Chillin' on the West Side

The Directional Aspects of Population Patterns

East side versus west side – north side versus south side.

In most cities, these tensions exist – but it is more than simply a sense of neighborhood pride?

Maybe not, as there seems to be actual settlement patterns - in Europe and North  America, at least -  that lead to the consistency of those differences.

It should be noted that cities and communities are so varied that the apparent general pattern may not apply to every particular location; however the regularity of the variations may mean that real estate agents may only be partly correct when they say property value and desirability is driven by “location, location, location,” while in fact it be, at a more basic level, at the mercy of “direction, direction, direction.”

Initial – read paleolithic -  migration patterns in Europe were from south and east to north and west.  While the first immigration patterns in North America moved from the north and west towards the south and east (the Bering Sea land bridge, etc.), the colonial immigration moved, obviously, from east to west, from the Atlantic to the Pacific.  But, unlike the original movement, the European colonists brought with them something the earlier arrivals for the most part did not – the notion of discrete,  individual property ownership.

As settlers moved westward in America, they tended to settle in the closest habitable places – one can hardly imagine a more awkward conversation than the one between puritan husband and wife Capability and Prudence Goodheart in which Capability tries to convince Prudence – after a month in the wilderness -  to keep walking a few more miles further from the river because in about 300 years that land will be worth a bit more.

In other words, people settled in the best possible place made available by the shortest possible walk.

But these more easterly original settlements – neighborhoods, if you will -  rather soon gave way to becoming places more focused on commerce and industry and those who made a bit of a packet could move out – usually west – to have a more comfortable life.  The bonus, for those able to move west, was that the general direction of the wind – from west to east – would keep whatever nasty smells and such away from the “west side” of town. 

As settlers moved even further and further west this pattern repeated itself, just as it had done in Europe – think of London as a perfect example - which has the same general wind patterns - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-incredible-reason-east-sides-of-cities-are-poorer-than-west-sides-2016-11-02

While separate cities, there is a reason Camden, New Jersey is Camden and that Philadelphia’s fancy Main Line suburbs lay to the west of downtown, that the west side of Los Angeles may as well be a million miles rather than 12 miles from the east side, that the lower east side of Manhattan was for decades on a different planet from the upper west side, East St. Louis versus St. Louis, though that may be unfair to both cities, and on and on.

Again it must be emphasized that different localities did not all follow this pattern – Gates and Bezos live in Medina, east of downtown Seattle, for example, and certain permanent institutions like universities and hospitals create a significant impact – but in general the rule holds true until the onset of gentrification, when the children of the west side people realize they cannot quite afford to stay in the neighborhood, declare the east side “cool” (take the resurgence of Brooklyn) and change – like evil aliens with climate modification machines – those older neighborhoods to best fit their own needs (the analogy, admittedly, does not have to be that mean and gentrification can “lift all boats” if done well).

When it comes to deciding where to live and where is the most desirable place to live, semantics – beyond weather and initial settlement – can also play a role.  At least for speakers of the English language, for some reason, people find the idea of “up” better than “down,” which subconsciously transmogrifies in to meaning “north” is better than “south.”   https://healthland.time.com/2011/05/31/the-psychology-of-real-estate-why-north-is-better-than-south/

Therefore, the seemingly innate draw to the west and the north – through for different reasons – may explain population settlement patterns over the course of a community’s development.

Of course, this may not be true all the time; in fact, the Kansas City metro area puts paid to most of the above arguments – the eastern city is nice than the western and Overland Park, which lay to the south, is nicer than both (“nice” being loosely defined by having higher property values and incomes and lower crime rates). And geography plays a large role, which is why the east side of Chicago has so few non-aquatic residents.

That being said, the pattern does appear to be surprisingly consistent and the rivalries and differences between the neighborhoods may always exist.  As the eminent societal philosopher, Cartman of South Park, notes  -

 - “chillin’ on the west sieeday” may be, eventually, everyone’s goal.