Barrett Chase compares Rochester to Duluth and finds that the comparison is not favorable.
Whether I’d been there or not, I knew a lot about Rochester when I was a little kid, simply because I liked learning facts about cities, and knew that Rochester only slightly smaller in population than Duluth at the time. Rochester was rapidly growing. Meanwhile, Duluth was rapidly shrinking. Rochester had the Mayo Clinic and IBM. Duluth was the westernmost port on the St. Lawrence Seaway, and the gateway to the Iron Range, industries that didn’t do well in the latter 20th century.
I love Duluth. It feels like home to me because that’s exactly what it’s always been. So it’s hard to comprehend when I go someplace like Rochester, which isn’t all that far away and shouldn’t be all that different, and yet it feels like I’m on another planet.
This is followed by an eleven-point bulleted list. (I’ll wait for you to read it, and then come back here.)
I know very little about either of these cities, but Barrett’s descriptions jibe with the incredibly vague sense that I had. Is he right? Anybody from Rochester want to stand up for their city?
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[...] Barrtt Chase: Effing Roch: Comparing Rochester and Duluth: In Rochester, everything looks new and clean and everyone likes it that way. The way to improve something is to remodel it, or better yet, to tear it down and build a new one. In Duluth, everything looks old. At its best, it looks impressive and historic. At its worst, it looks seedy and decrepit. In all cases, it looks cool. Everyone likes it that way, except for developers and people who live in Hermantown, Duluth’s only suburb. (via) [...]