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North-South: The general rich-poor boundary of american cities ?

35K views 73 replies 52 participants last post by  Boxèr21 
#1 ·
The northside of Chicago has a high number of whites, area of well educated people, it's more safe and have higher median income compared to the southside.

The southside has always been associated with blue collarworkers, lower income, large black population, high crime rate, murdes. The opening lines of the song "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" state that the South Side is "the baddest part of town".

I have read that the city of Dallas has the same northside/southside segregation.

London has it's east and westend. where the Westend is the wealthier part of the city. Eastend is where the immigrants from the third world lives.

I think Paris with it's infamous area Clichy-sous-Bois of the eastside has about the same east-west poor-rich areas as London.

My question is: Are there more american cities with northside/eastside areas similar to the ones in Chicago and Dallas ?
 
#35 ·
Salt Lake City, and Utah in general, is all about east-west. The eastsides are always the nicest, and west sides always more rundown. This is primarily because the mountain ranges run north to south, creating valleys separated in the middle by railroads and freeways running north to south. The 'nicer' mountains are on the eastside, so all the wealthy people build up 'on the hill'. This is true in almost every metro area in Utah.
 
#36 ·
I grew up in Dallas and it is very North/extremely wealthy and South/poor(undeveloped). There are some pockets of wealth in southwest Dallas(North Oak Cliff).

I moved to Oregon about 11 years ago and Portland is completely opposite. The North side of Portland would be considered the poor side and the southwest/west would be the rich, nicer area.

I live in Austin now and its more like Portland here(in more ways that one). Southwest Austin and West Austin are the niceset area by far. Austin's southwest and western edges of land are mainly large hills.
 
#38 ·
It's different in Charlotte. The east and west sides are the bad sides of town; the south side has the more desirable neighborhoods, and the north is more solid middle class with some "hood" thrown in.
 
#40 ·
Duluth is much more of an "east-west" city than a "north-south" city. The East (at least east of 19th Ave. E.) is known as the "rich" or "cake-eater" part of town, and the West (particularly the West End) is recognized by most people as being working-class, particularly West Duluth and Lincoln Park. Interestingly, the city actually tilts northeast - southwest, so the "rich" part of town is indeed further north than the poor part.
 
#68 ·
Yes, they do drive up the roads in the winter.

The homes on the hill range from the poorest subsidized housing to some of the most expensive houses in the city. However, the neighborhood with the best views of the city (view of downtown, the lake, the harbor, and the sandbar) is also interestingly the poorest, with plenty of Section 8 (subsidized) housing. They even built subsidized townhomes atop the hill.
 
#44 ·
The North , East and parts of the South wards of Newark are Middle Class / Hard Working low class and the West Ward is poor / crime infested class.:eek:hno:

The East , and North sections of Jersey City are Rich / Middle Class and the South sections are middle and low class.
 
#47 ·
There definitely seems to be a pattern to this in American cities. Not all, of course, but it's very common and definitely not random.
Historically, the wealthy choose to live north and west so that they were never downwind from factories, meatpacking plants, sewage treatment, etc. Nowadays it has more to do with real estate, amenities, and social perceptions of "hip" areas of the city.

The 'nicer' mountains are on the eastside, so all the wealthy people build up 'on the hill'. This is true in almost every metro area in Utah.
I always found this odd after visiting Brazil. The poor and their favelas are almost always located up on the hillsides (up and out of view).
 
#49 ·
In Louisville the poor side of the city is the north westside, with working class neighborhoods to the south and the wealth to the east, especially the northeast. The patterns originate from the Ohio River flooding (especially the 1930's flood), the affluent left the low lying areas for higher ground, the lowest area of the city happens to be the northwest side. I would imagine for any river city with similiar flooding patterns the same would follow at least to an extent. Geography seems to have a lot to do with this subject.
 
#50 ·
In Indianapolis it is this way. For about 150 years the wealthy have lived on the north side of town while the working class lives on the south.
 
#51 · (Edited)
What cities have segregated Old and New Money?

In my experience living throughout the East Coast, the close-in wealthy areas tend to be old money and the newer areas tend to have newer money. This is generally true of DC (Gtown/Kalorama/MassAve), Atlanta (Buckhead) and Charlotte. NYC is an interesting case and should probably be broken down between LI, Westchester/CT and North Jersey. In Long Island, the further out you go from Great Neck the newer the money is all the way to Port Jefferson. In Westchester/CT, the older close-in places like Bronxville, Scarsdale and obviously Greenwich generally have older money than places like Chappaqua and New Canaan. The water views definitely play into this. In North Jersey, places like Wykoff and Franklin Lakes further from the city are more Nouveau Riche than Westfield and Short Hills. In Philly, the old money of the proximate Main Line contrasts with the new money of the Jersey Burbs and Montgomery County (PA). In Miami/Ft. Laudy its pretty random, but I'd say the further North you go the newer the money, all the way up through FTL, Boca and finally West Palm and Jupiter (Palm Beach is an outlier and Boca isn't quite as cache as it used to be). Oddly enough, in NYC the oldest money is in the newest area, the UES.
 
#52 ·
Here in Orlando north east and north Orlando is middle / upper middle class with plenty of wealthy neighborhoods
south Orlando is mix of poor and working class as well as pockets of wealth
west Orlando is poor and East Orlando has bit of everything
In my birthplace of Casablanca
West side = very wealthy
South west side = upper middle class
Downtown = Elites but also mix of middle class and poor
East side = Industrial working poor/ lower middle class some pockets of wealth
South side = poor and some working poor
South east side = Extreme poverty ( worst part of the city )
there is no north side that is the ocean
 
#58 ·
Houston seems to have poor and well off neighborhoods in any direction although the West side is much wealthier. East Colfax is Denvers toughest/poorest neighborhood but the dividing line seems to be anything North of Colfax=low income.
 
#61 ·
Another Minnesota post....

As previously mentioned, North Minneapolis is the poor section. Yet, over in St. Paul, the East Side is the blue collar, poorer part of town. Geographically, Minneapolis is more of a North-South city, while St. Paul is more of an East-West city.

Interesting about Duluth. I imagine that the port area is more on the West End of town while the bluffs overlooking Lake Superior are on the East.
 
#63 ·
Not sure if someone's already done Baltimore, but the general trend in the city is that the North is rich while the south, east, and west are lower class. However, there are large areas of middle class and even upper class to the south of the city.
 
#64 ·
Buffalo NY rich and middle class on north side
east side is the shit section and very poor
west side is poor but there are many pockets of middle and even rich
south Buffalo is working class
 
#69 ·


Indianapolis: Generally speaking, our more wealthy areas are on the north-side. But there are nice areas on each side of town...

North
Carmel: $$$$$
Westfield: $$$
Noblesville: $$$
Fishers: $$$$
Zionsville: $$$$
Trader's Point: $$$
Midtown: $$$$$$
Glendale: $$

South
Perry Meridian: $$
Greenwood: $$$
Center Grove: $$$$
Whiteland: $$
Franklin: $$
Beech Grove: $$
Franklin Central: $$
Southside: $

West
Brownsburg: $$$
Avon: $$$
Plainfield: $$$
Danville: $$
Mooresville: $$
Speedway: $$
Lafayette Square: $
Westside: $

East
Cumberland: $$
Lawrence: $$
Eastside: $
Brightwood: $

And then of course there is downtown which would be $$$$ because of how expensive it is to live there!
 
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