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Old Posted Aug 20, 2019, 1:12 AM
eschaton eschaton is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Buckeye Native 001 View Post
That's why I hesitate to say St. Louis is similar, but I'm not at all familiar with that city's topography, at least compared to Cincinnati and Pittsburgh.

To me, Squirrel Hill and Hyde Park are nearly identical and Clifton and Oakland share similarities as well, although I'm not sure if there's a Cincinnati equivalent to Mexican War Streets (someone else with more familiarity with the two might be able to help?)
Cincinnati and Pittsburgh have a lot of similarities in terms of the topography and the relationship of the city to the hills and rivers. There's also a lot of similarities in the built environment. Large sections of Over-The-Rhine remind me of Pittsburgh, just 1-2 stories taller, if you know what I mean.

That said, I think it kind of breaks down on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis.

Hyde Park is in some ways analogous to Squirrel Hill, in that it's an affluent "suburb in the city." However, Squirrel Hill is a far denser, more urban neighborhood (nothing like this in Hyde Park that I can see), has a much larger business district, and is much more Jewish, Asian, and left-leaning.

Similarly, Clifton and other nearby neighborhoods have a bit of an Oakland vibe, and sort of an analogous position in the city (uphill from Downtown, and a bit separated). But nothing up thataway seems to serve as a secondary CBD in the same way that Oakland does.

On the flipside, Pittsburgh has nothing exactly like Over-The-Rhine. We demolished all of our first-ring urban neighborhoods more or less (though a whole lot of second-ring neighborhoods survived). Even if those areas remained intact, Pittsburgh's 19th century density peaked at rowhouse level, meaning there really wasn't ever any great stands of 19th century tenements like Cincinnati.

Cinci doesn't have anything truly analogous to the Mexican War Streets. Cinci never really did rowhouses much like Pittsburgh, pretty much going straight from a tenement core to detached "rowhouse style" buildings set a few feet apart. Some of Mt. Adams reminds me of it a bit, insofar as it's a wealthy white historic urban enclave close to downtown, but - as is generally the case in Cinci - it's a much more conservative neighborhood than the Pittsburgh analogues.

Really, the much more conservative nature of the city of Cincinnati is one of the biggest differences between the cities, along with the different ethnic mixes (Cinci's white population is much more heavily German, while Pittsburgh's "ethnic" populaton is a mix of everything, including lots of Jews and Eastern Europeans).
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