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If somebody is looking for municipal corruption, however, it might be at the top of their list!
"Buddy" Chianti twice-convicted felon, was also twice elected as their mayor.
However, he is not the only crook in their local politics.
I know that this may come as a surprise to NJ-averse people who think that our state is the only one with rampant corruption, but on a per capita basis, Rhode Island in general--and Providence in particular-- probably have beaten us pretty well in the corruption department.
The niece who now lives in New Bedford used to live in Providence. When I first visited her, people were still pretty riled up that their beloved mayor had been sent to prison for bringing their city back to life.
I remember when he was released, he started his press conference with, "As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted..."
When I did my previous post, I had "Buddy" Cianci's name spelled correctly, and if you take a look at my post, it is still spelled correctly. However, when you quoted my post, his name had somehow morphed into "Chianti".
I don't know whether "Buddy" might be a wino in addition to being a convicted felon, but I am fairly confident that he is not actually a wine.
How (or why) do formatting changes like this take place?
I agree, Boston is a much smaller city than most people think. I guess by New England standards it is considered "big". And compared to Boston, Providence is like a small town. I have friends that used to live there and the city really isn't all that great. The downtown area is basically 2 streets with a few restaurants and a big mall. Their "skyline" is basically 1 or 2 mid-rise buildings. Rhode Island has been cited as having the worst economy in the US, so Providence wouldn't exactly be anywhere near the top of my list when looking for places to live.
Boston might be small compared to NYC, but smaller than most people think? It's easily top 10 population considering it doesn't actually end at the city limits.
Until fairly recently, Jersey City was almost a complete urban blight, a rundown, crime-ridden city from which anyone who could had fled a generation ago.
Then along came the developers who saw waterfront and views of Manhattan and knocked down old warehouses and built high-rise apartments and condominiums.
So now you have a city that has a very expensive waterfront area and an interior that is mostly urban blight, rundown and crime-ridden. Some areas are much worse than others, with gunfire being a common sound in a few neighborhoods. There are also sections that hold a significant Asian Indian population. Other areas are expected to be redeveloped and gentrified in the near future. There are pros and cons to living there, depending upon your situation and your lifestyle. There are those magnificent views (I work in Jersey City and the view still strikes me from time to time). If you have kids, you may have to look into private schools. There is easy public transportation to the city, and even though the best areas come with a pricetag, that pricetag is still lower than the ones across the creek. Jersey City itself doesn't have a whole lot to offer--there are some nice restaurants, a few decent bars, but it's biggest pro is access to Manhattan.
But...I love Providence and would definitely advise you to take that under consideration! And Jersey City doesn't have Waterfire!
yikes, amazingly ignorant post by someone who surely never set foot in most parts of my hometown.
i grew up far from downtown, in the heights. Mightyqueen, did you go to an ivy league or seven sister school? Maybe you did not have the opportunities afforded those growing up on my jc heights/western slope block. Four such schools were represented from three two-family houses adjacent to each other. oh the horror
As for the 2nd generation, my daughter's pre-school class {Concordia, in the heights} had parents with MBAs, JDs, and one Ph.D.
your point about JC's main benefit being access to Manhattan - isn't New York the main reason why most people live anywhere in north jersey ? Living in JC just gives you quicker access. there are tradeoffs for that easy access. Is the average public school good? not at all but there are other options.
mcnair and the catholic schools can match or exceed many suburban schools. There are also two reputable charter schools (TECCS and LCCS)
the Western Slope section has a crime rate comparable to many suburbs. That section was and is quiet. There are high crime areas in jersey city but don't throw out the baby with the bathwater and say that the areas outside of the waterfront are "ridden" with crime.
Boston might be small compared to NYC, but smaller than most people think? It's easily top 10 population considering it doesn't actually end at the city limits.
You're referring to metropolitan area (which Boston is #10 in the US). I was referring to the actual city itself (which I would consider rather small given that it's only ranked #24 in the US). People that go visit Boston don't go visit Somerville or Newton, just like people that come to visit NYC don't visit Fort Lee or New Rochelle.
You're referring to metropolitan area (which Boston is #10 in the US). I was referring to the actual city itself (which I would consider rather small given that it's only ranked #24 in the US). People that go visit Boston don't go visit Somerville or Newton, just like people that come to visit NYC don't visit Fort Lee or New Rochelle.
I respectfully disagree having lived in NY, Boston, and visited too many cities on that list. I think it's more of a technicality that puts Boston at #24 and would rank it closer to #10. Think about what you said; the Boston "Metro" area is #10 but the city is #24. I don't have exact statistics of the population distribution, but it's pretty easy to infer. The city of Boston is measured at ~50 square miles where cities ranked above it on city population (but not metro population) have an average of 300. The bordering municipalities of Boston and the municipalities that the bordering municipalities border have a higher average population density than the 17 of the 23 cities that out populate Boston.
It's just a matter of where municipalities drew their lines. Cambridge feels like a neighborhood of Boston. Brookline feels like a neighborhood of Boston and you'd probably stumble in unknowingly.
It seems to me that almost everything inside the 95 loop is dense and transit connected enough to be part of the city of Boston by any reasonable definition, except for where the lines are technically drawn.
If we're describing the experience of living in a city, there is no reason to exclude the inner ring from the conversation, and on that basis, Boston is hard to define as a small city.
When I did my previous post, I had "Buddy" Cianci's name spelled correctly, and if you take a look at my post, it is still spelled correctly. However, when you quoted my post, his name had somehow morphed into "Chianti".
I don't know whether "Buddy" might be a wino in addition to being a convicted felon, but I am fairly confident that he is not actually a wine.
How (or why) do formatting changes like this take place?
yikes, amazingly ignorant post by someone who surely never set foot in most parts of my hometown.
i grew up far from downtown, in the heights. Mightyqueen, did you go to an ivy league or seven sister school? Maybe you did not have the opportunities afforded those growing up on my jc heights/western slope block. Four such schools were represented from three two-family houses adjacent to each other. oh the horror
As for the 2nd generation, my daughter's pre-school class {Concordia, in the heights} had parents with MBAs, JDs, and one Ph.D.
your point about JC's main benefit being access to Manhattan - isn't New York the main reason why most people live anywhere in north jersey ? Living in JC just gives you quicker access. there are tradeoffs for that easy access. Is the average public school good? not at all but there are other options.
mcnair and the catholic schools can match or exceed many suburban schools. There are also two reputable charter schools (TECCS and LCCS)
the Western Slope section has a crime rate comparable to many suburbs. That section was and is quiet. There are high crime areas in jersey city but don't throw out the baby with the bathwater and say that the areas outside of the waterfront are "ridden" with crime.
How long ago did you grow up there? I can only go by my own experience and what I've seen, and I'm in Jersey City every single day. As I said, I work on the waterfront, but I've been in other parts, and I don't see this wondrous paradise of which you speak.
When I first started working in the city, in 1979, I worked with a number of people who grew up in "the Heights" in Jersey City. Most had moved out to the suburbs. One still lived there. That, I was told, was the "good" section of Jersey City. I didn't say one word about people not moving on to higher education if they grew up in Jersey City, so I don't know where you were going with that. The Jersey City people I worked with were mostly engineers, since that's the industry I worked in. They'd gone to NJIT or Stevens, both good schools. I also know people who grew up in the slums of Newark who have advanced degrees from good schools, so no, not everyone who comes out of rundown urban areas is doomed. A lot of factors play in.
I finally got to the Heights one day when I visited the woman, another secretary in the office, who still lived there. She was on the third floor of a building that looked as if it would go up in flames if you put a match near it, and she and her two kids lived in four rooms that were set up so that you could stand in one and look straight through all the rooms to the other side of the apartment. There was no hallway, just doors leading from one room to another. Sorry, but I was not impressed. Yes, I realize that all the buildings probably didn't look like that inside, but the neighborhood seemed very crowded in general.
Perhaps it's partly a matter of perspective from a person who grew up with woods and creeks around. I don't see people wedged into two-and-three-family homes that sit three feet from one another and are right up to the sidewalk as the optimum place to raise a family. YMMV, and it seems to have worked for you.
Never heard of "the Western Slope", so I'll take your word for it that it's as lovely as you claim. In the past year in particular, I've had to do a lot of driving from Newark to Jersey City, and based on where the construction and/or traffic backups are, my GPS has taken me through a variety of routes through Jersey City. Most of what I've seen looks rundown and sad, and that's what I based my post on. If you have better information for the OP, by all means share it.
I spent 17 years looking out of the western windows of One World Trade Center at the area in which I now work (near Exchange Place), and it was not a pretty sight. The rent was cheaper on the west side because the view sucked so bad. Crumbling old warehouses.
To answer one of your other questions--SOME people live in north Jersey because of the proximity of the city, yes, but not all. I grew up thirty miles from Manhattan in a town in which my family has been for five generations, but no one I knew had parents who commuted to the city back then, and my parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc., rarely if ever went to the city. We went on school trips to the UN and a few museums, of course, but I don't even think any of my grandparents were ever in New York City in their entire lives. Even when I lived in that same town while raising my daughter, I met quite a few people who were shocked and horrified that I actually took a train every day to Manhattan and worked there. They could not imagine.
According to City-Data (the info only goes to 2012) it does look as though the crime rate has dropped, so you had "only" 11 murders in 2012, compared to 17 in 2001. Jersey City's crime rate is still much higher than the US average.
Last edited by Mightyqueen801; 01-19-2015 at 08:33 AM..
The dreaded autocorrect strikes again!
That can be potentially embarrassing, depending on exactly which words are "corrected"...
...and the example above is one of the few G-rated examples from that site!
I love that site. Someone sent it to me at work a couple of years ago, and I had to close it because I was sitting at my desk, supposed to be working, and I was laughing so hard I was crying.
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