New York Discovers Buffalo

A friend sent me a link to an article in the New York Times by a writer extolling the virtues of newly hip Buffalo. Buffalo has long been a national joke since the big snow storm that rendered the city immobile, but now it has recovered and its HIP. Hip, that is, in the sense that it has bars that approximate the hipness of Brooklyn and neighborhood business districts that revolve around the college scene. There are new arrivals from foreign lands seeking to claim their stake in the American dream. Ziplining at abandoned grain elevators. And of course there's the Buffalo contribution to the pantheon of regional foods, Buffalo wings. Its Buffalo as a Disney amusement park.

The writer also visits a few of the tourist attractions, an overpriced hotel, a market full of said new arrivals and then proclaims the city to now be a great place to visit. The map of the writer's trip shows a rather limited geographical range that belies the fact that they missed much of the city. No BBQ joints, no Polish restaurants, no Broadway Market, no Albright Knox Gallery, no Kleinhans Music Hall. I am sure that many Buffalonians are thrilled to have been discovered by New York, and eagerly await the arrival of the invasion of hipsters seeking to find the "new" Buffalo.

Buffalo is, and has always been, a great American city. The first city lit by alternating current (thanks Tesla), a transhipment point of the fruits of the land, gritty hardworking steel and auto producer. I tend to find New Yorkers to be a tad bit condescending when they suddenly discover something that appeals to their refined tastes. Buffalo, like many industrial cities, certainly has had its share of ups and downs. The fact that it boasts an incredible wealth of architectural gems has more to do with it being bypassed by progress than by design. The city foolishly tore down some of its greatest structures to provide parking spaces, and continues to piss away its architectural heritage in the name of progress. Preservationists are confronted with municipal malfeasance on a daily basis.

There is of course the developers who rescue abandoned industrial buildings and warehouses to create loft spaces only the well healed can afford. Meanwhile whole portions of the city succumb to rot and disinvestment. You can still buy an affordable house in the city in a neighborhood that bears no resemblance to the happy places the article's author visited. Like many American cities, Buffalo is attracting people seeking the urban experience and willing to pay for it. How much the long suffering residents of established neighborhoods are benefiting from this influx is questionable.

I would have liked to see the author visit the Central Station, and ask why the fuck it hasn't been rescued and developed. I would have liked to see them visit the Fruit Belt and see how the non-collegiate full time residents live and struggle. Maybe sample some food at the Broadway Market or have a beer in a Kaisertown gin mill. Have a pierogi or a beef on weck, maybe a grilled hot dog at Ted's. Buffalo cannot be honestly judged by somebody from New York seeking hipness, and missing those things that make the city unique.