Minneapolis this dangerous?

[UrbanMinnesotan]

Minneapolis isn't bad at all. It fares much better than nearby cities such as Chicago, St. Louis, Cleveland, Gary, or Detroit. The crime in Minneapolis is well concentrated. (Don't go North of I-394 or West of I-94)

[golgi1]

Originally Posted by Albert_The_Crocodile

Don't let that BS slide show "article" worry you. The so-called "survey" is crap, because the author doesn't make even a halfassed attempt to explain what the numbers mean. Probably because she didn't bother making even a halfassed attempt to understand it herself.

How, exactly, does the FBI determine a city's crime risk index? How are crime statistics compiled and collated to generate those numerical rankings? If we don't know that, then the information is worthless - and we don't know that, because the author made no attempt to explain it. Just grabbed some numbers and spent a half hour putting together one of those useless "slide shows" that websites love because it means more page-views and therefore more ad revenue. I'd file it right next to "The 10 Cities Most Likely To Be Hit By An Asteroid."

If you were talking about the crime statistics in isolation, then you would have a small point assuming that somehow a differing method exists, for instance, for calculating murders per 100,000 individuals. Personally, I don't see how the method and result could vary much outside of possible juridictional differences in definitions for crimes such as rape. Either way, regional crime statistics aren't considered in isolation. They are always considered in relative measure to crime statistics in other places. The crime of all cities is calcuated by the FBI using the same method, and therefore the offical methodology is irrelevant because it is the de facto most authoritative methodology. The FBI is the foremost authority on crime tatistics and therefore its method is the accepted standard. Any possible variation in crime statistic calculation that you might entertain would be de facto less authoritative in the discussion, barring any large flaw found in their methodology. A large flaw would be somewhat big and therefore easy-to-find news.

If you want to recalculate the offical ranking based on different crime statistic prioritizing (differently prioritizing all violent crime, the murder rate, rape, etc.) then there is an interactive table on the wikipedia U.S. city crime ranking page that allows you to do so.

Originally Posted by uptown_urbanist

I, for one, wasn't trying to argue that Minneapolis as a whole was any safer or any more dangerous than any other city on any given list -- just pointing out how ridiculous it was, when identifying personal safety risks if considering a move, to look at overall numbers, rather than looking at specific location. It's absolutely true that the safety of any city can vary drastically by neighborhood. Just as suburbs also vary greatly, or suburbs within any one suburb can likewise vary greatly.

I disagree. Proximity is everything. If what you say is true, then it wouldn't matter how close or far you lived from a high crime area. I could live on a "safe" block next to a block that had a high murder rate and because there were no murders on my block, using your logic, it would be claimed that my area is not dangerous.

The truth is that dangerous neighborhoods affect the quality of life of an entire city to a degree. Crime spills over and parts of the city become unnofficially off-limits to the safety conscious part of the population that does not have to live there. As high crime areas become more prominent, the city takes on a less-trusting, if not dangerous, overall feel despite safe pockets. People are perfectly rational to take into account the overall numbers, as those numbers will likely accurately reflect the overall social feel and fabric of the city as well as statistical risks. To illustrate: most of us would not choose to live in a "safe" neighborhood in Detroit, the most statistically dangerous large metro in the country, despite it not being a specifically dangerous neighborhood.

Originally Posted by PackerFan1

I think the crime statistics for Minneapolis is blown out of proportion. The Twin Cities is relatively safe with a few pockets of bad areas but it's nothing like St. Louis, Chicago, or Detroit for that matter.

Faint praise. You listed three of the more dangerous cities in the country, one of them being the most dangerous. More relevant comparisons would be with Seattle, San Francisco, and Boston. These are the cities that are most often compared with the TC, especially in terms of the arts and the economy, and which are often upheld as relatively model cities/regions in the USA. When we want to be better, we don't compare ourselves to those who perform much worse. The real world, relatively ideal example (city - in terms of crime in this instance) is always a more appropriate contrast. The murder rate of Minneapolis is embarrassingly high compared to Seattle's, for instance, at approximately 2.5 times the rate. I can't recall to specific murder rates of the the other cities that I mentioned at the moment.

[mnmarina]

https://coms.doc.state.mn.us/Level3/

wow lots of level 3 sex offenders in mpls..maybe one would look up the other communities to see how they compare.

[chessgeek]

Originally Posted by UrbanMinnesotan

Minneapolis isn't bad at all. It fares much better than nearby cities such as Chicago, St. Louis, Cleveland, Gary, or Detroit. The crime in Minneapolis is well concentrated. (Don't go North of I-394 or West of I-94)

Also include Milwaukee on that list of cities with a higher murder/violent crime rate than Minneapolis. Anyways, it makes more sense to compare to cities in the same region than a trendy "peer" comparison to cities over 1,000 miles away IMO. That being said, achieving Seattle's lower rate should be a goal. (Tacoma has a higher rate of crime, though).

[xandrex]

Originally Posted by golgi1

I disagree. Proximity is everything. If what you say is true, then it wouldn't matter how close or far you lived from a high crime area. I could live on a "safe" block next to a block that had a high murder rate and because there were no murders on my block, using your logic, it would be claimed that my area is not dangerous.

The truth is that dangerous neighborhoods affect the quality of life of an entire city to a degree. Crime spills over and parts of the city become unnofficially off-limits to the safety conscious part of the population that does not have to live there. As high crime areas become more prominent, the city takes on a less-trusting, if not dangerous, overall feel despite safe pockets. People are perfectly rational to take into account the overall numbers, as those numbers will likely accurately reflect the overall social feel and fabric of the city as well as statistical risks. To illustrate: most of us would not choose to live in a "safe" neighborhood in Detroit, the most statistically dangerous large metro in the country, despite it not being a specifically dangerous neighborhood.

But what is proximity to you? I live in a quiet neighborhood in the city, just across the river from downtown Minneapolis. As the crow flies, I'm awfully close to North Minneapolis (I worked in North for a while, and my commute was about 2 miles). When I visit friends in the North Loop, I'm even closer. Yet I have no fear walking about my neighborhood (or the North Loop), and you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone with a legitimate concern of getting randomly shot or being the victim of a crime. Things like murder are rarely random.

It's just silly because nobody in Linden Hills or Kenwood has any reason to fear the crime coming out of North Minneapolis. I mean, if they are afraid, why isn't anyone sending up red flags in Golden Valley? It literally abuts North Minneapolis! Oh geez!

Nobody will argue that you should typically avoid the neighborhoods that are "block by block" when it comes to crime. But there are an overwhelming number of city neighborhoods where we all feel very comfortable and without concern for crime (above, you know, taking normal precautions).

[wushuliu]

Originally Posted by golgi1

Faint praise. You listed three of the more dangerous cities in the country, one of them being the most dangerous. More relevant comparisons would be with Seattle, San Francisco, and Boston. These are the cities that are most often compared with the TC, especially in terms of the arts and the economy, and which are often upheld as relatively model cities/regions in the USA. When we want to be better, we don't compare ourselves to those who perform much worse. The real world, relatively ideal example (city - in terms of crime in this instance) is always a more appropriate contrast. The murder rate of Minneapolis is embarrassingly high compared to Seattle's, for instance, at approximately 2.5 times the rate. I can't recall to specific murder rates of the the other cities that I mentioned at the moment.

Meh. Seattle, SF, and Boston don't exist in vacuums. They are huge cities that also are not far away from other huge (compared to MSP) cities. Are you talking Seattle proper? West Seattle/Alkai? White Center? Shoreline? Oakland/San Jose? etc..

Minneapolis crime is not a surprise considering it's basically an oasis between Chicago and Seattle and in Minnesota itself. Of course crime is going to be comparatively higher since there's nowhere else to go. It's Minneapolis and St. Paul, period, for hundreds of miles. Unless Eau Claire and DesMoines are considered metropolis's now.

This isn't rocket science.