6 ms·

Yeah, but NYC came back and so will SF. Detroit likely didn’t make a return because of its undesirable climate, but I’m hard-pressed to see a future where SF is

Yeah, but NYC came back and so will SF. Detroit likely didn’t make a return because of its undesirable climate, but I’m hard-pressed to see a future where SF isn’t relevant in 50 years.

bluedino 3y ago
Detroit and NYC have similar climates. Detroit is a little drier and a little colder. But they both have freezing winters, hot summers... The climate has nothing to do with their lack of a comeback.
- blamazon 3y ago
  The difference lies largely in public transit. NYC had strong transit bones despite a few decades of wayward highway prioritization. Transit enables higher urban densities which (can) carry more revenue per square foot.
  - poorDtoi 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - bart_spoon 3y ago
    The difference is the time period and the industries they were built around. NYC was the center of the banking universe, but banking didn’t become big the way we know it today until the 80s, which did a lot to pull NYC out of its rut. Detroit was built around manufacturing and automobiles, and American businesses have done everything they can to make eviscerate domestic manufacturing in their pursuit of profits.
  - nickv 3y ago
    I always thought it was lack of universities in Detroit. Henry Ford hated cities, “elites”, etc which is you don’t see a major Ford University in Detroit. There was no Leland Stanford or James Duke in Detroit. So no CMU, Case Western, etc. [1] NYC has a few great universities which means it has a pipeline of students for high information/innovation business employees. Same with the Bay Area. Chicago, LA too. Detroit doesn’t really have any world class universities. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/could-a-private-university-have-made-a-difference-in-detroit/278148/ https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/could-a...
    - alephnerd 3y ago
      Detroit has UMich, where Larry Page of Google fame is an alum of (Ann Arbor is commuting distance from Detroit). Also, all the conversations about Detroit vs NYC seem to forget the Riots of 1967. > The riot resulted in 43 deaths, 1,189 injured, over 7,200 arrests, and more than 400 buildings destroyed Entire neighborhoods were razed in the aftermath of that and White-Black relations deteriorated severely leading to an extreme amount of white flight. If you visit Michigan, suburbs located outside of Wayne County like Dearborn, Ann Arbor, Troy, Hamtrack, and Windsor ON continue to have a vibrant economy, but Detroit (Wayne County) is economically dead. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot
      - dventimihasura 3y ago
        What economy would you propose for a downtown core of tall office buildings in an American city post-pandemic and post-remote-work?
  - cscurmudgeon 3y ago
    https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-york-city https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-yor... > The contribution of such deterrence measures (the "stick") offers more explanation for the decline in New York City crime than the improvement in the economy, the authors conclude. Between 1990 and 1999, homicide dropped 73 percent, burglary 66 percent, assault 40 percent, robbery 67 percent, and vehicle hoists 73 percent. The authors' model manages to explain between 33 and 86 percent of those declines
brezelnbitte 3y ago
NYC was founded as and continues to be a financial capital, its where deals are done, so that strong anchor among its overall diversified economy helped. SF is somewhat similar to Detroit in that their economies are less diversified but weather and geography is a major advantage.
q1w2 3y ago
NYC came back because the mayor imposed some draconian laws - laws that would not be palatable in San Francisco.
- piva00 3y ago
  Or perhaps because of the finance industry boom of the 80s onwards?
  - cscurmudgeon 3y ago
    Research supports the draconian narrative. > The contribution of such deterrence measures (the "stick") offers more explanation for the decline in New York City crime than the improvement in the economy, the authors conclude. https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-york-city https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-yor...
dventimihasura 3y ago
Detroit never came back to what it was, but it became something different and in many ways it's better than it was at any other time in the last 50 years.

Yeah, but NYC came back and so will SF. Detroit likely didn’t make a return because of its undesirable climate, but I’m hard-pressed to see a future where SF isn’t relevant in 50 years.

bluedino 3y ago

Detroit and NYC have similar climates. Detroit is a little drier and a little colder. But they both have freezing winters, hot summers... The climate has nothing to do with their lack of a comeback.

blamazon 3y ago
The difference lies largely in public transit. NYC had strong transit bones despite a few decades of wayward highway prioritization. Transit enables higher urban densities which (can) carry more revenue per square foot.
- poorDtoi 3y ago
  [flagged]
- bart_spoon 3y ago
  The difference is the time period and the industries they were built around. NYC was the center of the banking universe, but banking didn’t become big the way we know it today until the 80s, which did a lot to pull NYC out of its rut. Detroit was built around manufacturing and automobiles, and American businesses have done everything they can to make eviscerate domestic manufacturing in their pursuit of profits.
- nickv 3y ago
  I always thought it was lack of universities in Detroit. Henry Ford hated cities, “elites”, etc which is you don’t see a major Ford University in Detroit. There was no Leland Stanford or James Duke in Detroit. So no CMU, Case Western, etc. [1] NYC has a few great universities which means it has a pipeline of students for high information/innovation business employees. Same with the Bay Area. Chicago, LA too. Detroit doesn’t really have any world class universities. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/could-a-private-university-have-made-a-difference-in-detroit/278148/ https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/07/could-a...
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    Detroit has UMich, where Larry Page of Google fame is an alum of (Ann Arbor is commuting distance from Detroit). Also, all the conversations about Detroit vs NYC seem to forget the Riots of 1967. > The riot resulted in 43 deaths, 1,189 injured, over 7,200 arrests, and more than 400 buildings destroyed Entire neighborhoods were razed in the aftermath of that and White-Black relations deteriorated severely leading to an extreme amount of white flight. If you visit Michigan, suburbs located outside of Wayne County like Dearborn, Ann Arbor, Troy, Hamtrack, and Windsor ON continue to have a vibrant economy, but Detroit (Wayne County) is economically dead. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot
    - dventimihasura 3y ago
      What economy would you propose for a downtown core of tall office buildings in an American city post-pandemic and post-remote-work?
- cscurmudgeon 3y ago
  https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-york-city https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-yor... > The contribution of such deterrence measures (the "stick") offers more explanation for the decline in New York City crime than the improvement in the economy, the authors conclude. Between 1990 and 1999, homicide dropped 73 percent, burglary 66 percent, assault 40 percent, robbery 67 percent, and vehicle hoists 73 percent. The authors' model manages to explain between 33 and 86 percent of those declines

brezelnbitte 3y ago

NYC was founded as and continues to be a financial capital, its where deals are done, so that strong anchor among its overall diversified economy helped. SF is somewhat similar to Detroit in that their economies are less diversified but weather and geography is a major advantage.

q1w2 3y ago

NYC came back because the mayor imposed some draconian laws - laws that would not be palatable in San Francisco.

piva00 3y ago
Or perhaps because of the finance industry boom of the 80s onwards?
- cscurmudgeon 3y ago
  Research supports the draconian narrative. > The contribution of such deterrence measures (the "stick") offers more explanation for the decline in New York City crime than the improvement in the economy, the authors conclude. https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-york-city https://www.nber.org/digest/jan03/what-reduced-crime-new-yor...

dventimihasura 3y ago

Detroit never came back to what it was, but it became something different and in many ways it's better than it was at any other time in the last 50 years.