"A Transplant's View of Buffalo"
Some of you know me by now - and my particularly strong views on Buffalo development. But there was a time when I wasn't a resident, just a visitor from Los Angeles flying in for some girl that I couldn't get off my mind. Often times, we speak of how Buffalonians are their own worst enemy. That we fail to see what others see in our city. So I figured I would try to remember back when I first saw Buffalo, and my initial reactions to those visits:
May 2005: On Tour with a Rock Band
I have been sleeping for most of the day, as our show last night in NYC turned out to be a late night affair of China Town and a New Jersey hotel room. I am lying down in a bunk in a huge conversion van that has been my home for the last 4 weeks and the next 4 after that. I am awoken by some talking, and find myself in a downtown area..."so this is Buffalo," I say to myself. "Huh."
After loading in and sound-checking, I walk down the block to Chippewa Street where I find that Happy Hour is a time tested tradition in Buffalo. I walk to Starbucks on the corner and get a frappacino. A Bruce Springsteen cover band is blaring from some place called McMonkeez. Cheesy looking place, but I like the boss so I stop by the street for a listen. All in all for never having seen the downtown of Buffalo before, I am fairly impressed with the amount of people out on the street.
September 2005: On a different tour with the same rock band, playing at the same club.
I am in a foul mood today. Not only am did I stay up partying late last night in Poughkeepsie (who parties all night in Poughkeepsie) but my alma mater lost a very bad football game today. I take my college football very seriously. I am in no mood for partying of any sort and determine that I need to play a slightly better than normal show to get my mind off things.
We play our show and drive to our hotel in Amherst. We get lost but eventually find ourselves on Main Street driving through the University District, which seems to look like your typical strip of run-down college pubs and bars. Looks fairly typical to me, but as I glance to the right, I see the clock tower at University at Buffalo and say, "well that's a pretty campus." (College campuses are my weak spot and guilty pleasure. I met some girl tonight who sort of took my breath away, but she's in Buffalo and I'm in L.A.
I finally have my first "Buffalo" Buffalo wing the next day at Duff's. It tastes like every other wing I've had in my life.
October 2005: Visit 1
After performing in Rochester a few weeks earlier and talking to the aforementioned girl, I have come for a weeklong visit. This is my first real foray into Buffalo. She lives on LaSalle Avenue by the University.
After driving to and from Washington D.C. for a radio show, we arrive back and she takes me on a tour of UB's North campus. I comment that it is cozy but too many modern brick buildings. She takes me to a restaurant on Niagara Falls Blvd. with decent food but I look at this street named for one of the wonders of the world, and can't help but shake my head that it is dominated by suburban shopping malls and Wal-Mart's.
She takes me downtown for a night of dancing.
Chippewa Street reminds me of Rush Street in Chicago. Traffic everywhere, people everywhere. Cops everywhere. It's pretty exciting and is a pretty damn active nightlife district. On the way home, she drives down Delaware Avenue, where I can't help but be overwhelmed by the beauty of lit-up mansions that seem too perfect to be real.
November 2005: Visit 2
I visit again after being home for Thanksgiving. I see Elmwood Avenue for the first time. It reminds me of Lincoln Park in Chicago a little bit. We do some window shopping and some real shopping. We stroll through Delaware Park, which amazes me. It's the first time I am harassed by a homeless man for money. We keep walking and have a great dinner at a particularly fancy place on the avenue.
I go downtown again, and continue to have fun down there. She parks east of Main Street, and crossing it, I realize that Main Street doesn't look like a Main Street Should. Later on that night, we go to Pearl Street, which I love, but I am a bit confused by the action of Chippewa and the graffiti ridden boarded up windows around Pearl Street.
January 2006: Los Angeles
She convinces me that since she is in school I should move to Buffalo rather than her moving to L.A. After all, I can do what I do from anywhere and she has a Masters Degree that she is starting.
For the first time ever, it hits me, I am going to live in Buffalo. Buffalo? Jesus Christ.
May 2006: Move to Buffalo.
I see potential everywhere, but that is all. Potential. Unused potential. I see gorgeous architecture, a lakefront, and a group of people dedicated to their city. I see a vitality on Elmwood Avenue that is infectious, and a Bohemian lifestyle on Allen Street that I enjoy. I am confused as to why this one avenue has all the shops and where all the other action is.
I am in love with the Elmwood Village which is my new home, and like going downtown, because I like downtowns. I am amazed by some of the meals I have eaten and love walking down Delaware Avenue to the park. I wonder why I heard some guy downtown call the city "Barfalo?"
September 2006:
After the first few months I have my good days and bad. Some days I am frustrated by the poverty and the 11 O'Clock News and people asking me for money in front of places with Now Hiring signs. Other days I stop in the funky stores or have a great meal. But when I truly feel at peace is at Sunset either by the Erie Basin Marina or at Hoyt Lake in Delaware Park. The park is so gorgeous.... if it wasn't for that stupid highway bisecting it!
That above account is what one person (with no ties to the city) thought of Buffalo over the course of one year. I would say it is significantly more positive than many Buffalonians, and probably on par with what most promoters of the city think.
Over time, of course, I have grown to care deeply about the city and its future. The same things frustrate me, but now I have the vested interest to make things right in this city....or at least, more realistically, to try to do my part.
The politics of this city have grown to frustrate me far more than the homeless guy on the corner asking for money. The broken promises bother me more than the "bleed it leads" stories on the 11 O'Clock news.
But I still love the same things.
If I was to wax poetic on one thing, it would be this point:
Buffalo, this city belongs to us. We can demand the changes to make this a progressive and prosperous city. We can elect the people who share our vision. We can do it, but there has to be the will. Once there is the will, there will be the way.
I think that is a fair account of what many people think when they visit Buffalo, but it always is determined by who shows you around. There are many people who visit "Buffalo" and never see anything in the city proper. They get taken our for dinner at Applebees or some other place on the Boulevard. It would drive me crazy to see all the students @ UB who never once experienced the city and because of that all their family and friends who visit never experienced the city.
Local knowledge about the best things in Buffalo is critical to obtaining a great impression of Buffalo. Some many natives are VERY uninformed.
Great post!
Connect UB North to the Metro Rail, for God's sake! Instant foot traffic for retail, restaurants, etc.........DUH!
Great Post! You're a genius Transplant!
Wow, what an uplifitng article! Thanks for making my day!
Nice that you followed your heart... hope the girl was worth the trouble.
Merry Christmas!
I agree completely. I came to Buffalo in 1994 as a transplant myself, to join the faculty at UB, and quickly fell in love with the city. (See
this ARTVOICE article of mine from 2000 for all about why.) It seems that transplants often appreciate what's here more than those who grew up locally and are overwhelmed by how much has been lost over the decades. I became so attached to Buffalo that I chose to stay even after I quit my job at UB.
As sbrof said, it all depends on who shows you around. It used to drive me crazy when faculty candidates visiting UB would be shown nothing but Amherst and the North Campus during their interview visits. Once colleagues learned that I enjoyed spending a few hours showing candidates around the city itself and sharing what I'd learned about it, I started getting asked to do many more of the tours (and we snagged quite a few of those candidates)...
I agree wholeheartedly. I know that when I move back to Buffalo in the Spring I'll get frustrated by the negativity and apathy of many of the locals when Buffalo could definitely be turned around and once again become one of the great cities of the world. When I go back I want to make positive changes there somehow. I feel that just by going back I'm doing something to contribute, and while I'm there maybe I'll stumble into some way to help the cause.
Great story to share... maybe it will wake some people up. SO many people born and raised here are so busy talking how buffalo is rotting away, they do not even realize how much is going on. The politics well its a disaster.. people need to realize there are investors ignoring whats going on with our politicians and investing anyway because they see the potential here and are finally acting on it.. Thats the only way we will get buffalo back on track. Start small lets do it ourselves! Thanks for sharing your experience.. you in your first trips realized more about this great city than mst that live here know or ever take advantage of.
Thank YOU Transplant for the inspiring words of comfort and hope this holiday season. Years ago, as a toddler in the Town of Tonawanda, I would often be taken by my mother to go check on my older sister who was modeling in a restaurant on the top floor of Hengerer's downtown (on Main St), where there was also a radio show broadcast each morning. I think it was WBEN. We would get off at Sheldon Square (gone) and go to Woolworth's for breakfast, visit Norban's, Grant's, AM&A's, to name a few, but it was always bustling and exciting from Swan to Ferry Sts. My first memorable imagines were the details of the buildings. We'd play sort of an 'I Spy' game as we walked along. We'd always end the morning with a visit to St. Michael's Church on Washington St. I watched helplessly growing up as those who thought they knew better, obliterated historical landmarks, that the likes of, could never be seen again. I love hearing again and again, the stories of those who have been bitten by the bug of this glorious city's charm. I moved down to Bryant St. at 17 and had my first job at Delaware and Allen. It was so cool in 1971, to make what I thought was a pretty good buck and make friends have a good time in Allentown. Of course, a good girl like me didn't go near Chippewa. It was the red light district. LOL This city gives back with the lifelong memories of friends you make and the warm environment that is the springboard to those connections.
Spread the word to those you know. Invite them to be guests, tell them to bring their ideas and their money. For here lies a virtual new frontier all over again! If our ancestors could fight the elements and the Indians what are a few crumby nay sayers?! Right? We've begun a legacy of our own so those who go down the streets a hundred years from now say to themselves just how thankful they are for those who took their que from the founders of this city and built upon their tenacious work with some of their own. We have to keep in focus the good aspects and ignore and SHAME anyone who does not think it can be done. IT CAN BE DONE! God willing, I'll live another twenty years to see it.
Wonderful post!
I am moving to Buffalo this Spring from the Northwest....
I cannot wait to become a "transplant!"
My favorite read in a long while on this site!