Outside Erie

Sure, Erie cannot compare with Pittsburgh in terms of scale.
But a story today in the Cleveland Pain Dealer explores why Pittsburgh is seemingly more ready to weather the recession than other cities in the Rust Belt.
The keys, according to the story:

Regionalize
Develop and use the waterfront
Develop educational leadership
Cooperate (by this, the piece means that corporations and […]

One of the clear goals of this site is to help give more opportunities to those who want to live in Erie.
On a broader scale, that is also one of the goals of a regional group called the Great Lakes Urban Exchange, or GLUE.
The effort is backed by foundation money, writes the Pittsburgh Post Gazette:
Ms. […]

This week’s top comment comes from John Morris of Pittsburgh, who discusses the parallels between the issues plaguing the development of his city’s downtown and Erie’s downtown:
Pure logic and aerial views support the idea that there should be a much broader definition of what Erie’s downtown is.
This is core problem that has never been grasped […]

Erie will be well represented at this weekend’s PodCamp Pittsburgh — an event aimed at helping folks learn more about social media.
Erie native Douglas Derda — the author of the bubbly beer blog Should I Drink That? — is one of the speakers. And he invites his Erie brethren to make the trip down I-79 […]

The New York Times had a neat piece recently on the fact that Pittsburgh’s death rate exceeds its birth rate.
“What demographers call a natural decrease has been occurring for years in tiny rural towns and in some retirement meccas in the South,” the Times writes. “But the phenomenon is relatively new in metropolitan areas in […]

This has nothing to do with the debate going on here, but I have a reading assignment for you.
If you have a few minutes go read Ashley Weber’s Green Apple post today.
It will be worth the couple of minutes out of your day.

In case you haven’t yet seen it, I’d like to point out Sunday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette story on Erie in advance of the April 22 primary.
Writer Mackenzie Carpenter does a great job of providing context and painting a three-dimensional picture of the community. After some of the drive-by attempts at profiling the community by other media […]

The groundswell of discussion concerning the future of Great Lakes cities such as Erie is rising pretty rapidly.
We’ve written in the past that there is a gathering of Rust Belt/Great Lakes bloggers planned in Erie in July to talk about ways to use our blogs to promote growth and change in our region.
But there is […]

I heard the news on the radio this morning about the passing of former Pittsburgh Steelers announcer Myron Cope.
Cope was best known by Steelers followers and sports fans for his distinctive voice and for inventing the Terrible Towel.
But he also had strong ties to Erie — working as a sportswriter for the old Daily Times.
I’m […]

Jim Russell over at Burgh Diaspora has been spending a lot of time lately asking some important questions about the potential value of setting up formal partnerships between Rust Belt communities that would help further economic growth throughout the region.
Like we have here at GlobalErie, Russell has long seen value in tapping into expatriates who […]