Pittsburgh the San Francisco of the East? (Washington, California: movies, living in)

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by pghdude28

Interesting comparing a city that leans far left, progressive, a gay mecca, and expensive to a city that leans left (union), conservative (socially), intolerant of gays, and cheap to live in. The hippies went to San Francisco for the Summer of Love and the white trash mullet wearing hillbillies went to Pittsburgh for a summer Kenny Cheney concert. Wear a flower in your hair on your way to San Francisco and wear a cut off muscle T over your beer belly on your way to Pittsburgh. "San Francisco of the East," "Paris of Appalachia." What's next? "Manhattan of the Golden Triangle?"

You don't really know crap about San Francisco I see. It was run by a socially conservative, Catholic Democratic political machine through the 1970s. Read about the issues Harvey Milk had when he was rising to political prominence.

[LIRefugee]

Originally Posted by Aqua Teen Carl

It's cause we want to pretend we are in that same league but in reality we're not. This is not a knock to the city or anything, I'd much rather live in my own city then the "___ of the ___".

Saying "Pittsburgh is like Boston" is not the same as saying "Pittsburgh is the Boston of the Unglaciated Allegheny Plateau". All cities are going to bear similarities to each other, especially if they boomed at around the same time. But you're right, no city will be in Pittsburgh's league.

[steindle]

Originally Posted by pghdude28

Interesting comparing a city that leans far left, progressive, a gay mecca, and expensive to a city that leans left (union), conservative (socially), intolerant of gays, and cheap to live in. The hippies went to San Francisco for the Summer of Love and the white trash mullet wearing hillbillies went to Pittsburgh for a summer Kenny Cheney concert. Wear a flower in your hair on your way to San Francisco and wear a cut off muscle T over your beer belly on your way to Pittsburgh. "San Francisco of the East," "Paris of Appalachia." What's next? "Manhattan of the Golden Triangle?"

The irony of you ignorantly bashing a straw man ignorant Pittsburgh stereotype never fails to amuse.

[youngabe]

Originally Posted by pghdude28

Interesting comparing a city that leans far left, progressive, a gay mecca, and expensive to a city that leans left (union), conservative (socially), intolerant of gays, and cheap to live in. The hippies went to San Francisco for the Summer of Love and the white trash mullet wearing hillbillies went to Pittsburgh for a summer Kenny Cheney concert. Wear a flower in your hair on your way to San Francisco and wear a cut off muscle T over your beer belly on your way to Pittsburgh. "San Francisco of the East," "Paris of Appalachia." What's next? "Manhattan of the Golden Triangle?"

You and zman are constantly negative, for the love of God, we get that. But when you post things that are just straight up untrue, that's when you just look like a buffoon.

This city is NOT intolerant of gays. I AM a gay man for Ch**** sake, I would know. "white trash mullet wearing hillbillies" at the Kenny Chesney concert? What, I suppose in the world of you and zman, Charlotte and Columbus wouldn't even allow Kenny Chesney in because they're like SOOOOOO educated and SOOOOOO amazing, right?

[FreightTrainRunning]

Originally Posted by pghdude28

Interesting comparing a city that leans far left, progressive, a gay mecca, and expensive to a city that leans left (union), conservative (socially), intolerant of gays, and cheap to live in. The hippies went to San Francisco for the Summer of Love and the white trash mullet wearing hillbillies went to Pittsburgh for a summer Kenny Cheney concert. Wear a flower in your hair on your way to San Francisco and wear a cut off muscle T over your beer belly on your way to Pittsburgh. "San Francisco of the East," "Paris of Appalachia." What's next? "Manhattan of the Golden Triangle?"

Did you just awake from a thirty year coma or do you always traffic in such stale stereotypes? You know that Kenny Chesney played Silicon Valley last summer too? And that Pittsburgh's president of city council, the second most powerful elected official in the city, is an openly gay man? Or that California has a history of nutty right wing politicians?

I mean, I could go on but seriously why do you keep posting things that are so completely opposed to observable reality? I haven't actually seen a mullet since the nineties.

[AaronPGH]

Pittsburgh is gay as hell.

[Goodjules]

Originally Posted by eschaton

You don't really know crap about San Francisco I see. It was run by a socially conservative, Catholic Democratic political machine through the 1970s. Read about the issues Harvey Milk had when he was rising to political prominence.

True. The 60s and 70s were a time when SF changed significantly. The Castro was a working class neighborhood and Milk had a camera store. SF in those years was like Pittsburgh in that it was more of an old school Catholic, Union Democrat run city. The movie Milk captures the era quite well.

[bradjl2009]

Originally Posted by steindle

Well... sure, but hardly: Was there an Asian influence in Pittsburgh's history? | You Had to Ask | Pittsburgh City Paper



... You mean Pittsburgh has the opportunity to become an indistinguishable Eastern Sunbelt city? Oh happy day!

Pittsburgh vastly exceeds Nashville, Columbus, and Charlotte in many categories -- especially those that the under-35 crowd is increasingly interested in (e.g., walkability, arts scene, progressive policy, etc.).

I should note that I lived in Nashville for three years and have some nostalgia for very specific aspects of it, but I can't describe how much happier I am to be in Pittsburgh.

I visited Nashville for a week last summer and felt that besides a few small areas, the Pittsburgh area is much better.

[gg]

Originally Posted by Goodjules

I'll start by saying there are a lot of differences, but there are many striking similarities. As a native San Franciscan who recently moved to Pittsburgh, one of the reasons I chose Pittsburgh was because it reminded me of SF.
These are the things that are similar to me:
1. Hills and water. Both cities are very hilly. SF is a peninsula surrounded on three sides by the Bay and the Pacific. Pittsburgh has the three rivers.
2. Age of homes. SF has lots of Victorian and Edwardian era homes. The "newer" districts were built in the 20s-30s. But SF's housing is primarily wood and stucco while Pittsburgh's is brick.
3. Blue collar union roots. When I was growing up SF was a working class union town. Longshoremen, teamsters, etc. Pittsburgh had steel.
4. Ethnic Catholic population. When I was growing up just about everyone I knew was Catholic. In SF it was mostly Irish and Italian Catholic, here there are lots of ethnic eastern Europeans. The ethnic makeup has changed in recent years in SF.
5. Distinctive neighborhoods. Both are cities of neighborhoods, each with their own identities.
6. Nuts about their sports teams. Both have football teams with awesome Superbowl records. Fingers crossed that we beat Seattle and go on to win at the Superbowl to tie Pittsburgh's record for six wins. Both have beautiful baseball stadiums with water views.
7. World class colleges and universities. Carnegie Mellon, Pitt, Duquesne… Stanford, Berkeley, UCSF…
8. Quirky art community.

I don't disagree that there are other cities that are similar to SF. And, there are plenty of differences, the weather for example. We won't even go into the cost of housing. Decent Mexican food; I haven't found any here yet. Same goes for Asian. People tell me it's out there, mostly on the East side from what I hear. The Asian food I've found on the West side has been disappointing. Pittsburgh has very small Asian and Hispanic populations, where those populations are huge in the SF Bay Area. I could go on about differences but my main point is to point out the similarities that I see.

There you have it. Someone that moved from San Francisco to here. No one more qualified IMHO. Thanks for the post. I think we take CMU, Pitt and Duquesne for granted sometimes and forget that it helps our region quite a bit. Pittsburgh food is getting better, but it has a ways to go still.

[Craziaskowboi]

Originally Posted by eschaton

You don't really know crap about San Francisco I see. It was run by a socially conservative, Catholic Democratic political machine through the 1970s. Read about the issues Harvey Milk had when he was rising to political prominence.

Originally Posted by steindle

The irony of you ignorantly bashing a straw man ignorant Pittsburgh stereotype never fails to amuse.

Originally Posted by youngabe

You and zman are constantly negative, for the love of God, we get that. But when you post things that are just straight up untrue, that's when you just look like a buffoon.

This city is NOT intolerant of gays. I AM a gay man for Ch**** sake, I would know. "white trash mullet wearing hillbillies" at the Kenny Chesney concert? What, I suppose in the world of you and zman, Charlotte and Columbus wouldn't even allow Kenny Chesney in because they're like SOOOOOO educated and SOOOOOO amazing, right?

Originally Posted by GeneW

Did you just awake from a thirty year coma or do you always traffic in such stale stereotypes? You know that Kenny Chesney played Silicon Valley last summer too? And that Pittsburgh's president of city council, the second most powerful elected official in the city, is an openly gay man? Or that California has a history of nutty right wing politicians?

I mean, I could go on but seriously why do you keep posting things that are so completely opposed to observable reality? I haven't actually seen a mullet since the nineties.