Posted on 01/30/2008 6:20:16 AM PST by cowtowney
Imagine living in a city with the country's highest rate for violent crime and the second-highest unemployment rate. As an added kicker you need more Superfund dollars allocated to your city to clean up contaminated toxic waste sites than just about any other metro.
Unfortunately, this nightmare is a reality for the residents of Detroit. The Motor City grabs the top spot on Forbes' inaugural list of America's Most Miserable Cities.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Weird. Very weird.
Around here, all of East Cobb is just a disaster area (from an aesthetic standpoint). Not only do all the subdivisions look alike, all the HOUSES in the subdivisions look alike. When we were looking for a house, we went into one well regarded subdivision in East Cobb -- we drove down one street and I told our agent "Don't bother - let's go." All the houses were on one plan - center hall Georgian with an ell. Some had garage on left, some had garage on right, some had ell on left, ell on right. Painted different colors (mostly), but even the LAMPPOSTS in the driveways were identical. Shades of Stepford!
We wound up buying a semi-abandoned infill house in Vinings, which is an old non-uniform suburban community.
Nothing’s changed in Princeton proper, although US 1 (especially from the Plainsboro line down the the Trenton border) is now all strip malls and office parks. Lots of construction, especially since the 1980s.
Haven’t seen that site before. Looks like a whole lot of mess in Detroit, even the Episcopalians are moving out!
Yup. It’s terrible in Fresno. Don’t even THINK of moving here! ;)
Wow. The link is amazing. The Packard building still stands after 50 years!
My hubby commuted to Newahk, he can still recite all the stops on the Pennsy from "PRINCEton JUNCtion!" to "NEWahk!" I went the other way to go to my Gaelic class at Bryn Mawr and got off at the Philly station, right after "TRINNNton!" and "NAWTH PhilaDELphia!" and took the Haverford line.
Funny, my friend is Jewish and anything but “Ham on Wonder Bread”. He only shopped at some fancy “fresh” or gourmet markets and paid so much for food I was amazed. I’ve forgotten the name of the places. He lived in a so called “gated community” which I thought was a pain and tacky.
I tried to tell him ot NOT buy the $20 per pound filet or Swoardfish and just get some chicken and a “modest” wine, but Nooooooo. I admit, I did enjoy the wine and fish.
He’s one of those Jewish guys who can’t stand his fellow Jews. I don’t get it. Go figure.
That would likely be Doris's, which is where my parents buy their meats and pastries.
I do shop at Whole Foods for fish, and will pay extra for that fish, only because the local Supermarche chains (Stop and Shop, Acme, Shop Rite, etc.) usually only carry the farm raised crap, often from Asia. There is a difference between wild caught and farm raised that's worth forking over the extra money.
I meant to refer to the kinds of stores on the mall in Fresno, not the fact it was traffic-free. The stores were catering to the poorest of the poor with lots of schlock.
Never gave a thought to it. In fact, Detroit DOES have one of those strips that I used to pass when driving into Detroit to the plant but as for yours and mine interpretations of malls, there aren't any......
Yes, Jim Robinson lives in Fresno.
If you are ever in the area, let him know and we will try to plan a Support the Troops rally. At the least, maybe we can ping some locals and meet you for dinner.
I’ve lived in the Central Valley just south of Fresno off and on for 6 years. Lots of illegals because the whole valley is engulfed in the ag industry.
The city I live in is a very nice place and is very conservative. I don’t read the local paper, but I’ve been told that crime is bad and getting worse. I haven’t been touched by it so I don’t know.
I have noticed something that piqued my curiosity. There are an awful lot of 20 somethings driving Cadillac Escalades, Audis, Mercedes, and BMWs. You don’t see a lot of “hoopties” here.
The air quality sucks and the smell of manure from the dairies can get pretty strong. We’re 40 miles from the Sequoia National Forest and most days you can’t see the mountains at all.
If you have a water well on your property there’s a very good chance it’s polluted with an overdose of nitrates and/or nitrites. I was told this happens because of the way the dairies are allowed to “dispose” of the manure. I don’t know if that is true or not...just what I was told when I asked.
I live 35 miles from Fresno but don’t know much about it except that I like to go shopping there. :) I’ve heard on the local news talk radio that gang crime is very bad.
Flint at least replaced a crooked incompetent mayor, Woodrow Stanley. The new mayor had a rather questionable background, but has run the city like a business. Except for Stanley, Flint has not had mayors who were openly antagonistic to the historical community and suburbs like Detroit has had. Coleman Young used to tell them to “Hit Eight Mile”. The demographics bear this out.
I’m venturing a guess that these are nearly all democrat-run cities.
“And today, our mayor is going to come out of seclusion to tell us about his sexcapades and lying under oath. Where else but in his church.”
Yes, but he isn’t going to resign.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/01/30/detroit.mayor/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
I drove through the entire state last December. Vast swaths of it look like a movie set for a Great Depression movie - boarded up businesses, vacant buildings, for sale signs everywhere, garbage on the streets.
The only image I didn’t see is a guy with a sandwich board that said “Will work for food.” That’s because so many people in Michigan feel that work is a disease to avoid.
Thank you, liberal idiot voters.
“I did not have textual relations with that woman!”, Mayor Kwame.
I dated a gal from Porterville. Loved her company, but she always said that the valley was rather dumpy. Of course, I mentioned my father’s bad experiences in Fresno in 1970 a few posts back.
I live in Visalia. I like here and have been here long enough to consider it home. However 99% of the reason for that is that my son and his wife bought a home here 1-1/2 yrs ago. If they sold out and moved I’d not have a problem moving too.
The one place we’ve “landed” in the past 3 yrs that I would return to in a heartbeat is Temecula.
Porterville is just south of me. I’ve never much liked it. It is kind of a dumpy town. There are several of those type around...Delano, Pixley, Earlimart, Terra Bella, Ivanhoe, Lindsay, Wood Lake........but are are very small.
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