing up folks worked at the Kelly Springfield tire plant, Rohm & Haas, Dupont, and of course lots of teachers, nurses, doctors, lawyers, etc. Lots of civilians work at Fort Bragg. I have civilian friends who have had long careers working at Womack.
True--and just about all sizable towns in the Carolinas had a few mills--but not like Charlotte, Greensboro, Durham, etc. which had a pretty significant textile industry. Raleigh had a few textile mills too, but the industry wasn't major there; however, it had other things going for it which puts it in the position it's in today.
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Fayetteville could have also been like Greenville NC if there weren't a big army base and if the colleges were better. What is in Greenville besides ECU and ECU-related things like healthcare?
True. Universities and healthcare facilities are QOL assets for a city in a way that military bases aren't, which I think just might put Greenville in a better position in the long run.
I just see more disinterest rather than positive posts regarding fayetteville, while i agree it's not the best place, it does not deserve the hate it gets.
Words well spoken! Every town has it's good and bad qualities.
It's what you choose to make of them that shows a person's true colors...
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Originally Posted by Zensteel
I just see more disinterest rather than positive posts regarding fayetteville, while i agree it's not the best place, it does not deserve the hate it gets.
Fayetteville has the most strip clubs of any city in the state except Charlotte, which only has 1 more.
With one of the largest military bases in the world and copious amounts of horny guys with discretionary money to burn, one you think strip club owners in Fayetteville are pretty smart and making money hand over fist, just saying!
Hopefully the new ballpark downtown will help out, I just saw a game there and it's probably the 3rd or 4th best MiLB ballpark in North Carolina, although Kannapolis's new downtown ballpark does open next April and it might bump Segra Stadium down a spot.
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Every town has it's good and bad qualities. 
