Gritty - Bad or Interesting?

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by eixample

I don't know that the grittiness of a city has a good definition. Grit as applied to a person means determination, resolve, courage. Presumably that is derived from the "fine particles of sand" definition of grit although I don't know exactly how. When people say a city is gritty, sometimes I think they mean the city has fallen on hard times but is persevering and 'making a come back'. I feel like it is also used to as a synonym for 'grimy', i.e. dirty or dilapidated.

One thing I think of with relation to grittiness is the overlap of new and old in a city. Jane Jacobs talks about the need for old buildings mixed in with newer buildings in a city - older buildings give smaller or lower rent businesses a place to locate so a neighborhood is not all bank branches and drug stores. Older apartments also ask cheaper rents generally so you get mixed incomes, which is really important in a city for a whole host of reasons (newer apartment buildings are of course necessary to keep the supply up and rents down). Buildings of different eras that are side-by-side are also interesting architecturally as well.

Originally Posted by Handro

"Grit" is really the charm of a city. If you want clean and bucolic, go to a small village in the countryside. If you want grit--the result of thousands of people over decades or centuries working and living in a shared space, go to a city. And not all cities have true grit (as I subjectively am defining it). Some are too spacious or uncrowded or new. Grit tells a a million stories--scary, sad, funny, happy, and bittersweet. Colorful graffiti, dirty alleyways, weird smells and sooty infrastructure.

A nicely built structure with high-end cladding is nice and often welcome. But you can find those just about anywhere. Only in a real city will you find real grit. Not to be confused with "rundown", which exists in cities as much as it exists in the suburbs and the country. Rundown is underused, forgotten, ignored. Gritty is immersive, layered, battered.

I love grittiness. It's what has attracted me to cities since I was 5 years old visiting Chicago from the suburbs with my family. The mystery, the contrasts... it always fascinated me.

Those are exactly what I had in mind when I opened the thread. It’s not like an apocalyptic urban decay, but a neighbourhood with a strong identity, people with different backgrounds, rough on the edges.

Indeed, that's the whole point of a city: diversity, otherwise we'd all be living in a suburb or a dense rural area.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by eschaton

IMHO a great example of grittiness is Naples in Italy. Not a touristy city at all as far as Italy goes, and also not a blighted city, but very grimy and dense.

I've never been there, but Napoli is an wonderful example of it. It might be the best example on the entire West: a major city, 4 million inh. full of character, great architecture and history, but extremely authentic. Not ruined by mass tourism or intrusive gentrification.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by ilcapo

I do love this type of grit. It's not affecting anyones life and gives charachter to the city.

Examples:
Malmö
https://maps.app.goo.gl/2NryrmW7eJuk1Nex9
https://maps.app.goo.gl/UnQsvbqXoVphTi4N6

Copenhagen:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/3JZkFSiYsCwrWFjr6

Oslo
https://maps.app.goo.gl/eN2vyavyZTFbcgho9

For me, it should be parts of grit in dense cities that are otherwise well kept.

A full city of grit is just sad and brings stories of hopelesness, while pockets of gritty areas and building shows signs of "a real neighborhood with real people" in it.

I do not love gentrification but im attracted to areas on the verge of gentrification.

Me too. In fact, I just moved to a neighbourhood just like this. I'm not that brave to face a district on the very beginning of the recovery and moving after the gentrification, defeats the whole point of it.

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

Anyway, loved the examples brought to the thread: Cincinnatti, Scandinavian cities, Buenos Aires, Naples, Bucharest.

[isaidso]

Areas without any grit can be fabulous but all too often they're soulless, sterile, boring places with absolutely nothing interesting to look at. Most of the areas I like have a little bit of grit but there are limits, of course. A lot of places have far too much and just end up looking like ramshackle dilapidated eyesores.

A case in point is a very popular area of Toronto called Kensington. It's vibrant and interesting but looks like a shantytown in a poor country. Oddly, lots of Torontonians don't think a place can be vibrant, interesting, and beautiful at the same time because they've never experienced places like that. They then proceed to point out the countless sterile new developments to back up their claim.

Until Toronto develops vibrant interesting areas that are free of grit those perceptions will remain.

[softee]

Almost all the most interesting parts of Toronto look a bit gritty and worn out.

https://goo.gl/maps/ouxBCswMcMQu2uTg8
https://goo.gl/maps/LsUMcZ4UJybJf5wx6
https://goo.gl/maps/3KSKNxCzDJGvnu3N9
https://goo.gl/maps/7AsUkyvHY8irDy1p7
https://goo.gl/maps/xSqKTkP7wuTu2L998
https://goo.gl/maps/nFiXkLcSgXd6hxuw6
https://goo.gl/maps/B91a4KahyHNkfbRP8
https://goo.gl/maps/w3voARhiD94MfLqKA
https://goo.gl/maps/T1jYjwfvKN3oiD9y8
https://goo.gl/maps/Np65M3BJHccjPwZ89

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by isaidso

A case in point is a very popular area of Toronto called Kensington. It's vibrant and interesting but looks like a shantytown in a poor country. Oddly, lots of Torontonians don't think a place can be vibrant, interesting, and beautiful at the same time because they've never experienced places like that.

Sure we have - Yorkville sits on the exact opposite end of the same urban continuum where Kensington exists (also I'm sure you're not the only Torontonian who's travelled...). It has the same fine-grained, human-scaled built form and vibrant street life - but is clean, well-maintained, and conventionally attractive. The St. Lawrence area is another similarly polished, successful urban district.

They're fine neighbouhoods, but still less interesting than their grittier counterparts. The same is true in any city. It's precisely the singularity and sense of place that can only be achieved through a bit of grit that makes them so appealing.

[Investing In Chicago]

Originally Posted by Qubert

I think we need to distinguish physical grittiness from human grittiness. Using NYC as an example, places like SoHo, Tribeca, and even parts of the UES have physically "lived in" spaces, older buildings and street art, despite being some of the wealthiest places on the planet. Tokyo is immensely gritty in some aspects with it's overhead trains/wires, industrial centers and maze of 1980s shopping arcades, but is clearly far safer and more socially polished than any city in the western world.

IMHO, I have a strong disdain for the trend of upper middle class individuals seeking out "human grit" in the form of homelessness, open drug use, poverty or lawlessness. People come here asking for tours of Harlem or the Bronx as if it's some kind of human zoo. That to me is extremely off-putting. Poor people don't exist to make oneself look cooler/edgier or morally superior. As far as "bubbles" are concerned I doubt the people you see sprawled out on the sidewalk are any more thankful to those who step over them everyday versus those who live on the other side of town. I'd be more moved if efforts were being made to have them be not homeless?

Couldn't have said it better myself. Many act like the homeless, or the "human grit" as you put it, are a novelty.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by Investing In Chicago

Couldn't have said it better myself. Many act like the homeless, or the "human grit" as you put it, are a novelty.

Where I stand, the real problem is an opposite: obviously homelessness is a nuissance for "regular" people. On the other hand, our "nuissance" is much less of a problem than the homelessness itself.

Just last weak, the state governors' first lady said the streets were too "confortable" for homeless people.

[Minato Ku]

Grit shouldn't be alone, it should come with density and activity.
A gritty urban environment is more enjoyable than suburban grit.

Paris has always some grit. There is always a little something that is not exactly net. It's the sign of a living city.
Some graffiti, many wild posters (and homelessness is quite an issue in Paris).

Rue de Provence

Rue de la Verrerie

Rue de Lappe

Rue du Faubourg du Temple

Rue des Poissonniers

Some streets in north and northeastern inner "suburbs" have very gritty look. This can be very intimidating for some.
Not that there is nothing suburban about them, it's very urban.

Rue de Paris, Montreuil

Avenue Jean Jaures, Aubervilliers

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Sure we have - Yorkville sits on the exact opposite end of the same urban continuum where Kensington exists (also I'm sure you're not the only Torontonian who's travelled...). It has the same fine-grained, human-scaled built form and vibrant street life - but is clean, well-maintained, and conventionally attractive. The St. Lawrence area is another similarly polished, successful urban district.

They're fine neighbouhoods, but still less interesting than their grittier counterparts. The same is true in any city. It's precisely the singularity and sense of place that can only be achieved through a bit of grit that makes them so appealing.

You're sort of making my point for me. You're basing your stance on what you see in Toronto. That viewpoint amongst Torontonians will only change when the city gets a neighbourhood as interesting as any other but without grit. The contention that one needs grit to be interesting is extremely well entrenched amongst Torontonians. Convincing people otherwise is like convincing someone that a steak tastes good to someone who's never had a steak.

Personally I don't mind a little grit but grit isn't what makes a neighbourhood interesting. People scaled streets with good varied architecture, mixed uses, people, smells, noises, life on the street, art, etc. make them interesting. Yorkville and St Lawrence are nice areas but they're far too homogenous. Homogeneity is the problem not the lack of grit.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by isaidso

You're sort of making my point for me. You're basing your stance on what you see in Toronto. That viewpoint amongst Torontonians will only change when the city gets a neighbourhood as interesting as any other but without grit. The contention that one needs grit to be interesting is extremely well entrenched amongst Torontonians. Convincing people otherwise is like convincing someone that a steak tastes good to someone who's never had a steak.

Forget about Toronto - show me one city where the most interesting neighbourhood has no grit.

Here's a silly list of the world's 50 "coolest" neighbourhoods for 2019 - it's not something to take at face value, but nonetheless gives a decent indication of some of the kinds of areas that would currently be considered interesting: https://www.timeout.com/coolest-neig...s-in-the-world. I think just about every one of these is at least moderately gritty. They're interesting because they're lively, diverse, and unpretentious. You don't get liveliness, diversity, and unpretentiousness without a bit of grit. It's not that the grit makes it interesting - it's that interesting makes grit.

[LosAngelesSportsFan]

Grit is a must. Without it, most neighborhoods are rather bland and boring. As much as i like uniformity, structure and cleanliness in my personal life, i like grit and disorder in my cities

[Pedestrian]

So if this is true, why are people always dumping on San Francisco's Tenderloin, forcing me to defend it (it's got--or had pre-COVID--great dive bars, south and southeast Asian stores and restaurants, diners and dives):


https://www.google.com/search?rls=en..._bzgMRh2lHqQgM








I took 'em.

[muppet]

London's grittiest, highest crime areas are also the hippest, predictably due to artists attracted by the cheap rents (and thus the new centres of the nightlife, now priced out of the centre).

They look like crap, but are mined with interest and great for exploring:


Peckham


www.kerbfood.com

www.domusweb.it



Hackney


https://www.homesandproperty.co.uk/a...t-a104681.html


www.london.gov.uk


https://thelondoni.com



http://journal.urbantranscripts.org/...abella-rossen/



Dalston


www.cfcommercial.co.uk

www.residentadvisor.net, https://minnatakala.files.wordpress.com

https://huecryagency.com


Other areas are Shoreditch, Stroud Green and Brixton.

[pdxtex]

Gritty means full service and usable but still dingy and unkempt. Lots of Austin is gritty but has character. Shitty! That means mistreated and troublesome. I can take you to many west coast neighborhoods like that.