"My city was gone"

"I went back to Ohio

But my city was gone

There was no train station

There was no downtown. ...

A, O, way to go Ohio "

Those are lyrics to the 1983 song by 'The Pretenders' according to an article in the Columbus Dispatch today. The song was about Akron Ohio. Akron Ohio is one of the seven biggest cities in the state of Ohio. Chrissie Hynde lead singers of 'The Pretenders' is from Akron Ohio originally and wrote the song when she returned after 10 years in London, England.

Coincidently I moved to Akron Ohio in late 1983... I worked in downtown Akron... as it turned out there was still a downtown. I found the downtown... I liked the downtown... we lived a couple of miles away... I drove my car...up and down Market Street to and from work every day.... I think there was a bus system... I doubt I ever took the bus.

The downtown had changed from what Hynde remembered.

Why am I writing about Akron Ohio? I live and work in Columbus Ohio now...The Columbus Dispatch is currently doing a series about the seven largest cities in Ohio and I dedided to kind of blog along for some strange reason.

Here's "I went back to Ohio" on ColumbusBestBlog.com They say there is a brain drain in Ohio. Young people graduate from college and move out of state to exciting urban areas like... Bruce Katz of the Brookings Instititution the expert interviewed for the Columbus Dipatch said young people are moving to urban areas in the southwest or southeast US or even just to popular mid-western urban areas like Chicago, Madison or Minneapolis... They're moving from Ohio while many of the big cities in Ohio are shrinking in population. Akron unlike most of the industrial cities in Ohio has not lost jobs since 1983. Do you think it's 'The Pretenders' song? song? Chrissy Hinde lives outside the US but she has a presence in an exciting new development in downtown Akron.

In Sundays article "On the BRINK: Can Ohio Cities be saved?" The Columbus Dispatch Special Report says:

Findings

• "Except for Columbus Ohio's big cities have endured vast population and job losses, but now city leaders realize the glory days aren't coming back."
• "A key reason the plight of Ohio's major cities can't be ignored: Their problems will continue to spread to the suburbs and beyond."
• "Cities are adopting unique strategies to reverse years of decline, but they remain hindered by crime and poor-performing school districts."

On Monday the Dispatch wrote about Cleveland... I wrote about the Viral Idea, an audio comment in the series about young people want to live downtown because they saw it on TV? Katz from the Brookings Institution said so...

On Tuesday the Columbus Dispatch wrote about the City of Dayton. I was trying to write about suburbs and suburban sprawl on ColumbusBestBlog.com Dayton suburbs, Columbus suburbs but I got sidetracked with who the intended reader for the series is. The legislature? Columbus is the state capital... Or is the Dispatch article written for the rest of us? The ordinary folk. I think the ordinary Columbus folk... but what do I know... they got me reading it. I called Tuesday's post Ohio Cities' burbs.

All of the seven largest cities in Ohio except Columbus are former industrial cities... Columbus has never been considered an industrial city... or maybe it was back in the days of buggies. Columbus was a big manufacturer of buggies, but that was a real long time ago.

Step back into 1983... actually this is a video from a recent performance of the song by The Pretenders...