The West waxes, the East wanes

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Flipping through a fashion magazine in the bathroom, everything was "Brooklyn" this and "Lower East Side" that... and I was reminded of a list they devised a few years ago to give credit to the West Coast writers that had always been overlooked by the established East Coast intelligentsia (Stegner, Chandler, London et al). It's the seedy late night Downtown train ride versus the pomegranate margaritas of Silver Lake...

So does the East still rule the roost? Or is the West the best?

(UK folks can substitute North vs South...)

― andy, Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Rents need to come down in SF, then everything will change.

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:29 (twenty-two years ago)

rent in SF is cheaper than Manhattan

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:30 (twenty-two years ago)

rent in Regina is cheaper than both subtracted from each other, or one another or whatever.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:31 (twenty-two years ago)

but then you have to live in Regina.

― Huckleberry Mann (Horace Mann), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:32 (twenty-two years ago)

also, I think that we still live in a highly Eurocentric world and NY is closer to Europe, so, as far as fashion mags goes, NY is a hub of greater activity. Also, it's more condensed, which gives everything more weight. On the west coast, the influence is as likely to come from the East but that doesn't always translate well throughout the rest of the country.

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:33 (twenty-two years ago)

Is it cheaper to live in the Lower Haight or The Mission (or...errr, Silverlake) than it is to live in Brooklyn?

I still think the whole bagels thing is the real issue here...

― @d@ml (nordicskilla), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 19:35 (twenty-two years ago)

No. (I don't know about Silverlake). It depends on what part of Brooklyn though. There are cheap places to live everywhere, that doesn't mean you want to live there (Hunter's Point, Vistacion Valley).

― anthony kyle monday (akmonday), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 20:01 (twenty-two years ago)

The Northwest channels its great fashion senses from wolves, orcas, and puffins.

― donut bitch (donut), Wednesday, 17 December 2003 20:30 (twenty-two years ago)

ROCK

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 18 December 2003 07:47 (twenty-two years ago)

in a lot of the cities i have been to, the north is richer than the south and the west is 'stuffier' than the 'edgier' east, berlin, manchester, london, leeds, dc? bradford, all spring to mind straightaway anyway

― charltonlido (gareth), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Gareth I read somewhere that that effect (in the UK at least) was to do with prevailing winds blowing the smoke from industry (which is central) to the south and the east. I like the idea but I've never been able to make the theory stack up in my mind and I've forgotten where I read it.

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:19 (twenty-two years ago)

i have read the theory before, and whether that is the reason or not, im not sure, but in the uk it does seem very much that cities are skewed this way, once you remove coastal cities, which wouldnt necessarily follow the same pattern

― charltonlido (gareth), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Tim -- that's definitely right. I can't remember where I read it -- Eric Hobsbawm? -- but it checks out.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:22 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, of course a lot of the coastal cities were primarily ports and therefore didn't have the same level of smoke-belching industry.

I thought South Manchester was supposed ot be the leafy bit though, and North the roughandtough industrial area?

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:23 (twenty-two years ago)

Manchester is tricky cos it's really to cities, or was -- Salford (in the East) and Manchester.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:25 (twenty-two years ago)

'two'

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:25 (twenty-two years ago)

But that shouldn't affect the north south thing should it?

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:25 (twenty-two years ago)

Tim, we got taught that in Geography A-level.

― chris (chris), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Dunno. It does, I can confirm, work for Cambridge.

xpost

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Chris, but is it right?

Enrique, did Cambridge ever have enough smoky industry to make this effect work?

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:27 (twenty-two years ago)

(Also: is it true of Oxford?)

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:29 (twenty-two years ago)

It certainly works for Sheffield, the west - mostly leafy heading out to the peaks, the east- steel works and Tinsley (a very grotty district)heading out to Rotherham and Doncaster *shudder*

Also the same for Chesterfield thinking about it

― chris (chris), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:30 (twenty-two years ago)

why is the south side always the baddest part of town?

― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Chris, but is it right?
Enrique, did Cambridge ever have enough smoky industry to make this effect work?
-- Tim (hopkinsti...), December 18th, 2003.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Also: is it true of Oxford?)
-- Tim (hopkinsti...), December 18th, 2003.

HAHAHAHAHA

I got the black lung from my time here... erm, Oxford's industrial area is in the South East (Cowley). But the town sort of peters out in the west -- it doesn't *have* a west. The north is the posh part. Cambridge has a sorta industrial area in the East (Mill Road, etc -- though I have no idea what sort of industry there was).

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:34 (twenty-two years ago)

the posher part of St. Louis is to the south and west.

― teeny (teeny), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:36 (twenty-two years ago)

plenty of south manchester is poor, plenty of north manchester is rich?

― charltonlido (gareth), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:37 (twenty-two years ago)

Sale, Didsbury, are in South?

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:38 (twenty-two years ago)

For the smoke theory to work it requires the industry to be central, doesn't it? I mean if the heavy industry itself is on the South of town then you have to ask why it was built there, don't you, rather than assuming that it was built there because that's where the smoke went?

Clearly my lack of a geography qualifications of any kind is causing me problems here.

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:40 (twenty-two years ago)

It's broad stroke stuff. I mean, when the Manchester factories were built the place was tiny, and the main criterion must have been proximity to water power/canals.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:43 (twenty-two years ago)

but many cities are on rivers, and the industry located on the south bank, so still very central, but already the city is being delineated?

― charltonlido (gareth), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Right -- when they built the first Lancashire factories there wasn't really a 'middle class' as such, not for, oooh, fifty years, which is when the 'leafy suburbs' were built.

― Enrique (Enrique), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:52 (twenty-two years ago)

They would move the industry eastwards to maximise the effect of having the wind blow away from the more affluent areas. In the example of Sheffield, The Don actually runs through the East of the city so they built around there. The places to the east of that are largely horrible. The same thing has happened in Lond, the smelly industry gradually moved Eastwards didn't it? Not that thre's much smelly manufacturing left in London of course.

― chris (chris), Thursday, 18 December 2003 16:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Have any of you lot ever read this: http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/185894077X.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
?
Is it as good as it looks?

― Tim (Tim), Thursday, 18 December 2003 17:16 (twenty-two years ago)

I skimmed it but never actually bought it for some reason, but it seemed excellent. I think I may have been skint at the time

― chris (chris), Thursday, 18 December 2003 17:17 (twenty-two years ago)

It looks good on a skim basis but I was wondering whether anyone had read it? It's not cheap...

― Tim (Tim), Friday, 19 December 2003 10:10 (twenty-two years ago)

ride the 15 third st bus from city college to fisherman's wharf, then come to papa

― Vacillating temp (Vacillating temp), Friday, 19 December 2003 19:48 (twenty-two years ago)

yes! the complete routes of the 15 (and the 22) are amazing sociological studies.

― gygax! (gygax!), Friday, 19 December 2003 21:09 (twenty-two years ago)

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