The Observation Deck

See this link for some interesting info regarding population movements.

http://www.unitedvanlines.com/mover/uni ... -01-06.htm

Perhaps the problems we see as Ohio's problems are really Northeast Ohio's problems.

What does Northeast Ohio have in common with the leader in out migration: Michigan?

What does Northeast Ohio have in common with the leader in out migration: Michigan?

you mean, besides a lot of Lake shoreline?....

I'd vote for a decaying core city (Detroit/Cleveland) with a school system that is perceived to be non-functional.

Jeff

All of Michigan is not Detroit, though the Cleveland-Detroit analogy is probably pretty accurate.
Think about the shift in economy and demographics. How many people who earned a living in the heavy industrial regions on the Great Lakes retired and headed to the sun belt in the past 20 years? 10 years? 5 years?
They will do that.
More disturbing is the failure to adapt to the economic shifts. Other cities are adapting. Education, labor pool, and infrastructure are key. All are at-risk in Northeast Ohio, but it is sort of like Dicken's "Christmas Carroll". The future does not necessarily have to be like that.
It will take more than the choice of a single person to change the course of the region. It will take hundreds of thousands, or maybe millions of choices.

One region that should be lauded for their ability to adapt to change is the Virginia/Carolina region.

Think about it. In the span of 10-20 years three of their major industries were decimated by either decline in demand or the off-shoring of manufacturing. This region's backbone was cigarettes, textiles and furniture manufacturing.

Tobacco Road was hit hard by the anti-smoking crusades and legislation. The textile and furniture manufacturing industries have nearly been driven extinct by global outsourcing.

Nonetheless, the Virginia/Carolinas have persevered (no doubt aided by some pretty good climate). They took a regional view of planning. They developed the Technology Triangle, boosted their tourism investment and leveraged their universities. They built upon the aging of the baby boomer population to drive retirement home investment. Said another way, they took hold of their future.

They did not wait until the aforementioned industies dried up. They sought and created change in the midst of the turmoil.

My biggest disappointment in the Rust Belt region is all the people that still say today they didn't see it coming. My golly, it has been coming since Youngstown went belly up in the mid-70's.

Jay, it's been almost 30 years. I guess some people still didn't get the memo?

Doug

"On Monday, September 19, 1977, Jennings R. Lambeth, president of Youngstown Sheet & Tube, announced that a large portion of its Youngstown operations was shutting down."

http://www.libraryvisit.org/localfaq.htm

There are some bright spots for the Cleveland area. We have some good universities and colleges. CSU has a very good engineering program in particular, CIA has a national if not world-wide reputation, CWRU has been troubled lately, but is still a sound institution. This list could get quite long.

There are some good companies that operate out of Cleveland, though the plundering of TRW was pretty disturbing. Honda just chose to build their next plant in Indiana not because there is something better there but because they did not want to over-load their local supplier base. It's a shame they could not have looked North from Columbus rather than West.

We have good transportation infrastructure, though lowering lake levels may threaten some of that. Companies also look at the labor pool when they evaluate a town. The mess that the Cleveland city school system has become over the past 18 years is flat embarrassing.