First drive through St. Louis! (Miller: time, about)

[Peter1948]

Originally Posted by PerseusVeil

Quite a lot of Kentucky is night and day when compared to the Midwest. We're certainly not going to claim them. I have a friend from Louisville, and, while not having much of an accent, she considers herself Southern. I also briefly ended up in Paducah last year while on a trip, and there was nothing Midwestern about the place. Hell, I don't think I ran into one person who didn't have a drawl while I was there, and the number of people who thought drinking was a sin was ridiculous.



They both have influences, but Missouri most definitely leans more Midwestern while Kentucky leans more Southern.

This is a seriously ridiculous stereotype. Really, travel more. People in Louisville drink like fishes and bars are open until 4 am. Just as many Catholics on a per capita basis as any Midwest city.

[mjtinmemphis]

Originally Posted by Peter1948

People in Louisville drink like fishes and bars are open until 4 am.

Louisville is a major party town. Without a doubt surprising nightlife.

[PerseusVeil]

Originally Posted by Peter1948

This is a seriously ridiculous stereotype. Really, travel more. People in Louisville drink like fishes and bars are open until 4 am. Just as many Catholics on a per capita basis as any Midwest city.

Calm yourself, and reread my post. I was talking about Paducah in that comment. I only mentioned Louisville in regards to my friend considering herself Southern.

Thanks for the reply though

[censusdata]

Kentucky is opposite of Missouri, it is mostly Southern with some mostly Midwestern places while Missouri is mostly Midwestern with a few very Southern areas. The urban places across from Cincinnati are mostly very Northern with a good number of Appalachian transplants. Louisville is almost a 50/50 Midwestern and Southern hybrid city, a native could either sound like someone from Iowa or someone from Alabama. In land area KY is probably 90% Southern but the Midwestern areas or mixed areas are large population centers.


I find St Louis to be very Midwestern. One difference between STL and places like Detroit or Chicago is accents are mostly neutral standard American, few people have the more pronounced Northern accent.

[STL2006]

Originally Posted by censusdata

Kentucky is opposite of Missouri, it is mostly Southern with some mostly Midwestern places while Missouri is mostly Midwestern with a few very Southern areas. The urban places across from Cincinnati are mostly very Northern with a good number of Appalachian transplants. Louisville is almost a 50/50 Midwestern and Southern hybrid city, a native could either sound like someone from Iowa or someone from Alabama. In land area KY is probably 90% Southern but the Midwestern areas or mixed areas are large population centers.


I find St Louis to be very Midwestern. One difference between STL and places like Detroit or Chicago is accents are mostly neutral standard American, few people have the more pronounced Northern accent.

I agree on STL being Midwestern. 100%. As for the state of MO being opposite of KY, that hasn't been my experience. Just curious how much of the entire state of Missouri you've traveled, because the southern half of Missouri is very much like Kentucky. There's a lot of Missouri outside of Kansas City, Columbia, and St. Louis. Our state instrument is the fiddle and state dance is the square dance if that tells you anything.

[U146]

Originally Posted by STL2006

I agree on STL being Midwestern. 100%. As for the state of MO being opposite of KY, that hasn't been my experience. Just curious how much of the entire state of Missouri you've traveled, because the southern half of Missouri is very much like Kentucky. There's a lot of Missouri outside of Kansas City, Columbia, and St. Louis. Our state instrument is the fiddle and state dance is the square dance if that tells you anything.

The southern quarter, nor the Southern half, is very much like Kentucky. The southern half of the state is 50/50 on Southern and Midwestern. The northern half of the Southern half is only topographically like Kentucky, not linguistically or culturally.

[censusdata]

When I said "opposite of Kentucky" was meant that one is 70/30 Midwestern while the other is 70/30 Southern. There are many similarities, in fact a lot of rural Missouri was settled by Kentuckians, other areas were heavily German.

[Old Trafford]

Originally Posted by ColdAilment

I was enroute to St. Louis for a quick business deal, I've never been to the city, let alone the state of Missouri before, so I was curious what my impressions of it would be. I study city data, statistics, and demographics relentlessly, so I am pretty well read up on the stats of St. Louis, but I wanted to actually see it up close, and today I had my chance. I'll share my brief experience and fist impressions here, I honestly wish I had more time to explore it, but time was short today.

My first impression was the road signs, letting me know I was nearing the city. I came from the east and came in on I-55. My first impression was, "St Louis 6", 6 miles away and it's still mostly woods and fields on the Illinois side. So I gathered that the St. Louis metro has not expanded much on the Illinois side directly east of the city, eventually I rounded a hill and all at once the city's skyline and massive Gateway Arch came into view. The city skyline actually looked better in person than it does from pictures. In pictures the buildings mostly look short to medium height and stocky, their character doesn't stand out as much in pictures, overall it didn't look too impressive from the pictures. But from the road, crossing over the bridge St. Louis looked pretty impressive. The buildings taller than I'd though, and with a lot more features than I had realized. I started to develop a feeling of a unique culture in this city. It may be a river city, but it is very different from all the other river cities, like Minneapolis, Memphis, New Orleans, etc. The city looked massive on the Missouri side, I couldn't see an end to where the streets and buildings were, whereas on the Illinois side there was just East St. Louis and then fields and woods. The Missouri side of the metro looked extremely well developed, as if this was one of our older cities and much of its historic buildings had been preserved.

I soon noticed the new and old along the riverfront. Downtown St. Louis looked like a healthy mix of new and old buildings, just to the south looked like an area of heavy industry and possibly river port use. Some of the buildings looked quite large, and quite empty. The sports arena complexes looked very clean and modern.

I took a drive through downtown St. Louis and was very impressed with it. I will admit I only went down a few streets, but one of the cons I noticed about the city, or at least the sections I traversed, was that there were very few local store fronts, eateries, bars, clubs, shops, etc. For the most part it looked to be banking offices, insurance companies, large corporations, and sterile office buildings and government buildings. Foot traffic was light, but then again it was 1PM on a Monday afternoon. I feel like I must have missed the shopping district of downtown, or the arts district. I'm sure the city has it, I just didn't find it on my brief drive through downtown. The city did look remarkably clean though, most buildings were inhabited, the streets and sidewalks clear of clutter and not crumbling apart.

The streets and how they veered right and left and curved at various stages gave me the impression that many of the roads were designed before cars. It feels much older than some cities, confusing road patterns to me anyway are a sign of a more historic city.

Near the south side of downtown along the river front there were a string of very beautiful old charactered looking buildings, many of them with brewery signs on the front. I loved the rustic setting and environment. I then drove north through the city again and came along something called "Old St. Louis Riverfront" I think it was? I might be a little off. However, that section of the city looked EXTREMELY antiquated, almost preserved from the 19th century. The roads were brick, and not brick roads for ca.r...they looked and felt like the original brick roads that were used for horse and carriage. The roads were horrible to drive on, but I believe that area was more or less meant for walking. At any rate, I loved that area and really hope to visit again soon and visit it on foot!

Next I traveled a little north on the freeway, leaving downtown. I came across another very old looking section of the city. It looked like it used to be one of the nicer areas of the city, but was long past its heyday. I was on St. Louis Ave. and University St. for the majority of this exploration, if any of you locals know where that is. What really stuck me here was the red brick...almost every building was built in red brick, and if it wasn't red brick, it was white brick. Very few wooden homes. The SECOND thing that struck me was the abject poverty and decay of the local area. Many of the buildings were abandoned, broken windows, holes in the walls, several buildings were actually crumbling down to the foundation. I saw a lot of "DO NOT ENTER" signs on boards posted up over closed doorways. Trash littered almost every street, there was a serious sadness to the area. But what else I noticed was the area seemed to almost be split in some spots. There was a stretch of St. Louis Ave. with large foreboding two story brick houses, that all looked to be in relatively good shape, but they were bordered on the north side by block after block of buildings that looked as if they had just been hit by an airstrike.

If anyone has any insight on what this area is called and some of the history behind it I'd be curious to know.

All and all St. Louis struck me as a very distinctive city in the midwest, it feels older than Indianapoils, older than Columbus, Des Moines, Louisville, etc. The style of buildings and the density of the neighborhoods is something rare in midwestern cities. The city also struck me as a pretty divided place. From the crumbling foundations of the near northside neighborhood I was exploring, I could see the pristine looking skyline of downtown St Louis, which looked like a gem and a haven for success. I know all cities have their bad sides, but something about St. Louis seemed to be more sinister, I know it routinely ranks as one of the higher cities for murders and violent crime.

I'd really love to come back and be able to spend a full day or two really exploring the city on foot. I'd like to hit the basic tourist attractions, and the older and lesser known sections of the city as well. My first impression is not the most informed, I'll admit that, but it has seriously piqued my curiosity on St. Louis, I vow to return and explore more of it.

Glad you enjoyed the drive, but had you gone to the south you would have discovered some of the best intact historic building stock in the US, and what really separates St. Louis from its peer cities

[ColdAilment]

I'm glad my thread has devolved into whether or not Kentucky is in fact southern.

[FrankMiller]

Now that the Rams are gone, we need something pointless to passionately argue about.