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Schenectady NY is pretty appalling. It has the ugliest train station I've ever seen, sky high crime rates, and hasn't built itself up at all since GE left many years ago.
Taking the Adirondack train (a mostly beautiful ride by the way) in Schenectady you'll see huge piles of rubble and brick from disused buildings, mounds of garbage everywhere, and a threatening and unsafe looking downtown. It's what I imagine a London slum would have looked like after the Blitz.
Got to give it out to the police officers who worked there when they still had a municipal police department. Must have taught a whole different level of street smart.
Camden has a bad reputation but this picture makes it look like a gypsy quarter in Romania or Bulgaria. There are better pictures showing more typical American style buildings and decay. Both Europe and the US have places they should be ashamed off although it seems the US has quite a few more of those.
Camden looks like a town in Africa or even like a slum in Latin America. It's hard to think of such place being located in USA.
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Originally Posted by improb
Is this place really in the USA? Seems something out of a third world country. Is it as bad as the pic suggest?
The picture is bad, but it is a place in the US. There are other cities, such as Gary, IN, East St. Louis, IL, etc which are similar. You'll also find blighted and decayed areas in many of the large cities in the American Midwest and Northeast that have experienced population loss over the last 50 years or so. They generally won't look as bad as pictures you'll see of the aforementioned towns though because the cities typically have more resources at their disposal.
American cities are going through a renewal at the moment, but many have a long way to go before they look anything like how they did at their population peaks decades ago.
The picture is bad, but it is a place in the US. There are other cities, such as Gary, IN, East St. Louis, IL, etc which are similar.
I wonder which would actually be the worst of Camden, East St. Louis, Baltimore, Gary, Detroit, Flint, South Chicago, etc. I'd say probably East St. Louis because it seems to be completely dilapidated without any liveable parts left whereas Detroit or Baltimore, etc. have at least a few liveable areas left. Maybe someone who lived in all those places could comment on that?
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You'll also find blighted and decayed areas in many of the large cities in the American Midwest and Northeast that have experienced population loss over the last 50 years or so. They generally won't look as bad as pictures you'll see of the aforementioned towns though because the cities typically have more resources at their disposal.
American cities are going through a renewal at the moment, but many have a long way to go before they look anything like how they did at their population peaks decades ago.
Actually, when reading the forums on CD about different states all over the US everywhere people are mentioning cities are in decline, even in the southern states. My hypothesis is that the decay and poverty which originated in Detroit in the late 60's spread first through the rustbelt to places like Flint, Saginaw and Baltimore and after that it spread through the rest of the country. Parts of Miami, LA, Dallas, New Orleans, etc, etc, are just as much in decay. The reasons are complicated but things like globalization, outsourcing, de-industrialization, corruption, mismanagement, white flight, crime rates, lack of a decent social welfare system amongst others all have been contributing factors.
I wonder which would actually be the worst of Camden, East St. Louis, Baltimore, Gary, Detroit, Flint, South Chicago, etc. I'd say probably East St. Louis because it seems to be completely dilapidated without any liveable parts left whereas Detroit or Baltimore, etc. have at least a few liveable areas left. Maybe someone who lived in all those places could comment on that?
The Southside of Chicago is not comparable to cities like East St. Louis, Gary, etc, especially since some of the safest neighborhoods in the city are also on the South Side. Chicago has blighted areas and former industrial sites, but Chicago has many resources at its disposal, unlike those cities. Instead of burnt hulks and crumbled walls, you're more likely to simply see an empty lot. Even Detroit has done work to clear out crumbling abandoned homes and structures.
People seem shocked to realize that Chicago's population decline is similar to the cities of Minneapolis, Philadelphia, and Boston, not Detroit, St. Louis, Cleveland, etc. Chicago lost 1/4 of its peak population, Detroit lost 2/3.
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Actually, when reading the forums on CD about different states all over the US everywhere people are mentioning cities are in decline, even in the southern states. My hypothesis is that the decay and poverty which originated in Detroit in the late 60's spread first through the rustbelt to places like Flint, Saginaw and Baltimore and after that it spread through the rest of the country. Parts of Miami, LA, Dallas, New Orleans, etc, etc, are just as much in decay. The reasons are complicated but things like globalization, outsourcing, de-industrialization, corruption, mismanagement, white flight, crime rates, lack of a decent social welfare system amongst others all have been contributing factors.
Cities are not in decline. Even places like Detroit are seeing gentrification and rebirth in various areas. Decay did not start in Detroit and spread like an infection either.
Cities in the South like Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, etc, are all very popular and are currently booming. They're by no means declining. Crime is also down across the board in the country. Even the most dangerous major cities are far safer now than they were in the 90s.
You seem to think that a city having a bad part of town automatically thinks that it's in decline, but that frankly isn't the case. There's always going to be bad parts of town, and they're not all cut from the same cloth.
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