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Old 04-11-2008, 12:50 AM
 
578 posts, read 2,090,493 times
Reputation: 149

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I'm curious on a few things about the city.

1) How would classify the city of Pittsburgh.
-Is this a Northeast City, a Midwest City, a Rustbelt City, or part of Appalachia?
-I have read that Pittsburgh fits all of these, in fact when reading on the term about Appalachia it was said the Pittsburgh area was the biggest city in this area.

2) Id also like to know...how does Pittsburgh compare with say Buffalo?
-I know Buffalo has a very bad economy...and that has really hurt their sports teams abilities to compete.
-Is Pittsburgh in a similar position, or not as bad, and if so, why?

3) Going on about it compared to the other rustbelt city...people often say Buffalo is dreary and depressing...yet I don't see the same said about Pittsburgh.
-How come...what does Pittsburgh have to offer that other cities don't?
-Is it a declining region...or is it a blue collar town but with rich culture and educational, arts?

4) What is the future like? If Pittsburgh is more than old factories...why is the economy declining and is there a chance at a renissance?

5) Also...how would you rate Pittsburgh as a sports town?
-Is this a huge hardcore sports area...or is it football country with hockey and baseball being fair weather ala Washington?

Thanks.
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Old 04-11-2008, 01:23 AM
 
Location: Squirrel Hill
1,349 posts, read 3,557,790 times
Reputation: 406
Pittsburgh is pretty unique and doesn't fall into any one category neatly. As someone that has lived here for 4 years, I have a different perspective than natives I'm sure. But how I see it, Pittsburgh is a mix of the old blue collar that is still waiting for the steel mills to reopen and the new white collar that revolves around health care & research. The economy isn't booming, but living here, I don't consider it economically depressed either. It is surviving, not collapsing or thriving. The weather is typically cloudy and dreary... and it is a bit colder than I would prefer, but there are definately worse spots.

Pittsburgh is definately a football town. The level of fanatasism for the team is something I've never experienced anywhere else. Stores are empty during games. The hospital ER is even *much* less crowded, believe it or not. The other teams have their followings, but are much more fair weather. The pirates seem to be pretty hopeless... the Steelers are consistently a strong performer, the Penguins are now doing well but have their ups and downs, and the University of Pittsburgh is generally pretty competitive and often in the top 25 in football/basketball.
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Old 04-11-2008, 05:01 AM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,857,468 times
Reputation: 2910
Quote:
Originally Posted by bluecountry View Post
I'm curious on a few things about the city.

1) How would classify the city of Pittsburgh.
-Is this a Northeast City, a Midwest City, a Rustbelt City, or part of Appalachia?
-I have read that Pittsburgh fits all of these, in fact when reading on the term about Appalachia it was said the Pittsburgh area was the biggest city in this area.
I think Appalachia divides into two parts, a northeast part and a southwest part, with the border somewhere around the southwest border of West Virginia. I view Pittsburgh as the de facto capital city of the northeastern part of Appalachia.

Quote:
2) Id also like to know...how does Pittsburgh compare with say Buffalo?
-I know Buffalo has a very bad economy...and that has really hurt their sports teams abilities to compete.
-Is Pittsburgh in a similar position, or not as bad, and if so, why?
I don't know Buffalo well enough to compare.

Quote:
3) Going on about it compared to the other rustbelt city...people often say Buffalo is dreary and depressing...yet I don't see the same said about Pittsburgh.
-How come...what does Pittsburgh have to offer that other cities don't?
-Is it a declining region...or is it a blue collar town but with rich culture and educational, arts?
To summarize a complex situation, Pittsburgh was once a booming industrial city, then the industrial sector contracted dramatically causing economic problems and a large-scale exodus of young people, and now Pittsburgh is reinventing itself as a medium-sized service center and high tech manufacturing city. As a result of its history it has both good and bad legacies from its boomtown days. The good parts of the legacy include unusual amenities for a city of its current size (in arts, sports, the airport, and so on) and some great historic housing stock. The bad parts include the aging remnant of the boomtown peak population, a cohort which is not replacing itself with children (their children moved away), and which is gradually passing away or migrating away, which is dragging out the economic and depopulation issues.

Quote:
4) What is the future like? If Pittsburgh is more than old factories...why is the economy declining and is there a chance at a renissance?
There are two economies in Pittsburgh: the new economy based on the new model, and the old economy reflecting this aging remnant from the peak boomtown days. The old economy is still having an affect on the overall economic statistics, but it is gradually losing influence and eventually (in many more years) will be completely gone. The new economy appears to have a bright future: it is diverse and well-positioned to make use of current economic trends, and it has survived the recent financial crisis relatively well, thanks in part to it having relatively little dependence on the housing industry. I would note that being the de facto capital city of this northeast part of Appalachia helps explain why Pittsburgh has a robust service center role--it is providing the hospitals, universities, business services, and so on for this region.

Quote:
5) Also...how would you rate Pittsburgh as a sports town?
-Is this a huge hardcore sports area...or is it football country with hockey and baseball being fair weather ala Washington?

Thanks.
NFL Football is a clear #1, but the other sports teams have decent followings. Obviously, being bad never helps.
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Old 04-11-2008, 06:41 AM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, the Iron City!!!
803 posts, read 2,959,772 times
Reputation: 241
The only thing I can add to that, is about Buffalo. . . . . .Buffalo blows, seriously. I spent several months there, and it was even summer, so it wasn't the dreadful snows getting to me, but the crime, poverty and overall malaise that they suffer through, which Pittsburgh, blissfully, does not have.
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Old 04-11-2008, 11:15 AM
 
158 posts, read 524,896 times
Reputation: 66
1) How would classify the city of Pittsburgh.
-Is this a Northeast City, a Midwest City, a Rustbelt City, or part of Appalachia?
-I have read that Pittsburgh fits all of these, in fact when reading on the term about Appalachia it was said the Pittsburgh area was the biggest city in this area.

Most people here very much consider themselves Northeast. I don't identify with the Midwest at ALL. In my experience, we are like other people from the northeast. We are not like southerners at all. Midwesterners?...don't know. I'm not interested in anything west (or south) of here. That's awful, yes, but you'll find that a relatively common sentiment.

2) Id also like to know...how does Pittsburgh compare with say Buffalo?
-I know Buffalo has a very bad economy...and that has really hurt their sports teams abilities to compete.
-Is Pittsburgh in a similar position, or not as bad, and if so, why?

Buffalo is dreary. Pittsburgh is also: weather and bad economy. But we have all a bigger city has to offer...just less of it, I always say. I don't know much about Buffalo.

3) Going on about it compared to the other rustbelt city...people often say Buffalo is dreary and depressing...yet I don't see the same said about Pittsburgh.
-How come...what does Pittsburgh have to offer that other cities don't?
-Is it a declining region...or is it a blue collar town but with rich culture and educational, arts?

It actually IS rather dreary here. Often feels that way, at least. This is a deCLINED region. Now we are probably on the way up. this city is not SMOKY anymore, and people will catch on. AS for us, we already know it. We have amazing medical and medical technology here in Oakland. Things will get better. Eventually. So we have THAT. And we have great museums (a few), great Steelers (well, most people love the football team, and the crappy baseball team has a great stadium). We have an amazing skyline and general beauty. We have interesting neighborhoods. We have generally low crime and "liveability."

4) What is the future like? If Pittsburgh is more than old factories...why is the economy declining and is there a chance at a renissance?

AGain, medical community is top notch, really. And I think there is our future. No more steel, but we all know that. I sense a comeback in next decade or so. I can't give you any figures at all.

5) Also...how would you rate Pittsburgh as a sports town?
-Is this a huge hardcore sports area...or is it football country with hockey and baseball being fair weather ala Washington?

Football is God. Some say hockey is, too, but certainly less so. Baseball is for a cheap place to take your date. But again, football is insane here. Oh, my.
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Old 04-11-2008, 11:32 AM
 
Location: Pittsburgh
29,624 posts, read 34,077,569 times
Reputation: 76590
Quote:
Most people here very much consider themselves Northeast. I don't identify with the Midwest at ALL. In my experience, we are like other people from the northeast. We are not like southerners at all. Midwesterners?...don't know. I'm not interested in anything west (or south) of here. That's awful, yes, but you'll find that a relatively common sentiment.
I grew up in Cincinnati, and the vibe in Pittsburgh is completely different. Landscape's different, the economy's different, even the people are different. I wouldn't consider Pittsburgh Midwestern at all.
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Old 04-11-2008, 12:00 PM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,857,468 times
Reputation: 2910
Quote:
Originally Posted by fleetiebelle View Post
I grew up in Cincinnati, and the vibe in Pittsburgh is completely different. Landscape's different, the economy's different, even the people are different. I wouldn't consider Pittsburgh Midwestern at all.
I grew up in the Detroit area, and had a friend whose family moved up from Cincinnati, and it was pretty clear he was from a different culture as well.

What I think that shows is that the Midwest is actually made up of several distinct cultural regions (possible candidates include the Great Lakes regions, river valley regions, farmland regions, and so on).

And Pittsburgh isn't any of those. But I also think it isn't New York or Boston. Hence the need to define a region between the Northeast Corridor and the Great Lakes to locate Pittsburgh (I like the term Northeast Appalachia, but I'm not sure there is any agreement on that).
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Old 04-11-2008, 01:11 PM
 
221 posts, read 748,150 times
Reputation: 53
How would I define Pittsburgh? Appalachia meets NYC with HARD CORE Steelers fans.
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