I was talking to some friends who had moved up here from Portland, and without hesitation they described Seattle as "sort-of meh." They said that they just didn't have any strong feelings because the city doesn't inspire any strong feelings, and one, in a dig at Greg Nickels, even said we got the mayor we deserve.
"Meh?" I thought. The city of my formative years, to which I (somewhat peripherally) returned based on the romantic notion that it was anything but "meh?" Green and glorious, perhaps, smart, innovative, interesting, full of opportunities, et cetera!!
But then I was driving around, in traffic, in the rain, in the neighborhoods - laurelhurst, hawthorne hills, sand point and past university village - where I spent some time as a child, and I looked around and realized that actually, it is sort-of meh.
Too many Calfornia-style condos and strip malls have been shoved into mini-neighborhoods that just don't have California-style space. Too much uppity urban new new "necessities" have replaced what used to be real. The community feels fake, the glossy sheen isn't shiny, the attitude is annoying, and the traffic is just unnecessary.
Seattle doesn't have a vision, like Portland, and it doesn't have a personality, like San Francisco. It has some cool stuff, rashly thrown together and shamefully overpriced. It has a history of being unable to get anything worthwhile done (i.e., mass transit, viaduct) and a structure and citizenry that focuses on the inane to the exclusion of all else (i.e., ban bags! legislate compost!) It's a shame really, because what Seattle does have is alot of smart people and plenty of squandered potential. But without a vision, or a personality, or even a defining goal or idea, it will just continue to descend into more and more meh.
UPDATE: Just to be clear, I always found Portland lacking in drive and condescendingly hippier-than-thou and SF is waaaay out of my price range and there is no place that I would rather be besides the Pacific Northwest. But it could be better.
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