Our friends at Great Lakes Urban Echange (GLUE) alerted me to this event: a film screening Tuesday, (Nov. 24) at 7:30 pm at the Drexel Theater, located at 2254 E. Main Street, in Bexley, Ohio.
The film is The New Metropolis, about America’s first suburbs and the problems they face. For a more detailed explaination of the film, click the link to the movie’s web site (above), or read a more detailed explanation from Cincinnati CityBeat.
The film will be followed by a panel discussion. The screening is being hosted by Greater …

Carol Coletta has an awesome post up at GOOD. I’ve been skeptical of the concept of ‘regionalism’ for quite a while. For all the hype, all I’ve seen around me in Cleveland is suburban development at the expensive of the central city, Coletta provides some much needed clarity

Regionalism can be relatively easy to impose in regions with big, dominant core cities, such as New York and Chicago. In those regions, everyone knows what’s powering the economic engine, and no one can risk killing it off. The dominant city is favored, as it should be, in regional decisions because it’s in everyone’s clear interest to do so…

But in those regions with cities of equal size

It’s always terrible to hear about people losing their jobs — but it seems even worse in a bad recession and in a place like McKeesport, Pennsylvania.
Earlier this week, a call center that employed 600 – and had received considerable tax abatements from local governments – announced it would be shutting down.
You can read the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s coverage, or the excellent post by McKeesport blogger Jason Togyer.
I think some (like Togyer) would say this situation shows the folly of expecting low-wage, easily outsourceable service jobs to replace the manufacturing jobs …

Ohio voters recently passed a constitutional amendment that will allow for the construction of four casinos in the state for the first time.

One will be located in each Toledo, Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati.
Ohio voters have turned down ballot initiatives like this one before. But it seems this time the need for jobs and the pervasiveness of casino gambling in neighbor states helped sway the electorate.
Anyway, there’s been a lot of debate over whether this will ultimately be good or bad. I thought it would be interesting to hear from other …

The Chicago Council on Global Affairs and the Global Midwest Initiative have launched an new blog to talk about the future of our region.
These folks should be familiar to you if you heard Richard Longworth speak at the Great Lakes Urban Exchange conference earlier this year or have read his book Caught in the Middle: America’s Heartland in the Age of Globalism.
Welcome to the conversation!
-KG
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Rust Wire was able to spend a few minutes recently chatting with Brian O’Neill, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist and, author of the new book “The Paris of Appalachia: Pittsburgh in the Twenty-first Century.”
I liked that the book details all of what O’Neill loves about Pittsburgh, but has a very realistic assessment of the city’s problems.
For a more detailed review, read what the Pittsburgh City Paper had to say here.
Rust Wire: “What’s right and what’s wrong about Pittsburgh?”

Brian O’Neill: “I would say that’s what right about it is – as I …

I enjoyed reading this op-ed in the Youngstown Vindicator, written by a newcomer to the community.
She points out that negative attitudes by Youngstowners toward their city have been surprising to her.
“[F]orgive me if this suggestion to the natives is way off base, but when somebody tells you they just moved to Youngstown it probably isn’t helping the town’s image to blurt out, ‘Why?’”
How much do negative attitudes impact your city?
Do they prevent positive change from taking place or are people just being realistic and pragmatic after years of problems?
-KG
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Braddock Mayor John Fetterman has been named to The Atlantic’s list of “Brave Thinkers.”
Fetterman and his efforts to revitalize Braddock, attract artists and businesses, and advocate for forgotten places like Braddock, have gained national media attention.
Sadly, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center announced last week it will close UPMC Braddock, the community’s hospital. It’s another blow to a community that has suffered greatly, just as there were some positive things happening.
Thanks to Rust Wire reader Alex Parker for bringing the Atlantic cover story to our attention.
-KG
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What can Las Vegas learn from the Rust Belt? Quite a bit, according to this article in the Las Vegas Sun.
Not to toot our own horn, but this story references Rust Wire, and our own Angie Schmitt!
I thought this story was well-written, and made an interesting comparison: though many wouldn’t think of it this way, Las Vegas and Detroit are both one-industry towns – Vegas’ industry of course, being tourism.
The author definitely did his homework- and talked to a number of knowledgeable folks in Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Boston and elsewhere.
I …

I spent a great Sunday afternoon exploring what is surely one of Pittsburgh’s coolest neighborhoods – the South Side Slopes.
I was there as part of the StepTrek, an annual event that celebrates the neighborhood and raises funds for improvements and projects.
For those unfamiliar with the topography, Pittsburgh is a hilly city with numerous sets of steps (which are actual legal streets) -documented in this book.
The annual StepTrek gives participants maps and suggests they walk along one of several courses- seeing Realtor open houses, neighborhood churches, memorials, parks, an art studio, …