Why does Richmond have such a bad rep? (Petersburg, Short Pump: for sale, apartments)

[RVAtoCNC]

anyone remember the "fry" parties they used to have near the old state pen ? Ole sparky was pretty active back in those days - for instance, the Brileys - big party for that one.

[Yankeerose00]

Even compared to smaller cities, I can't find any evidence that Richmond was ever number 1 in crime, even in the 80's. I always remember cities like Gary, Indiana, St. Louis, Birmingham, AL, ranking much higher in crime. There was a recent ranking in cities with high crime and they were Orlando, FL, Myrtle Beach South Carolina, and Wilmington, NC in the top 10. Richmond was like 79 or something really low.

While every city has it's ghetto area, what I always liked about Richmond was the fact that the crime areas were pretty concentrated and overall easy to avoid. While the bad areas are really bad, the nice areas are really, truly beautiful.

[Yankeerose00]

In this list, Richmond is #79. Not bad!

http://os.cqpress.com/citycrime/2010..._hightolow.pdf

[OldCavalier]

For the past 40 years, Richmond has remained the same. Yeah, a few new buildings built primarily by VCU and State of VA govt. Very little private enterprise building downtown. The big banks went to Charlotte. In addition, Richmond has seen constant racial confrontation about govt., schools, minority contracts, ward system after annexation, plus, the underlying threat of stealing more land from the counties. Ironically, Richmond spends more per student than the surrounding counties. Go figure!

Aethetically, Richmond is a beautiful city full of historic buildings. The cultural problem is none of them can be celebrated due to race. If Lee is on Monument Ave., then Ashe must be too. If someone suspects a black cemetery is under a well-used paved parking lot, then it must be destroyed to find(?) the bodies. The list goes on and on.

Why does Richmond still have a bad reputation? It has not changed. A self-defeating culture runs it.

[hgnmx]

Originally Posted by OldCavalier

For the past 40 years, Richmond has remained the same. Yeah, a few new buildings built primarily by VCU and State of VA govt. Very little private enterprise building downtown. The big banks went to Charlotte. In addition, Richmond has seen constant racial confrontation about govt., schools, minority contracts, ward system after annexation, plus, the underlying threat of stealing more land from the counties. Ironically, Richmond spends more per student than the surrounding counties. Go figure!

Aethetically, Richmond is a beautiful city full of historic buildings. The cultural problem is none of them can be celebrated due to race. If Lee is on Monument Ave., then Ashe must be too. If someone suspects a black cemetery is under a well-used paved parking lot, then it must be destroyed to find(?) the bodies. The list goes on and on.

Why does Richmond still have a bad reputation? It has not changed. A self-defeating culture runs it.

I'd have to disagree... the Federal Reserve built a new building recently, there have been renovations literally ALL over downtown the past several years, as well as many new private contracts. Had you made this post 6 years ago then I would have agreed but it's simply not the case anymore.

[richmondpics]

Originally Posted by OldCavalier

For the past 40 years, Richmond has remained the same. Yeah, a few new buildings built primarily by VCU and State of VA govt. Very little private enterprise building downtown. The big banks went to Charlotte.

The banks did go to Charlotte due to Virginia's unusual laws regarding banking. Regarding new buildings, you forgot about Meadwestvaco's new HQ building, Martin Agency's headquarters, Williams Mullen Center, Turning Basin Building (Union First Market's Corp HQ), the Edgeworth building anchored by Hischler Fleischer, Altria's Research facility in the Biotech Park, Riverside on the James anchored by Troutman Sanders and Harris Williams, etc.

There are millions of s.f. of private enterprise not affiliated with the city, state or VCU downtown. Downtown has a large financial sector, marketing/advertising firms, several very large law firms, biotech firms, corporate headquarters (Meadwestvaco, Media General, Dominion Resources, Swedish Match to name a few). There has been hundreds of millions of dollars in private investment in adaptive re-use and residential building projects.

[Yankeerose00]

OldCavalier, every city has its problems. Richmond is no exception.
But you really, really defeat your point when you say the city hasn't changed in 40 years. I can remember the city in the 80's during visits and then the difference in 2004 when we moved there. And now in 2011, it has changed even more for the better. I'm sorry, really, you have to be pretty unobservant to say it hasn't changed at all.

I guess if by Richmond you mean strictly the small downtown area by the capital building. (which even that has changed, but whatever). When I say "Richmond", I'm talking the entire Richmond metro area, which is a pretty vast area that HAS changed a lot, mostly in the past 10 years and all for the better!

I've noticed that when comparing the Richmond boards to the Tampa boards. I used to live in Tampa and that city is loaded with ghetto areas. Loaded. But when people speak of moving to Tampa, they are always referring to the "greater Tampa" area, meaning the newer areas that are no more than 20 years old. Those areas are beautiful, safe, clean and very desirable.
For some damn reason, when people on this board say "Richmond" they are strictly speaking the little core of the city around I-95 which is riddled with ghetto areas and crime. What about all of the outlying areas of western Henrico? Are they not Richmond as well? What about all of the neighborhoods from Maymont heading west around the river? Are you going to say that is not Richmond?

I'd love to know this magical place that you are moving to Old Cavalier where there is no crime, no issues with government and ebony and ivory all hold hands and sing We Are the World.

[Yankeerose00]

Richmond spends more per student than the surrounding counties. Go figure!

Do 5 minutes of Googling and you'll see that this is true of just about EVERY city in the US. There is always more money spent on inner city schools. Here in the northeast, the inner city schools suck like leaches off the school budget. It's annoying as heck and it proves what I've said over and over. Money doesn't solve problems. If you have a school in the ghetto it doesn't matter how much money you throw at that school. It is going to be a bad school until the parents of those kids put down the crack pipe and take a larger role in their child's education.
This is a nationwide problem, dude. Not a Richmond thing by any means!
You are dating yourself which thinking this is just a regional problem. Back in the 70s and 80s, the worse the school was, the smaller the budget it received. That has changed throughout the US as they blamed the lack of funds for the poor performance in inner city schools. Now they get just as much if not more money as the schools in better areas. And guess what? They still perform badly. Doh!

[OldCavalier]

Thanks for the post. Guess who built the Federal Reserve bldg. 30 years ago? (US govt.) Guess who built the convention center 40yrs. ago? City of Richmond. Guess who build JSR, Biotech and VCU bldgs.? State govt. My point is that virtually all the newness for downtown was built by govt., not private enterprised. Only Meadwestvaco was fool enough to locate downtown instead of Short Pump. Go figure.

[OldCavalier]

Sorry but you fail to see the lack of progress and are blind to the dismal failures of the City. I guess if someone left for 10 years, upon returning they would see differences such as new convention center, biotech bldg. and VCU. My point is that these were all built by state or local govt., not private enterprise. There has been little economic progress within the city limits. They cannot even build a ballpark.