America’s Ten Dead Cities: From Detroit To New Orleans

Some quotes of a very sharp article by the site "24/7 Wall St" :

"A city does not die when its last resident moves away. Death happens when municipalities lose the industries and vital populations that made them important cities.
The economy has evolved so much since the middle of the 20th Century that many cities that were among the largest and most vibrant in America have collapsed. Some have lost more than half of their residents. Others have lost the businesses that made them important centers of finance, manufacturing, and commerce.
Most of America’s Ten Dead Cities were once major manufacturing hubs and others were important ports or financial services centers. The downfall of one city, New Orleans, began in the 1970s, but was accelerated by Hurricane Katrina.
[...]
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology did a study of what they described as America’s 150 forgotten cities. The municipalities on their list were medium-sized and ranked by measurements that included poverty. The reason for their demise largely match the cities on the 24/7 Wall St list. The MIT research work goes beyond a mere list of statistics and points out reasons why some of these cities will never recover. In almost every case, tax bases have disappeared, which has undermined the ability of local governments to spend money on revitalization. Abandoned areas of these cities have high crime rates, which not only keeps people from relocating to these areas but is actually an incentive for them to move away. This in turn, leads to the image of these cities as desolate urbanscapes."

The top ten of the disapearing cities is :

1. Buffalo
2. Flint
3. Hartford
4. Cleveland
5. New Orleans
6. Detroit
7. Albany
8. Atlantic City
9. Allentown
10. Galveston

The USANATOMY project is about the clinic description of some of these cities.
To be continued...

Read more: America’s Ten Dead Cities: From Detroit To New Orleans - 24/7 Wall St. http://247wallst.com/2010/08/23/americas-ten-dead-cities-from-detroit-to-new-orleans/#ixzz1Lt0R2mMp