A good friend and ex-neighbor from Brooklyn recently visited us and fell in love with our neighborhood and our house and the whole she-bang here in Northwood in Frankford. I thought I'd post this since there has been so much discussion of Frankford and the lower NE in general lately. I asked my friend (an artist and urban pioneer for his many years in NYC) what he thought of Frankford Ave under the El and he said it seemed like basic urban grittiness, nothing out of the ordinary or horrifying. (he wandered) He loved all the Brazillian places on Castor Ave and the Weiss bakery - all refreshingly hipster-free. We went up to the Mayfair, too.

He thinks people in Phila are crazy for clotting center city and not branching out and taking over the low prices and big homes elsewhere.

There is such a difference in the real estate risks and habits of New Yorkers.
Not sure why this is.

If Philadelphians thought like New Yorkers, our city would be in better shape. Im serious.

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Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

There needs to be a push effect first New Yorkers used to clog Manhattan like it was a lifeboat too (perhaps not as much as how Phialdelphians clog CC but NY's outer neighborhoods have been in better shape). Then real estate prices became too high and people started branching out.

We're starting to see this with CC. Its just that the Philadelphia real estate market is still relatively cheap so things have progressed at a slower rate.

Thanks for your positive attitude about your neighborhood Amy and for bringing in a dose of reality about the Northeast in general. Some of the posts I see on this blog about the Northeast I truly wonder what people are talking about most of the time.

I hear about lack of leadership, the whole of the lower Northeast as a lost cause etc etc.
It seems to me that the quality of life here is very nice with many things to be proud of
In addition, the potential for more good things to start happening along Frankford Ave.

I think the Northeast has a high percentage of negadelphians that long to move to the Suburbs. I truly would rather be here. My job is in the suburbs and it would be a lot less commuting time for me to live in Montgomery Co, however we would not even consider it. It has nothing to do about affordability and everything to do about lifestyle. City living has many advantages that are often overlooked when people only focus on the negative.

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Now-a-days, men wear a fool's cap, and call it a liberty cap.
Thoreau from Slavery in Massachusetts

Well, I don't know what an "urban pioneer" is, but I agree fully with vincent59.
I've recently returned to Philly and bought a house in Tacony. I've lived in the sticks for quite a number of years and enjoyed it and when work brought me back to Philly, where I was born and raised, the suburbs were not an option. I have no desire to live in an area where people pretend to live in the country but shop at huge black topped, traffic clogged malls. Areas without sidewalks, history, culture or interesting buildings. I'm quite happy in Tacony and very much enjoy the neighborhood concept and lifestyle. Those who ran off to the suburbs, eat up all the farm land for their developments and now have a miserable drive each day on the Schuylkill, 95, or the bridges from Jersey or which ever routes they sit on, deserve every tormented minute they spend in traffic. I'm happy to be back living in my beloved city.

I agree that when you are a city person and have been all your life it is impossible to think about living in the suburbs. It's too strange.
I also agree, having quite a few friends from New York, that New Yorkers see the uniqueness of Philly and the architecture in the grittier neighborhoods.
This is one of the reasons the man who bought the Art Place on Frankford Avenue in around 1998 came here after living in New York and made a fantastic place here, if you'd never had the chance to see it while it was here, see if you can find articles in News Gleaner, Northeast Times, City Paper and Inquirer in and around that time period of 1998 through 2001/02. He not only put in a beautiful shop, he was an artist and set designer so the interior was fantastic, but he also lived in the building, held community gatherings and parties there, where he'd put in a rooftop garden with a fountain and it looked like a penthouse apartment in New York. At the time, several community parties would be held there, sometimes with 50 or 60 people attending and he was involved in every aspect of the community, bringing a following of artists from all over.
The gentleman at the Art Place held out for five years and after about the first year or two, the support and the oooohs and ahhhhs of the surrounding community fell off. He just couldn't sustain the costs any longer. That was a really sad day.
What I'd like to know, are some of these New Yorkers actually looking at houses in Frankford. Say on Sellers Street, Penn Street, Griscom, Paul, Harrison, Orthodox, Unity, Church, Adams Avenue and so on....that would be a real indication that things are getting ready to change.
Are some of them actually looking to put in businesses on Frankford Avenue, like restaurants, clothing stores, bookstores, coffee shops, bakeries, music stores, professional businesses?
When people start investing and buying homes in Frankford Proper,-which means more registered voters, which means getting real politial representation, (the redistricting of Frankford swayed parts of Frankford into the areas of Mariano, Rieger, Tartaglione - who do very little, or are facing indictments or , in the case of Rieger, are non-existent) which means a stronger tax base, which means people who will really fight to turn this area around.
Frankford does have potential and some do see it, but those that do really need to fight and turn the area around, that will make all the difference in the world! It's the one thing I don't know if some New Yorkers understand about Philadelphia and just how the power of change is so entwined in politics.

..and most of that historical district would have been razed for construction.

New York eats itself to grow...

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What are you talking about?
I'm not talking about razing historical structures. I'm talking about the way they invest in their neighborhoods.

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Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

Northwood is absolutely gorgeous, Amy, and you are always so refreashingly positive. We need that.

I have to say though your dear friend related that area under the El as basic urban grittiness. I'm sorry, Amy. I truly am, but it's a hell hole. I loved that library. I understand your children go to Frankford Friends, and that in itself shows that there's no financial obligation for you to HAVE TO LIVE in the area.

You hit that avenue you must not be where Dragonfly is. You must not be standing at Church Street waiting on a 3, and even if that was so it's a matter of time before you're a victim of a crime.

My girlfriend lived in those gorgeous apartments right across from Frankford High School. Beautiful. That was 15 years ago. Two rapes occured. She was held up at gunpoint. Then she found a man wrapped up from off the street in her laundry room in her Laura Ashley sheets. Fortunately he was nodding off.
Peaceful fellow, but frightening all the same.

I guess Vincent would call me one of the NE negatives. I love my neighborhood. I come from here. I HAD friends in Frankford, and they all headed up to Mayfair. The things I saw visiting my girlfriend on Orchard Street made me ill. Ruan, and Womrath, and drugs, and guns, and fat, ugly, creepy, social security receiving perverts having young prostitutes living in with them. I wouldn't want it. It's chaos, and mayhem.

Honestly. You, and Dragonfly are trudging on, and keeping up the fight, but urban grittiness is fine, but being pushed from the sidewalk by a pack of big mouths, and watching some young girl go in a corner, and dig out her works, and do her shot of dope in broad daylight is not where i want to live, and that is exactly why so many, many, many people left Frankford.

Yeah I'm negative when that slop is coming my way. I'm negative my cousin was third generation living on E. Hunting Park Avenue, and had a gun to his head. I'm negative his wife came home with the kids one day, and opened the door, and whoops where's the TV, and VCR? You want to sleep at night with your kids in a house where someone's come through there not once, but twice?

Now that's Juniata which is now known as Juanita. There are very nice people who have come in there, but ultimately it's crime ridden. Frankford is the same, and even with that new El stop getting off at Church or Margaret is not a place i want to be. Even more so my children.

Methinks you're not at all familiar with the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission.

http://www.nyc.gov/html/lpc/html/home/home.shtml

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Cheers,
Jayfar
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“I am indeed well aware of the history of Conventional (sic) Hall, both globally and locally, and can assure you that we are carefully exploring avenues for its future.” -- Penn President Amy Gutmann 5 days before demolition began.