Monday, November 10, 2008

Neighborhood Walk Diaspora

Both i will shout youngstown and Brewed Fresh Daily put out the call for the Rust Belt Bloggers Neighborhood Walk social media extravaganza. Post the wonders of your neighborhood tomorrow, November 11th. By way of inspiration, check out these photos of Syracuse. Also, I ran into the Pittsburgh Neighborhood Narratives blog today, which is a clever attempt at capturing the essence of a place using film and a fictional narrative. Some of you Pittsburgh natives may know about Randyland (video here). Finally, I'm trying to track down a short film about Lower Murray Avenue that I discovered at Alan Paul's blog. I realized only today that YouTube no longer hosts the video. The documentary is one of the finest examples of articulating the soul of a neighborhood I've ever encountered.

Update: I tracked down the information on the documentary in question. Sheila Chamovitz is the filmmaker and the title is "Murray Avenue: A Pittsburgh Community in Transition." I suspect the YouTube version was removed because it violated copyright. If your library has it or you can find a copy some other way, I highly recommend viewing the film.

2 comments:

jonathan goldstein said...

Here's my Philly post. Not all from my neighborhood, but still, things that caught my eye.

Philly is sort of in between the Maritime/Mid Atlantic zone and the Rustbelt historically and culturally, but I thought I'd contribute anyway, even though Philly is not hard core Rustbelt.

http://tinyurl.com/6k65ug

Jim Russell said...

Philly is an interesting case when considering which cities qualify as "Rust Belt." I extend the Rust Belt region to the cities of NE PA, but SE PA doesn't make the cut.

I define a Rust Belt city as a place that boomed because of its proximity to geographic assets necessary for industrialization. As you point out, Philly would exist for other reasons such as being a port city.

Also, I don't really consider capital cities to be part of the Rust Belt, despite their location in hardcore industrial states. Cities such as Indianapolis and Columbus don't face the same magnitude of economic transition that Youngstown must manage.

Of course, Philly's soul is that of a blue collar city, a legacy of its industrial past. Without a doubt, many parts belong to the Rust Belt and I'd bet you can now see plenty of Pittsburgh in your city.