I’ve been thinking lately of similarities and differences
between my current hometown, Austin, TX [yes I’ve just outed myself on that
one] and former hometown, Pittsburgh. At
some future point I’ll detail why in my opinion Austin and Pittsburgh are so
uniquely similar, and similar in unique ways.
But for this posting I draw on conversations over the years of living in
each place. I believe I have now reached
a point where I have lived in Austin for as many years as I lived in
Pittsburgh. OK, for clarification, I
grew up and resided through college in “the Pittsburgh area”. The City line was about five miles up the road
from my burg. To Pittsburghers, that’s
an important distinction. Michael
Chabon, another nominee in my pantheon of Pittsburgh saints [even though he
currently writes from “Bizerkeley”, CA] lectured one night at Southwestern
University in Georgetown, TX about 15 miles north of Austin and I was fortunate
to have attended. He began the lecture
by explaining to the gathered Texans that even though he loved Pittsburgh, and
wrote lovingly of it, AND considered himself a Pittsburgher, to “native”
Pittsburghers he would never be one. He
noted that Pittsburgh’s a place where, close to quoting him here, if you were
born just a step outside the City line, and the moment you could take a breath
you were whisked across that line into Pittsburgh, you would not be considered
a “Pittsburgher” by the City’s natives.
I believe the audience shared the joke partially because Texans resemble
that remark.
But this leads me into my comment for this post. Years back I had lunch at the Holiday Inn in
Pittsburgh’s Oakland section with a “mover and shaker” who directed a joint
effort between CMU and Pitt to incubate technology companies from the
universities’ academic pursuits. He said
something that I have carried with me ever since: “Pittsburghers are friendly
but not welcoming”. And he meant it as
an indictment resulting in an impediment to growth. He said that enterprises found it easier than
one might think bringing talent into Pittsburgh as their initial impressions
were usually good and they found the social climate “friendly”. [I seem to remember local TV station KDKA in
the 70s used the moniker “The Friendly City”.]
The problem was that those new transplants too often left after a
relatively short amount of time. In
leaving, they took ideas, training and often whole enterprises with them. And where did they go? Places like Austin, but also other places
either more socially welcoming like North Carolina and Atlanta or places more
economically wide open like Seattle and the Silicon Valley. The mover and shaker believed that along with
more developed sources of capital funding, a more welcoming social net would
equalize in and out migrations to something consistent with economically
dynamic cities.
Think of why you shop at a particular hardware store,
frequent your preferred airline, or settle in a certain neighborhood. I’d be willing to bet these and dozens of similar
decisions are made due to social bonds.
People who welcome us into their lives get a hold on us that makes all
the other things around us fade to the background; one example being your
neighborhood. You love your ‘hood. You grill with neighbors and share the picnic. You gossip over a glass of your preferred
refresher. You worry about someone up
the street who you haven’t seen in while.
Sure, in the midst of all that you don’t like the paint color on a
neighbor’s house. Or worse, the crying
need for fresh paint, whatever the color.
Maybe there appears a wall with graffiti a couple blocks over nearer the
highway. Or you’ve reached the end with a
neighbor’s dog using your front yard as their latrine. But overall, the social network keeps you
grounded to your neighborhood. And as a
result, you’re reluctant to leave for another part of town, or part of the
country. For newcomers, THAT’S what was
missing in Pittsburgh, I’ve been told.
I contrast that view with Austin. Back in the 90s when I first moved here there
was a guy in my startup company who was originally from Cleveland, OH. He even graduated from UT’s football rival
Ohio State. He told me the reason he
settled in Austin was that after motorbike touring the country during his
vacations, he never encountered a place as “welcoming” [his words] as Austin. I hear that same comment all the time in the
local Austin media. After big events
such as ACL Fest and SXSW you’ll hear and read of entertainers, business people
or just participant fans say they decided to look for work or housing and move
here because so many people open their homes, hearts and attitudes to them.
Pittsburgh has come so far economically in the last 20-plus
years so it’s now seeing higher in-migration.
And often Pittsburghers will ask newcomers, sometimes sheepishly fearing
a veiled put-down I suppose, “Why did you move here?” By contrast, I interact daily with Texans
who are not only natives, they are fifth and sixth and beyond generation
natives. And their attitude to me is
always “What took you so long to get here?”
So I end this piece with a question.
Or lots of questions. What
attitudes need to change? Can you change
the character of a city quickly enough to keep up with the pace of global
economic change? Can you rely on an
initial core group of newcomers, perhaps themselves more open to other
newcomers, to form the basis of social and economic progress?
