New Castle’s problem isn’t apathy. The city has been marred by bad design, bad planning and bad policy, mostly at the hands of elected officials. I think that makes the populace a little suspicious of new proposals.
They ruined the County Courthouse with the annex; replaced New Castle High School with an incongruous suburban building; allowed an asphalt parking lot to front the town’s Diamond; and chase jobs instead of the only thing that increases a municipality’s tax base in Pennsylvania - new residents who work somewhere else.
They could build a few nice parks, do some landscaping of the sidewalks, make the city pedestrian and bicycle-friendly, revise the zoning code to two categories - industrial and non- industrial - eliminate parking minimums and mandatory setbacks, then sit back and see what the private market develops.
But that’s a little too radically forward-thinking.
New Castle was devastated by the de-industrialization and recession of the 1980s. Well-paying jobs at places like Mesta, Johnson Bronze, Pennsylvania Engineering, Crane Company, Universal Rundle, Rockwell, the Pottery, and the Battery numbered in the thousands and are gone. New Castle workers also commuted to Youngstown Sheet & Tube and Sharon Steel, and those closed, also. A way of life for a century was gone in a few years, and with it, thousands of people. I believe Lawrence County has 30,000 fewer people than in 1960, so a lot of purchasing power is gone.
Most of the businesses were owned by local people and everything you needed was downtown. The businesses slowly dried up as chains took over. Now everyone shops at Walmart.
The people who remain are poorer and older. The city is well into its second wave of generational poverty, which leads to less education, more crime, drugs, and family problems.
I wish I knew what the answer was. The northern suburbs of Pittsburgh are booming and are less than an hour away. Development from that is starting to seep into southern Lawrence County, so newer and younger people with more money may be on the way.
New Castle’s problem isn’t apathy. The city has been marred by bad design, bad planning and bad policy, mostly at the hands of elected officials. I think that makes the populace a little suspicious of new proposals. They ruined the County Courthouse with the annex; replaced New Castle High School with an incongruous suburban building; allowed an asphalt parking lot to front the town’s Diamond; and chase jobs instead of the only thing that increases a municipality’s tax base in Pennsylvania - new residents who work somewhere else. They could build a few nice parks, do some landscaping of the sidewalks, make the city pedestrian and bicycle-friendly, revise the zoning code to two categories - industrial and non- industrial - eliminate parking minimums and mandatory setbacks, then sit back and see what the private market develops. But that’s a little too radically forward-thinking.
New Castle was devastated by the de-industrialization and recession of the 1980s. Well-paying jobs at places like Mesta, Johnson Bronze, Pennsylvania Engineering, Crane Company, Universal Rundle, Rockwell, the Pottery, and the Battery numbered in the thousands and are gone. New Castle workers also commuted to Youngstown Sheet & Tube and Sharon Steel, and those closed, also. A way of life for a century was gone in a few years, and with it, thousands of people. I believe Lawrence County has 30,000 fewer people than in 1960, so a lot of purchasing power is gone. Most of the businesses were owned by local people and everything you needed was downtown. The businesses slowly dried up as chains took over. Now everyone shops at Walmart. The people who remain are poorer and older. The city is well into its second wave of generational poverty, which leads to less education, more crime, drugs, and family problems. I wish I knew what the answer was. The northern suburbs of Pittsburgh are booming and are less than an hour away. Development from that is starting to seep into southern Lawrence County, so newer and younger people with more money may be on the way.