In The Ghetto: Canadian Style

[matthew6]

Originally Posted by Hali87

This seems pretty... normal to me? I don't quite get what this has to do with ghettoes.

Compared to the backyards of even some of Montreal's hippest hoods (Plateau... Mile End... etc) this yard is immaculate.... Although I prefer the particular charm of the decrepit back alleys of Montreal.

[Hali87]

One of the few reasons I'm not sure I could ever feel completely at home in St John's is this strict delineation (still going strong in 2015) of "x is for lower class/poor people, y is for middle class, z is for upper class" in pretty much every societal aspect. In Halifax the lines are much more blurred, and it's kind of jarring to me when a place very bluntly puts their social stratification on display with no sense that anything will (or should) change. In Halifax the only real assumption one could make about that really "ghetto" backyard (with the muskoka chairs) is that whoever lives there is too busy to mow their lawn, or isn't really a neat freak. it could be an unemployed single mother (although in such a case one might expect some child-sized chairs) or it could be a university prof, or a naval officer, or what have you. it would never occur to anyone thet "whoever lives in that house must be so poor!"

[eternallyme]

I see a lot of US vs Canadian ghettos compared - how do European ghettos compare to Canada?

[Hali87]

Well, Europe invented the Ghetto (the word initially applied to Jewish enclaves in otherwise Catholic cities in Italy, which evolved into the WW2-era ghettoes of Warsaw etc.)

I've heard the suburbs of Paris can be pretty bleak, largely stark modernist apartment blocks, in poor repair and inhabited largely by struggling immigrants. I also know that Brussels is somewhat like Toronto in having quite a bit of ethnic/cultutal self-segregation, which may result in what could be considered, by some definitions, ghettoes (in the sense that Chinatowns etc. are more or less ghettoes in the traditional sense). I would guess that ghettoization would be more extreme in countries with numerous ethno-cultural groups coexisting but not necessarily co-operating, such as in the Balkans, and maybe the Basque territories between France and Spain. These are mostly just educated guesses though.

[Trevor3]

Here are the worst parts of Stephenville, I wouldn't call them ghettos but probably rough neighbourhoods - Burtons apartments, the Silvers area and Viking Terrace were always the worst areas of town but they have been cleaned up substantially over the past 15 years. They're tenements from the 1950s that survived somehow despite being obviously awful to look at. Some buildings were knocked down for new homes or apartments, etc...

Burton Place - still looks bad but is across the street from the nicest neighbourhood in town and a tidy townhouse development

Silvers Neighbourhood - right downtown, looks awful, used to be terrible, but is now a perfectly safe area.

Cornwall Heights - public housing.

Ohio/Montana - When I was a kid this was the kind of place you just didn't walk through at night. Since then, a lot of the buildings were bought by a company in Montreal, rents raised, renovated, and superintendents hired to actually look after them. It's rebounding nicely.

Stephenville Crossing (Down Brook area) - Former railroad town on the other side of the mountain, which I just think looks disgusting.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Unemployment, social dysfunction, mullets, smoking teenage mothers-to-be, smoking teenage mothers, scrawny prostitutes, big dogs straining at leashes held by big assholes, stupid fights, stupid arguments leading to stupid fights, etc. Essentially People-of-Walmart when they're not in a Walmart.

It's partly the fault of the vinyl siding. A struggling pre-war neighbourhood is redeemable if the brick is still intact, but once the vinyl siding goes up it's all over.

You just very accurately described the northern half of Kingston's inner city (neighbourhoods like Williamsville, McBurney Park, Kingscourt, etc.)

It's distinctive feature is the vinyl siding, which largely replaced the wood construction that the area originally had in the 19th century.

Vinyl siding homes is probably THE most prominent symbol of Kingston's lower-class urban neighbourhoods. The upper class urban neighbourhoods are all brick and stone.

[MolsonExport]

Clearing out the red-light district of Montreal back in the 1950s: http://www.citylab.com/housing/2013/...learance/7242/

Many great photos.


citylab

[Junctionist]

One of the early posts in the thread mentioned this street in Surrey, BC. The updated 2017 street view imagery is by far the most "ghetto" scene in a Canadian city I've ever seen. It looks like Detroit.

[MolsonExport]

Yep. 135A street in beautiful Whalley (Surrey), which is a few blocks away from where ai worked for years (on East Whalley Ring Rd). It is the armpit of Canada, and it is shocking to see so many drug addled people living on the street.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Junctionist

One of the early posts in the thread mentioned this street in Surrey, BC. The updated 2017 street view imagery is by far the most "ghetto" scene in a Canadian city I've ever seen. It looks like Detroit.

Seems like an odd place to go camping.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

You just very accurately described the northern half of Kingston's inner city (neighbourhoods like Williamsville, McBurney Park, Kingscourt, etc.)

It's distinctive feature is the vinyl siding, which largely replaced the wood construction that the area originally had in the 19th century.

Vinyl siding homes is probably THE most prominent symbol of Kingston's lower-class urban neighbourhoods. The upper class urban neighbourhoods are all brick and stone.

Winnipeg is the metropolis of vinyl, given that the large majority of older houses are wood (and given that older houses are still a large percentage of the total). Nothing has done more aesthetic damage to the city than the invention of vinyl. When you see how beautiful many of the frame houses were originally, it is kind of sad.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by esquire

Winnipeg's grimmest area is the North End, and Selkirk Avenue is its hub.

https://goo.gl/maps/Oi0vv
https://goo.gl/maps/zOU4o
https://goo.gl/maps/zOU4o

I followed your link then traveled down the street one block and saw this.

https://www.google.com/maps/@49.9178...7i13312!8i6656

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Junctionist

One of the early posts in the thread mentioned this street in Surrey, BC. The updated 2017 street view imagery is by far the most "ghetto" scene in a Canadian city I've ever seen. It looks like Detroit.

Really? Aside from the tent city (which admittedly is a rare sight in Canada), I think you can easily find streets like this in any city in the country. Or far worse.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Really? Aside from the tent city (which admittedly is a rare sight in Canada), I think you can easily find streets like this in any city in the country. Or far worse.

Can you find us some? I've only seen examples of this on the west coast. But if people think that's bad they should head south down the coast and visit, Seattle, Portland and SanFran.

[north 42]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Really? Aside from the tent city (which admittedly is a rare sight in Canada), I think you can easily find streets like this in any city in the country. Or far worse.

Tent cities are a rare sight in Detroit too! And yeah, that street doesn’t look ghetto to me!

[niwell]

Looks more like Portland or Los Angeles with the tent camps tbh. When a place has housing as cheap as Detroit the visible homeless population isn't actually as noticeable, although you'll certainly have large swaths of substandard housing.

[niwell]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

Can you find us some? I've only seen examples of this on the west coast. But if people think that's bad they should head south down the coast and visit, Seattle, Portland and SanFran.

I assume Acajack was referring to the built form of the street itself. If you remove the tents it's a fairly innocuous older semi-industrial area. Of course it's the tents that make it bad... and the new condos rising in the background of course.

Most "ghetto" areas in Canada don't actually look that bad in terms of built form. I particularly think of the 1960s/70s era townhouse and apartment complexes that are ubiquitous in Ontario. You can have one in Toronto that is lower-income but generally fine, and then another that is a (very relatively speaking) high crime gang area.

Thinking of these:
https://goo.gl/maps/uqzxT1dF86t
https://goo.gl/maps/5LeVGfJ36oK2
https://goo.gl/maps/nGRkFDPFLnE2
https://goo.gl/maps/32gESzVmUNr
https://goo.gl/maps/EopgU3zaiqG2


Then again even in places like Detroit the worst areas actually aren't the bombed out hellscapes.

[TorontoDrew]

This might be the most Ghetto like area in DT Toronto. Though most of it is about to be torn down for a Regent Park style makeover.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.65118...7i13312!8i6656

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

This might be the most Ghetto like area in DT Toronto. Though most of it is about to be torn down for a Regent Park style makeover.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.65118...7i13312!8i6656

Happy Canada Day!

[chrisallard5454]

The answer for why tent towns and the sheer number of homeless people living in places like Vancouver is simple.

It is warm there.