Forbes is fascinated with Youngstown, but they’re not quite sure what to make of the place:
America’s #10 Worst City for Jobs (4/08)
America’s #3 Fastest Dying City (8/08)
America’s #1 Downsized City (3/09)
America’s #3 Cheapest Homes for Sale (9/09)
America’s #8 Place with the Fewest Newcomers (10/09)
America’s #4 Best City for Finding A Job This Winter (12/10)
America’s #14 Most Miserable City (2/11)
Honorable Mention: Best Cities for Raising a Family (4/12)
–This post comes to us via Tyler Clark, a Youngstown homeowner with a job and kids.
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No one can deny the awe-inspiring scenic beauty of Seattle, San Francisco, San Diego, or Salt Lake City. But, often overlooked are the splendid topographic and geographic settings where a number of Rust Belt cities are situated. Beautiful city settings of the Rust Belt may not get the national notoriety and ink of their western competitors, but some are equally endowed with great scenery. Here’s a list of 15 Rust Belt cities that I feel are a visual delight:

This year marks the third annual Pages & Places Book Festival in Scranton on Saturday.
The event is intimately tied to Scranton as a place, its creators say:
“Pages & Places grew out of two overlapping phenomena. On the one hand, there’s the obvious, ongoing revitalization of the city of Scranton, manifest in new construction and the rehabilitation of some of the city’s landmark architecture, in the influx of new downtown residences, and the reinvigoration of long-time and former residents who have committed to opening businesses downtown. On the other is the realization …

I love TV’s The Wire. When I heard about this self-guided, Wire-themed tour of Baltimore, I thought, “That’s the self-guided tour of Baltimore I’ve been waiting for.” But I read something a few days later that paralyzed my ambitions. Christian Lander, author of the blog and book “Stuff White People Like,” explained in an interview:

When and how did you get the idea for the site?

January 18th. A friend and I were having an IM conversation about The Wire. He said, “Not enough white people watch The Wire.” I said, “Don’t worry, they do.” We started talking about what they’re doing instead of watching The Wire : therapy, getting divorced, going to plays…

I have mixed feelings about this new reality show based on young, single women living near downtown Cincinnati.

One one hand, this type of reality TV show — sort of a “The Hills” ripoff without the drama — probably wouldn’t have even been possible in Cincinnati about a decade ago. The young protagonists live in modern condos in the revitalized Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. They hang out at craft breweries and attend fashion shows.

On the other hand, I couldn’t shake off this feeling of depression after I watched it. Gawker called it, get ready for it Cincy boosters, “a reality show about four boring single women and their boring struggle to balance their boring lives in a boring southern Ohio city.”

Community groups, neighborhoods even whole suburbs in Cleveland are helping advertise their offerings using smart phone aps. These portable guides can help you catch a film, catch the bus or grab a bite to eat when you’re on the go in the Cleve.

This is definitely a policy other communities, public agencies and businesses should be looking into to help with marketing and customer service.

Details after the jump.

Rust Wire is proud to present The Big Urban Photography Project art show, featuring photographic interpretations of Rust Belt cities as seen through the eyes of their young residents. The show is the result of a multi-year collaborative media project that called on the region’s best documentary and fine arts photographers.
Over two years, we asked for open submissions of photography highlighting the unique blend of despair and hope in a number of cities. Dozens of amateur and professional photographers submitted images of Detroit, Youngstown, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Chicago, Grand …

The Buffalo News reports The Travel Channel will feature Buffalo this summer in an hour-long show that has yet to be named.
The show’s host told the paper:
“It kind of awes me that much of the country, like myself, is in the dark as far as what Buffalo means in the evolution of the United States. Buffalo was such a profound part of this nation. If I can do a television show that has any part in teaching that, that’s terrific.”
The series features places that are off-limits …

I know this isn’t strictly Rust Belt-related, but I’m sure many readers of this site are fans of The Wire as much as I am.
So here’s a link to an excerpt of an interview creator David Simon did with The Progressive magazine. The entire piece is not available online, only in the print version of the magazine.
I think my favorite part is when Simon says:
“This show, if we do it right, is an argument for the city. For the idea of American urbanity, for the melting pot, for the idea …

Everyone should read this book, because it challenges conventional wisdom within the urbanist community. He argues powerfully that many activists’ attempts keep out evil developers just push development elsewhere or make cities more expensive. He’s critical of revitalization programs like light rail and convention centers. He’s critical of historic preservation.

One of the most novel cases made is that northern California should allow vastly more sprawl, because Californians emit very little carbon into their perpetually temperate atmosphere.