Where Is The Rust Belt?

[The North One]

Yeah, compared to Gary which has the largest steel mill in North America once largest in the world. No thank you.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

I know "quick" is subjective and relative, but I wouldn't call it all that quick.

The train ride from the downtown Gary station into the loop on the South Shore RR takes about an hour.

While still not all that quick, with the new double tracking, times from Gary to Millennium will be more like 45 minutes in a few weeks (https://mysouthshoreline.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/SSL_032524_A_MayPoster-LR-2.pdf). Wouldn't be surprised if they continue to improve (isn't the speed limited on the ME tracks getting higher soon too?).

I'm not a big beach person, I could imagine someone being happy in a place like this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.6209367,...jWSlHxI--4Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu with a relatively easy train commute to the loop, at presumably a small fraction of the cost of Wilmette or Winnetka?

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Highland Park, historically, was an upper middle class enclave, so pretty distinct from ESL or Gary. It was more of an executive town than a laborer town.

It was fairly prosperous until about 1970 and remained not that terrible until the 1980s. It still had Chrysler World HQ and a downtown district with a traditional department store into the 1990's. But when it fell, it fell hard. It's so distressed and unable to fufill basic needs it shouldn't exist, but Detroit doesn't want it, so it's basically a ward of the state.

It seems like when upper-middle class areas become the ghetto, they fall much, much harder than when working class areas do.

I think a lot of this comes down to the costs needed to maintain (and eventually restore) the big old houses are much higher than for bungalows and the like. A neighborhood which has always been poor can sort of eke it out in terms of infrastructure, provided enough homeowners are willing to put sweat equity into maintaining their homes, but that's just not going to be feasible for someone who has a grand old house to deal with.

This is before even considering when big houses get chopped up and turned into rentals.

[edale]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Highland Park, historically, was an upper middle class enclave, so pretty distinct from ESL or Gary. It was more of an executive town than a laborer town.

It was fairly prosperous until about 1970 and remained not that terrible until the 1980s. It still had Chrysler World HQ and a downtown district with a traditional department store into the 1990's. But when it fell, it fell hard. It's so distressed and unable to fufill basic needs it shouldn't exist, but Detroit doesn't want it, so it's basically a ward of the state.

The bolded part sounds like the City of East Cleveland. It's in horrible shape and really has no ability to pull itself out of its condition, but the City of Cleveland doesn't want it. So it just languishes

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by The North One

No thank you.

And you're not alone.

Most people wouldn't want to live in Gary (for a variety of reasons).

My point in bringing up the steel mills was that Gary is not the only city affected by such things (though there are now only 7 large old school integrated steel mills still operating in the US).



Anyway, racing the livability of Flint and Gary against each other is a bit of a midget height contest, to borrow Crawford's phrase from earlier.

Most people wouldn't want to live in either of them, which is probably why they're two of the biggest population losers in the country over the past handful of decades.

[edale]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

I don't know Youngstown at all, but perhaps being ~60 miles from both Cleveland and Pittsburgh means that it's downtown is more like Flint than Gary/ESL?

Circling back to this, for all its troubles, Youngstown's downtown is several magnitudes healthier than Flint, let alone Gary or ESL.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.099456,-...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.1019567,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.0997094,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

It has a similar MSA population to Flint, and the city as a whole has suffered massive population loss. There are large swaths of the city that are reverting to urban prairies, but downtown has stayed largely healthy and in tact, largely due to the presence of Youngstown State University, which is right next to downtown. There are still several museums, performance venues, restaurants, shops, etc. in the greater downtown area.

[SIGSEGV]

this might be a strange case of a freeway loop protecting a downtown rather than strangling it...

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by edale

Circling back to this, for all its troubles, Youngstown's downtown is several magnitudes healthier than Flint, let alone Gary or ESL.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.099456,-...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.1019567,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.0997094,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

It has a similar MSA population to Flint, and the city as a whole has suffered massive population loss. There are large swaths of the city that are reverting to urban prairies, but downtown has stayed largely healthy and in tact, largely due to the presence of Youngstown State University, which is right next to downtown. There are still several museums, performance venues, restaurants, shops, etc. in the greater downtown area.

Ohio’s cities universally have nice downtowns relative to their immediate surroundings. Cleveland, Cincy, Columbus, Dayton, Canton, Youngstown, Akron, Toledo, etc.

Their small towns mostly have decent main street districts also.

This suggests to me deeper statewide policy dynamics going on rather than simply anything to do specifically with Youngstown.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Right. Highland Park had pretty lavish institutions. Grand civic buildings, a city-funded college, its own water system and the like. It was likely swimming in money pre-1970. It didn't have the typical postwar narrative of race riots, industrial ruin and all that. Wealth flight came later.

It was doing okay, but I wouldn't say it was swimming in money. There were a number of opportunities for Highland Park to have been annexed by Detroit, but the reason it never ultimately happened was likely Detroit's decision. Highland Park took on so much debt to modernize itself for the Model T factory that Detroit became concerned about being on the hook for it. By the end of the 1920s, Ford stopped production of the Model T, moved the headquarters to Dearborn, and never produced another car in Highland Park again.

The move of the Ford Motor Company from Highland Park to Dearborn was the peak for Highland Park. The city peaked in population and wealth in the 1920s. Since FMC left, I think the ball has always been in Detroit's court on whether to annex, but it never really made sense for Detroit to assume HP's legacy obligations without also inheriting a major taxpayer to cover it. Even today the main reason Detroit wouldn't annex Highland Park is because of its legacy obligations. If the regional governments chipped in on those obligations in agreement for the annexation, I'm sure Detroit would be open to it. The state legislature would probably need to create some special exemption so that the issue bypasses the voters, though.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by SIGSEGV

this might be a strange case of a freeway loop protecting a downtown rather than strangling it...

Not sure I agree. The neighborhood of Arlington is within the highway loop, and heavily black and very blighted (although quite small - only around 400 residents).

It does appear there is some micro-gentrification edging into this area though, with new student apartments only a few blocks away.

[Velvet_Highground]

I see a pattern tax haven cities are founded in the US. Unions demand better wages and union workers are concentrated in and around major manufacturing centers. First plants are insourced to smaller cities where there is little union presence and then outsourced.

A developing country will accept bribes to keep down unrest and turn its back on pollution.

The Yom Kippur War & Arab oil embargo along with clean air laws saw industries like steel hurt the most & quicker. However the automotive industry cut corners like chopping off cylinders hence bad performance & poor quality with other corners cut. This was while developing new engines that complied with new regulations and fuel economy demands.

All of this came to a head during the 80’s when corporations along with the roll back of regulations dating back to the Great Depression were rolled back realized junk bonds can be used to finance hostile takeovers. Las Vegas casino industry financing using junk bonds in the 70’s worked and British financial creativity during the fall of Empire were merged.

Companies that didn’t get with the program that more money could be made on the stock market were taken over hostility. Assists like domestic production that didn’t make profit were stripped and sold even if research and development were expensive but needed.

Boeing is the perfect example of this model of capitalism McDonald - Douglass (a company not known for safety) vs the company known for safety won the board room merger war. They move their HQ to Chicago to be about as far away from engineers and their complaints about safety in a major aviation hub & financial center. They moved production to South Carolina where there are no unions also few regulations. They used contractors not employees who are paid less and less skilled. The Max series is the culmination of this style of production at home.

Over seas the search is on for the next country that will pay its workers little enough that a quality product at least for its built in life time can be built. Until the war in Ukraine and oh S**t we might need to build our own things at least to deter a great power war.

We have a generation of kids who had civics & history cut journeyman schools are a thing of the past except for HVAC which tend to be a good business if you know the right people otherwise a bit scammy.

We as in the American ruling class aka the top 1% don’t want to build things in America. We are the most resource rich & a reasonably well educated for a first world country. Resource poor Germany, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan all do it with benefits for workers because they have longer memories and hostile neighbors. It’s the US Navy that’s kept world trade humming.

US Navy secretary says he was 'floored' by a Pacific ally's shipbuilding abilities amid American warship production woes

https://www.businessinsider.com/us-navy-...lly-south-koreas-shipbuilding-2024-4?amp

You know it’s bad when the US outsourcing shipbuilding to Japan and South Korea which is its vital workhorse for its weird sorta neo-colonialism. I’ll use the term Western sphere of influence because we have principles we just don’t adhere to them all the time, hypocrisy yes. Though I’m writing this and the FSB isn’t kicking down my door.

We have a lot of problems and they center around how we abandoned an entire area of the country we call the rust belt now. Why does someone who’s from a second generation of no hope care about lofty standards and promises it’s Trump B***h!!! Not just white though he does draw heavily from what we would formerly call ethnic whites who never moved up in the 80’s. Micks, Polocks, Italians never fully got in on the full middle class deal before it broke down. I’m not pointing to one group, but people are easy to bait with all these rich foreigners (America draws the best and brightest legally) and illegals competing for the same crappy jobs but lowering the wages because they have no choice. Poor southerners have the same issue, re; the way the south industrialized that Boeing Plant is an answer.

I am Colin Arthur Love for a reason my mom was a Polok and my grandpa was a name I can’t say here. My parents thought about naming me, I’m of Polish, Jewish Ukrainian, Irish & Swedish heritage it gives me a leg up in society to sound as Anglo Saxon as possible. Though that last name Love was a mistranslation when we came into Galveston. I believe it was the last name was Zurav’lov they took the ‘lov off the end and said here you go Mr Love.

Tribalism is also there but racism isn’t a white only problem in a white majority country it is but it’s more nuanced than white vs black or brown or Armenian or Korean or whatever. We all have a lot more in common than “opinion” “news” wants us to believe. Classic imperial strategy divide and conquer.

*I believe that we have the best system the (capitalist republic) the world has seen and I’d like to see it survive and thrive. I get upset when I see cities like Youngstown, Flint, HP, Gary & East STL in the shape there in because it was a choice as much as circumstance. The 60’s & 70’s were rough but many cities saw a revival mainly new or and or coastal cities along with financial hubs (NYC & Chicago) begin in the 80’s despite crack hitting the streets. Monogenetic cities like an old suburb or the city before it regions were abandoned and still are. Appalachia isn’t coming back any time soon the Mississippi Delta isn’t doing too well either.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Velvet_Highground

I see a pattern tax haven cities are founded in the US. Unions demand better wages and union workers are concentrated in and around major manufacturing centers. First plants are insourced to smaller cities where there is little union presence and then outsourced.

In the case of Gary, one of the nation's ultimate examples of a "factory city", neither insourcing nor outsourcing were factors.

It was all about industrial automation.

Gary Works employed 30,000 men with solid union jobs back in 1970.

Today, it's still the largest integrated steel works in North America, churning out millions of tons of primary steel every year, but it now only employs ~3,000 people.


Overheard in a US Steel boardroom back in the '70s (in an evil Monty Burns voice):

"Gentlemen, since the beginning of time, we have yearned to destroy the labor unions. Now, I will do the next best thing and thin their herd by 90% over the coming decades by replacing most of them with machines.

Machines never ask for more TAR-TAR sauce.......

MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

[Velvet_Highground]

Lmao, that made my day! Though unions would do whatever you want in the 70’s for a backhander.

I wish I could remember the professor’s name I studied urban and state politics under, University of Michigan, an advisor to Kennedy on urban affairs & one time Washtenaw County Commissioner. The guy was in his 70’s and still sharp as a tack. Anyways he recommended for my end of term project reading Thomas J. Sugrue’s “The Origin’s of the Urban Crisis” Race and inequality in postwar Detroit.

The move towards automation was at least at Ford to cut down on the number of union members as well as opening the Lima plant where union presence was weak. Though it was unrest in Flint which had just taken a hit by an F-5 tornado that spooked the industry. 1953 was the year increased automation was rolled out so it may have been in the works already. This is my own extrapolation though Monty Burns cutting his chops in a disaster torn Flint in 53 is too good of a mental image to pass up.

The book argues that the unintended consequences of introducing automation the way it was done getting rid of the most physically demanding jobs fell hardest on blacks and poor whites competing for the same jobs. The changing economy after the recession of 58 saw many of the smaller independent companies die or bought up. Which hurt East STL the most arguably but enough damage was done to ring warning bells at Wayne State that a labor crisis was coming that the city couldn’t support with just the big 4.

We’re talking McCarthy era so union unrest was a bunch of pinko’s anyway so all was right and proper.

Gary and Flint were pure manufacturing cities though by design Flint weathered the storm better as its downtown was next to the cultural center and rich neighborhoods only separated by 475. Gary’s downtown was separated from Lake Michigan by one of the largest industrial works in the nation railroads, rail yards & a freeway.

Highland Park died when Chrysler moved its HQ in the 90’s to Auburn Hills the loss of manufacturing jobs over the years was bad but the loss of one of the largest companies in the country with its R&D killed the city as a functional entity. There are former executive neighborhoods in the south & salvageable downtown notables. If Detroit had the resources to annex it then the city could be turned around in a 10-15 years, it has the potential to make it on its own but it requires some kind of Detroit/regional intervention.

Unlike Youngstown & Flint to a lesser extent the cultural amenities in Highland Park couldn’t survive as a 3sq mile city & East STL while a never built up the cultural amenities that the early and lasting wealth the Youngstown area resources had despite it never being a major corporate hub.

Imo, US deindustrialization is above my pay grade though intensely studied interest.

[Tom In Chicago]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Overheard in a US Steel boardroom back in the '70s (in an evil Monty Burns voice):

"Gentlemen, since the beginning of time, we have yearned to destroy the labor unions. Now, I will do the next best thing and thin their herd by 90% over the coming decades by replacing most of them with machines.

Machines never ask for more TAR-TAR sauce.......

MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Well to be fair to your reference, Burns conceded. . .

. . .

[The North One]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Most people wouldn't want to live in either of them, which is probably why they're two of the biggest population losers in the country over the past handful of decades.

Yeah I know. The point is at least normal life is possible in Flint. I'd have gyms, bars, restaurants and a farmers market to go to, I could have a decent job, the air is breathable. I could have a nice home in a functional neighborhood. For a small-ish rustbelt city, it's a typical place. Preferring a total wasteland like Gary because there's a 2 hour train commute to the Loop in a day is absurd. I mean go ahead and knock yourself out though.

[The North One]

Originally Posted by edale

Circling back to this, for all its troubles, Youngstown's downtown is several magnitudes healthier than Flint, let alone Gary or ESL.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.099456,-...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.1019567,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.0997094,...!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu

I don't see how this is "several magnitudes healthier". They've got more taller pre-war buildings at that one intersection and it's a bit larger overall but it's basically a similar main street downtown. Don't see a huge functional difference.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by The North One

Yeah I know. The point is at least normal life is possible in Flint. I'd have gyms, bars, restaurants and a farmers market to go to, I could have a decent job, the air is breathable. I could have a nice home in a functional neighborhood. For a small-ish rustbelt city, it's a typical place. Preferring a total wasteland like Gary because there's a 2 hour train commute to the Loop in a day is absurd. I mean go ahead and knock yourself out though.

It's only 40 minutes / 30 miles to the Loop by interstate, a little bit closer than I thought. You'd be living a totally car-oriented life in either city so having more things within driving distance would become the overriding factor. And some people just can't do small towns. Any shitty exurb wasteland > small town.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

In the case of Gary, one of the nation's ultimate examples of a "factory city", neither insourcing nor outsourcing were factors.

It was all about industrial automation.

Gary Works employed 30,000 men with solid union jobs back in 1970.

Today, it's still the largest integrated steel works in North America, churning out millions of tons of primary steel every year, but it now only employs ~3,000 people.


Overheard in a US Steel boardroom back in the '70s (in an evil Monty Burns voice):

"Gentlemen, since the beginning of time, we have yearned to destroy the labor unions. Now, I will do the next best thing and thin their herd by 90% over the coming decades by replacing most of them with machines.

Machines never ask for more TAR-TAR sauce.......

MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Exactly. That huge steel mill and its ~3,000 good-paying jobs could support a town without problems and make it a very wealthy place, if that town has the correct size -- which Gary does not, it is still (mostly) sized for when that plant employed 30k people. That's the problem.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Velvet_Highground

Gary and Flint were pure manufacturing cities though by design Flint weathered the storm better as its downtown was next to the cultural center and rich neighborhoods only separated by 475. Gary’s downtown was separated from Lake Michigan by one of the largest industrial works in the nation railroads, rail yards & a freeway.

Gary was more of a pure "factory city" than Flint.

Flint has a 19th century pedigree, and was set up as a county seat back in 1855. By 1900 it already had a population of 13,000. So there was a slower, more normal, more organic trajectory of its founding, incorporation, and eventual growth into a midsize city that spanned many decades

Gary, on the other hand, didn't exist as a thing until US Steel decided that it wanted to plant a flag in the Midwest. At the dawn of the 20th century, the nation's largest steel maker noticed that some of its main competitors were taking advantage of the bottom of lake Michigan, a well triangulated location between lake Superior iron ore, Michigan limestone, and southern Illinois coal. Not wanting to miss out, they launched an ambitious plan to buy a giant tract of wilderness sand dunes at the very bottom of lake Michigan, roughly 25 miles out from Chicago, and build the largest steel mill the world had ever seen.

The first part of the mill opened in 1906, but there was no pre-existing town or village there upon which to build the city that would be needed to house the tens of thousands of eventual steel workers and their families, so US steel built a city, entirely from scratch, adjacent to the mill. And it EXPLODED into existence in a flash, going from a population of zero in 1905 to 17,000 by 1910, 55,000 by 1920, and 100,000 by 1930, with ALL of that growth built upon the giant steel mill growing right alongside it.

The steel mill was the city, and the city was the steel mill. That was the start and end of it.

Gary was never a county seat, it never had any foundations as a small town where civic institutions were gradually built up over time. It was just BOOM! wilderness to a city of 100K in only 25 years!

I'm of the opinion that the speed with which Gary came into this world also played a role in how quickly its downtown fell apart. It was easier to throw it away compared to a city like Flint, with deeper roots, and at least a county seat to anchor it.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

Gary was more of a pure "factory city" than Flint.

Flint has a 19th century pedigree, and was set up as a county seat back in 1855. By 1900 it already had a population of 13,000. So there was a slower, more normal, more organic trajectory of its founding, incorporation, and eventually growth into a midsize city that spanned many decades

Gary, on the other hand, didn't exist as a thing until US Steel decided that it wanted to plant a flag in the Midwest. At the dawn of the 20th century, the nation's largest steel maker noticed that some of its main competitors were taking advantage of the bottom of lake Michigan, a well triangulated location between lake Superior iron ore, Michigan limestone, and southern Illinois coal. Not wanting to miss out, they launched an ambitious plan to buy a giant tract of wilderness sand dunes at the very bottom of lake Michigan, roughly 25 miles out from Chicago, and build the largest steel mill the world had ever seen.

The first part of the mill opened in 1906, but there was no pre-existing town or village there upon which to build the city that would be needed to house the tens of thousands of eventual steel workers and their families, so US steel built a city, entirely from scratch, adjacent to the mill. And it EXPLODED into existence in a flash, going from a population of zero in 1905 to 17,000 by 1910, 55,000 by 1920, and 100,000 by 1930, with ALL of that growth built upon the giant steel mill growing right alongside it.

The steel mill was the city, and the city was the steel mill. That was the start and end of it.

Gary was never a county seat, it never had any foundations as a small town where civic institutions were gradually built up over time. It was just BOOM! wilderness to a city of 100K in only 25 years!

I'm of the opinion that the speed with which Gary came into this world also played a role in how quickly its downtown fell apart. It was easier to throw it away compared to a city like Flint, with deeper roots, and at least a county seat to anchor it.

I kinda knew most of this (but not with that level of detail), it's really fascinating!