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To be fair changing lifestyle trends---not necessarily a poor quality-of-life---have caused the continuing demise of inner suburban places like Kingston, Forty Fort, West Pittston, etc. while Mountain Top, the Back Mountain, the Abingtons, and other newer suburban areas have been the benefactors. Even Clarks Summit is in a population nosedive as residents there move to newer housing options in adjacent South Abington Township, and I don't think anyone would seriously offer up a credible argument to indicate Clarks Summit has a poor quality-of-life that is causing its downfall.
Families, at least for a long time from the 1970s until the recession, wanted to live excessively and ostentatiously with a large amount of land around them, distance from neighbors, 2-car garages, ample off-street parking, and relative isolation. They didn't care about front porches because they didn't want to be that "intimate" with their neighbors. They wanted backyard inground pools over sharing a neighborhood or community pool. They wanted backyard playsets instead of being within walking distance to a neighborhood park. That's why places like the Back Mountain are now replete with sterile cul-de-sacs right out of Desperate Housewives. There's been a much more recent trend of people reinvesting in core urbanized areas nationwide, and Wilkes-Barre has seen that to a smaller extent; it only lost 1 person from 2008-2009, based upon census estimates, and I project it will be growing between 2010 and 2020, especially if it can continue to improve its negative external image (Scranton is another story).
Say what you all will, but in my opinion places like West Pittston, Forty Fort, and, yes, Kingston, are all still wonderful places to live. If some of you think the nearly 100,000 people who live in the Back Mountain, Mountain Top, and Abingtons combined are all "angels", then you're in need of a serious wake-up call, as drugs are just as commonplace in these affluent outlying suburban areas as they are in the inner suburban areas. Violent crimes can and will occur. Where did that slain gay porn producer live who was nearly beheaded before having his home torched? Wilkes-Barre? Nope. Hoighty-toighty Dallas Township, one of the most affluent communities in the region. There have been major drug busts at Abington Heights High School.
If some of you honestly think Kingston is unsafe or trashy then you really should move out to Lopez or somewhere. Most of the people I knew from Kingston while working at Lowe's were middle-class college-educated professionals, many of whom worked Downtown.
I am so sick of you preaching without a pulpit!
For someone who craves acceptance from the majority, you surely do not have a problem putting down the majority! For an educated young men in American society you have so much to learn!! EVERY community has undesirables, some just hide it better! Have you ever heard of lipstick on a pig????? How dare you group an entire population into your narrow and limited life experience! Dangnamit...stereotypes are stereotypes and you have no problem problem perpetuating one. But God forbid someone said something to the effect of " ...all gay men are limp wristed puffs that just want casual sex..."!You would be calling the ACLU or something! When and if you ever become responsible for another human life, make sure you don't pick the best environment that you know of for that life! After all suburbia is.....blah blah blah blah! Your disdain for the environment in which you were raised has already been established in post after post...
I am so sick of you preaching without a pulpit!
For someone who craves acceptance from the majority, you surely do not have a problem putting down the majority! For an educated young men in American society you have so much to learn!! EVERY community has undesirables, some just hide it better! Have you ever heard of lipstick on a pig????? How dare you group an entire population into your narrow and limited life experience! Dangnamit...stereotypes are stereotypes and you have no problem problem perpetuating one. But God forbid someone said something to the effect of " ...all gay men are limp wristed puffs that just want casual sex..."!You would be calling the ACLU or something! When and if you ever become responsible for another human life, make sure you don't pick the best environment that you know of for that life! After all suburbia is.....blah blah blah blah! Your disdain for the environment in which you were raised has already been established in post after post...
I don't think what he said was bad or off-base. He was defending some of our older communities against all of the people moving out to suburbs and once-rural areas to live in sterile lifeless new subdivisions.
I don't think what he said was bad or off-base. He was defending some of our older communities against all of the people moving out to suburbs and once-rural areas to live in sterile lifeless new subdivisions.
Sterile lifeless subdivisions? I guess you can't see anything wrong when the above is YOUR opinion of subdivisions. Sorry but yet again another generalization/stereotype!!!! Have you ever lived in suburbia? Sorry I was raised in a suburb and my life was neither sterile or lifeless....My eldest two children were raised in the same environment I was...we had plenty of life and the only thing sterile was the handsoap!
I don't think what he said was bad or off-base. He was defending some of our older communities against all of the people moving out to suburbs and once-rural areas to live in sterile lifeless new subdivisions.
I'm sure the sterile lifeless communities don't seem so the people who choose to live in them, and Paul delights in characterizing all of suburbia as sterile and lifeless. When an area becomes so populated that it can no longer contain everyone, people will migrate to a less congested area. Even now, when the Back Mountain has become so developed, people are moving even further out.
Northeastern PA is made up of many communities, and there is something out there for anyone's taste. No point in condemning anyone's choice.
As far as the "continuing demise" of Kingston, Forty Fort and West Pittston is concerned, I happen to live here and there is no discernible demise. There 19 homes on my street. One is a duplex apartment bldg. and there has not been a vacancy there in many years. Most tenants are there for several years, and when one moves, there is another tenant taking immediate occupancy. The single homes are all owner-occupied and the last one sold after the owner passed away. Other than that, no turnover. That's a microcosm of the town.
Sterile lifeless subdivisions? I guess you can't see anything wrong when the above is YOUR opinion of subdivisions. Sorry but yet again another generalization/stereotype!!!! Have you ever lived in suburbia? Sorry I was raised in a suburb and my life was neither sterile or lifeless....My eldest two children were raised in the same environment I was...we had plenty of life and the only thing sterile was the handsoap!
Yes...I spent 10 years of my life living in a suburban new subdivision, thank you very much. I prefer older established neighborhoods with front porches, sidewalks, etc. New developments have every house the exact same distance from the street, no sidewalks, mailbox at the end of the driveway so the mailman doesn't even have to come to the front door, very few houses with front porches, attached garages so most people drive right into their houses and don't interact with the neighbors, etc etc. And to top it off, hardly any trees to be found.
Sorry I was raised in a suburb and my life was neither sterile or lifeless....My eldest two children were raised in the same environment I was...we had plenty of life and the only thing sterile was the handsoap!
Then you're one of the few who doesn't find sidewalk-less suburban cul-de-sacs to be sterile. I have others in NoVA inquiring about Pittsburgh after seeing how successful my own transition has been.
I'm sure the sterile lifeless communities don't seem so the people who choose to live in them, and Paul delights in characterizing all of suburbia as sterile and lifeless. When an area becomes so populated that it can no longer contain everyone, people will migrate to a less congested area. Even now, when the Back Mountain has become so developed, people are moving even further out.
Northeastern PA is made up of many communities, and there is something out there for anyone's taste. No point in condemning anyone's choice.
As far as the "continuing demise" of Kingston, Forty Fort and West Pittston is concerned, I happen to live here and there is no discernible demise. There 19 homes on my street. One is a duplex apartment bldg. and there has not been a vacancy there in many years. Most tenants are there for several years, and when one moves, there is another tenant taking immediate occupancy. The single homes are all owner-occupied and the last one sold after the owner passed away. Other than that, no turnover. That's a microcosm of the town.
1.) By "demise" I meant the population of NEPA's core urban communities, including Forty Fort, West Pittston, Clarks Summit, and Kingston, are declining as residents are enticed to the newer suburbs around them.
2.) You don't see paving over the Back Mountain to the point of congestion, leading to more people spreading themselves further outwards and felling more trees for more McMansions and creating more traffic congestion to be a non-judicious use of our open space?
3.) I DO "delight" in attacking these areas because it's disgusting that an area that has either been in steep population decline for decades or has stagnated, at best, in recent years, is continuing to sp-r--a---w----l itself out as irresponsibly as it has been. Scranton couldn't finance its way towards buying a Happy Meal while South Abington Township laughs all the way to the bank with all of the tax revenues it has stolen from the city proper over the years. Our core communities are in decline, and instead of reinvesting in them people would rather "run for the hills".
P.S. To loveinbloom, I DO plan to have children in my future, and I WILL be raising them right here in the city!
1.) By "demise" I meant the population of NEPA's core urban communities, including Forty Fort, West Pittston, Clarks Summit, and Kingston, are declining as residents are enticed to the newer suburbs around them.
2.) You don't see paving over the Back Mountain to the point of congestion, leading to more people spreading themselves further outwards and felling more trees for more McMansions and creating more traffic congestion to be a non-judicious use of our open space?
3.) I DO "delight" in attacking these areas because it's disgusting that an area that has either been in steep population decline for decades or has stagnated, at best, in recent years, is continuing to sp-r--a---w----l itself out as irresponsibly as it has been. Scranton couldn't finance its way towards buying a Happy Meal while South Abington Township laughs all the way to the bank with all of the tax revenues it has stolen from the city proper over the years. Our core communities are in decline, and instead of reinvesting in them people would rather "run for the hills".
P.S. To loveinbloom, I DO plan to have children in my future, and I WILL be raising them right here in the city!
I live in a house that was built before 1935. I have lived here for 35 years. I am the second owner. My neighborhood is stable. As is most of the town. Until and unless there are more houses for sale than there are people to live in them, the core of this community is fine.
Who am I to decide what is "judicious" use of open space? There is only one person of whom I am in charge, that being me, and I cannot legislate where or how anyone else can live, unless they are trying to do it on my property.
I fail to comprehend that you still contend that South Abington Township somehow kidnapped Scrantonians at gunpoint and insisted they live in SoAb. (On a related note, not ALL SoAb residents are Scranton ex-pats)
Better government and better fiscal management might have convinced people to remain in the city, but high taxes without comparable services made it prudent to go where you got what you paid for. (I'm a former Scrantonian. Moved there from Bucks County in 1968 because of employment. Moved to Forty Fort in 1975 for the same reason. I don't think I "fled".)
As for your note to LIB, you plan to have children and raise them in the (unspecified) city. I applaud you for having a goal. Plans are funny things. Life happens in spite of plans. You have about 50 more years of living until you accrue the life experience I have. It didn't always work out the way I "planned", but it was pretty good anyway. I hope it works out that way for you. Meantime, you should live and be well.
Yes...I spent 10 years of my life living in a suburban new subdivision, thank you very much. I prefer older established neighborhoods with front porches, sidewalks, etc. New developments have every house the exact same distance from the street, no sidewalks, mailbox at the end of the driveway so the mailman doesn't even have to come to the front door, very few houses with front porches, attached garages so most people drive right into their houses and don't interact with the neighbors, etc etc. And to top it off, hardly any trees to be found.
Your experience is that, yours an not all developments fit your description In my old neighborhood, we (surrounding neighbors) all knew each others names, sat in the front yard and talked to one another while watching the children play...
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EVERY community has undesirables, some just hide it better! Have you ever heard of lipstick on a pig????? How dare you group an entire population into your narrow and limited life experience! Dangnamit...stereotypes are stereotypes and you have no problem problem perpetuating one. But God forbid someone said something to the effect of " ...all gay men are limp wristed puffs that just want casual sex..."!You would be calling the ACLU or something! When and if you ever become responsible for another human life, make sure you don't pick the best environment that you know of for that life! After all suburbia is.....blah blah blah blah! Your disdain for the environment in which you were raised has already been established in post after post...
