Quote:
Originally Posted by Northern Light
My first question is why?
Is there inordinate pubic housing? A lack of police enforcement? are programs or services (ie schools, parks, recreation) absent?
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I'd also like to hear from you all on whether anything can be/will be done about this; and if so what Should be done?
Thanks again for all the input; I'm finding this interesting.
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Contrary to popular opinion , the North End has always been Winnipeg's little slice of crap.
Basically the city spreads out radially from Portage and Main. The north end of the city was doing just fine until the railways put their shops in what (at the time) were the northern outskirts of the city. In the days before cars , this was a big deal and it made anything on the other side (to the north of the mainline) less attractive to potential buyers. Consequently , immigrants to Canada who decided to call Winnipeg home were more or less forced for economic reasons to build a shack in what would become the North End. They'd pack 10 or twenty people in there and voila ! ... it doesn't take long for a shack to become a hovel. Now multiply homes like this and what you've got is a brand new ghetto.
Now , with this said , the North End isn't all bad at all. Actually , most of it is pretty good and doesn't look any different from most other areas of any middle-class neighbourhood in any city. The closer you get to the mainline though...well , you'll notice the bars on the windows and the "Beware of dog armed with M16 !" signs. It's basically a vicious circle though because people with no money have to live in places that require less of it to survive.
An outsider has to understand that by "North End" Winnipeggers aren't really referring to all of it. For the most part , we're really referring to the part that runs parallel to the mainline about five or six blocks north and maybe ten or fifteen blocks west of Main St. After that it tends to be fairly smooth sailing.
As for fixing it....probably never going to happen. The public housing isn't there to attract the poor , it's there to house the ones already living in the area. The provincial government tries to spread it around the city but since that eats up otherwise valuable land (and decreases the value of any adjacent land) they concentrate it where it'll do the least damage. Nobody wants to live next to a ready-made ghetto even if it looks nice for the first few years.
If the area is ever going to rise above the level of "Stay the F*CK OUT !" it'll have to be by slowly redeveloping parcels from the suburbs to the core.
Besides , it's not all bad as I say. In fact , in many ways it's the "spiritual" heart of this city and is commonly recognized as such among Winnipeggers. It ain't all bad ....it's just that the bad apple spoils the bunch.