Different Day, Same Shit.

While reading an AL.com story about concerned citizens meeting to discuss and plan Birmingham's future, I ran across this nugget that's a bit of a theme among some dissatisfied with the Magic City's current shape:

They should talk about B'ham's past (pre 1963). A lot more pleasant.
Be nice if they could revert back to that time. I just don't see it happening, which is why I left.

I've never known any black person from Birmingham to talk pleasant about the city as a whole pre-1960s, unless it involved their own neighborhoods. That kinda narrows down the pool of people most likely to say the above, trolls excluded.

The 1960s are a dividing line between the pleasant and idyllic Birmingham some whites knew and loved, and the depressed, crime-ridden shit pit they believe it turned into. You can figure out why on your own.

This is the reason why Birmingham abdicated any chance of out-Atlanta-ing Atlanta. Because while Atlanta was willing to momentarily set aside most of its racial unpleasantries (and woo-boy, were there plenty) in the greater pursuit of Greatness™, divisive and corrosive politics put Birmingham on the same road as Detroit, in terms of urban vs. suburban strife and non-cooperation.

Nostalgia is one thing, but pining about days gone by while ignoring opportunities to create future greatness is not only an exercise in futility, but just plain stupid, in my opinion. Instead of whining about the new CrossPlex being built in an area you're "scared" to go in, push for new events hosted at the facility and improvements made to the safety and livability of the surrounding area. In other words, stop whining over how the CrossPlex should have been built in Hoover, Vestavia or some other toney suburb with a more favorable color mixture.

And on a conspiracy theory note, I have a strange feeling that the ultimate plan is to shift the economic and metropolitan center of influence away from Birmingham. If Tuscaloosa and Montgomery could become the new metropolitan powerhouses while Birmingham languishes Decatur-style, that would suit the T-town and Goat Hill folks just fine. After all, it's their time to shine.

The State Farm Magic City Classic is one of the biggest events held in Birmingham's Legion Field, the city's premier football stadium that once played host to the Iron Bowl before the University of Alabama and Auburn University moved the event to their own respective stadiums. The Classic is a yearly football event that pits Alabama State University against Alabama A&M University, in effect making it the HBCU equivalent of the Iron Bowl.

For the city of Birmingham, it's a big deal, with 100,000 total participants -- 60,000 to 70,000 game attendees, plus another 40,000 that turn out for the pre-game city parade. $13.8 million to $15 million in potential revenue predicted for this year's game, according to the Greater Birmingham Convention & Visitors Bureau. Last year, the game brought in $12.8 million. Supporters come in from all over the southeast and beyond, and hotels are usually booked solid around this time, despite the constant bitching from collapse fetishists about the high lodging taxes. It's no wonder the sponsors are bellying up to the bar.

In past years, the traffic to and from Legion Field was always horrendous, as was the parking. So when the traffic issue became too much of an issue, the city recruited several charter bus companies to shuttle spectators from satellite locations well outside of Legion Field. Problem solved.

And yet, there are plenty of the aforementioned collapse fetishists who remain intent on slandering the event and the attendees, as it not only features a largely black audience, but it also features a city that's moving about its own business without having to beg UA or Auburn to come back to Legion Field, or begging and pleading the benevolent Over-The-Mountain interests bestow their blessings and wealth on the event. In other words, it's the sign of a majority black city minding its own business without requiring the input or largess of traditional southern white interests. Given this city's rather fucked-up racial history, most of the arguments made by the collapse fetishists inevitably trend back to, yep, race. Shameful shit, this is.

In the spirit of the first Freeper post, I will now demonstrate to viewers of this blog what happens when the local yokels become wrapped up in the grips of color arousal (a term regularly used by Francis L. Holland).

Extreme Color-aroused Emotion, Ideation and Behavior Disorder (ECEIBD) is an illness in which extremes of emotion, ideation and behavior arise and become harmful in conjunction with the perception of and reaction to the skin-color of a person or persons. In patients with ECEIBD, perception of skin color is the stimulus or “cue” that elicits feelings and thoughts in the patient that may become manifest in extreme behaviors. In ECEIBD, these extremes of emotions, ideation and behavior are sufficient in quality and quantity to impair the individual’s functioning in one or more areas of life.

When afflicted with extremely color-sensitive emotion, ideation and behavior, people who are otherwise law-abiding and respectful of others may commit acts that are unlawful, violent, risk loss of employment and social position, and rend the fabric of society.

The following comments come from a news article posted on AL.com concerning preparations being made at Legion Field to accommodate moneyed spectators of the Magic City Classic with the addition of several luxury skyboxes:

But the word might get to the thugs that people with money and things will be inside private booths - how about bullet-proof glass? What a waste of money!

Will the booths have bullet proof glass?

How about a safe place to park your car during a game where you don't have to worry about the windows being busted out? So glad Auburn abandoned this place.

Translation: Surely a large black event such as this is bound to be riddled with crime, because blacks are naturally predisposed to crime. That's their nature, after all. Plus, I don't want to get my windows busted out because that's what those negros will surely do to my car. I'm glad Auburn moved their venue so I can remain safe among my own kind, with the only negros to worry about being the good ones running the ball on the field.

After UAB builds an on-campus stadium, there will only be 4 events a year at this dinosaur. The cost of keeping it standing cannot be justified. Bring on the wrecking ball, or they could just paint it with copper colored paint and the thugs would steal it over night.

Legion Field was constructed between 1926 and 1927, making it one of the oldest athletic venues in the city and possibly the state, after Rickwood Field (built in 1910). But while Rickwood Field was rightfully preserved as a historic landmark, some people see Legion Field as a rickety, broken down relic that should be razed for something more useful, like a prison or another structure that makes color aroused whites feel happy and secure. The ugly comment about covering Legion Field with copper paint for the "thugs" to pick apart is just another glaring indication of color aroused insanity.

The place needs a lot of work done to it in order to keep it a viable venue, which is why events such as the Magic City Classic should be welcomed with open arms as major revenue generators. At any rate, whenever UAB finishes building their on-campus stadium, one would have reason to believe that its use would largely be restricted to UAB events.

The real reason you did not take your game to Atlanta or Nashville is they were not really interested in this second rate, meaningless to everyone but the second rate graduates of those substandard educational institutes that only continue to exist due to outdated federal lawsuits.

This comment strikes out against Alabama State and A&M grads somehow being "second-rate" by coming from a "substandard" HBCU, most likely said by someone who genuinely believes UA and Auburn to be the end-all-be-all of higher education in the state.

Meanwhile, the only reason people outside of the state of Alabama care about UA or Auburn is because of their football programs. Barring that, they wouldn't be of any importance or recognition outside of the state. At any rate, taking the game to Atlanta or Nashville would defeat the whole purpose of having a "mid-point" location for the game.

Move the Lions from Legion Field to the Railroad Park and then level the place and spend 90 million dollars on yet another "entertainment district" that no one will come to. Or build The Summit at Legion so that the Summit on 280 won't have city buses hauling thugs to it.

This is one reason no one really wants to fund public transportation in the region. Because of color aroused fears that such will be used to shuttle roving gangs of black "thugs" back and forth the suburbs and exurbs.

Luxury Suites at Legion Field, isn't that like putting $10,000 rims on a $100 car?

The Truth said "Luxury Suites at Legion Field, isn't that like putting $10,000 rims on a $100 car?"
LOL,,,good one!
It's the same mentality...Cadillac in front of a slum house...$200 shoes, food stamps in the pocket...

Ah, the welfare meme. I don't know how it fits into the color aroused collapse fetishist argument except how it paints the facility as a welfare basket case that should "act its income level." That, or "those negros don't deserve nice things -- they wouldn't know how to take care of it, anyways."

Any comment about the total waste of taxpayer dollars all for 1 event at legion field is sure to recieve accusations of racism.

How come it is that when one can not defend an action one always resorts to attacking the critic as a racist?

Must be nice to get a pass on every responsibility based on the color of your skin.

They have name for that don't they?

Ah yes, I believe it is called racism.

It is a shame when a people become exactly what they despise the most.

It's a shame when conservatives attempt to head-game people into believing they themselves are "racist" for pointing out continuing acts of racial bigotry where it continues to exist, and to ignore said racism under the belief that they somehow lack the moral authorization to point it out due to their own "racism."

Besides, how are the additions being made to Legion Field a "waste of taxpayer money" when the investment will come back ten-fold? At any rate, taxpayer expenditures and investments that don't go to the things that the collapse fetishists like or understand are always deemed a "waste of taxpayer money."

Meanwhile, several pockets of sanity:

I am very confused and don't understand why anyone who has no intentions of every darkening the steps of Legion Field would care or post a negative comment. If A&M and ASU fans, faculty, students, alumni. etc. are comfortable with this location everyone else should mind his or her business. I haven't seen any post from their fan base mocking Auburn or Tuscaloosa. I for the life of me don't understand why people debilerately entice racial division.

I am very uncomfortable with all this THUG commentary it's certainly a racial overtone for something ugly. I am blessed to be around beautiful people everyday from all types of backgrounds and ethnicities and for parent(s) who instilled christian principles. Have a GREAT game......

Amazing how any article about Birmingham brings out the idiots and the racists. I have been going to games at Legion Field for 30 years and have never had my car broken into or felt threatened in any way. Maybe that's because I'm not afraid of black people.

The yokels and collapse fetishists aren't necessarily "afraid" of black people -- on a deep level, they despise and loath the fact they can no longer openly use blacks as their own personal punching bags in front of "polite" society, instead having to employ dog whistles and code words that obscure what they really wanted to say. Refreshing honesty about your own bigotry that was validated and supported by your fellow peers was something that became a complete liability shortly after the Civil Rights era. To be refreshingly honest about your own bigotry today is to ostracize yourself from most "polite" circles. If the Tea Party was to be refreshingly honest about its own views and underlying bigotry, the mainstream media will relegate it to "joke" status and that would be the end of the Tea Party.

I do realize that, as with any online venue, there are usually a few trolls in the midst with the expressed goal and desire to incense and inflame with outrageous commentary, many of the quoted people are ordinary men and women who've found a venue where they can commiserate their outdated views with like-minded people. Imagine most of these people being 65+ retirees who've graduated from hunting and pecking through their emails and Word documents to firing off missives whenever stories involving Birmingham, blacks, crime or all three pop up.

I know the Magic City Classic will be successful this year, as it always is every single year, despite the moaning and whining from the collapse fetishists.

The Magic City Classic game starts on Oct. 29 at 2:30 p.m. The parade starts at 8:00 a.m., so bring a warm windbreaker to beat the early-morning wind chill.

Birmingham, AL and Detroit, MI are similar to one another in a variety of ways. Both were regional powerhouses during their heyday, both were heavily invested in the steel industry and both cities were hit hard when they lost their respective industrial capacity. Both were hotbeds of the Civil Rights movement and both cities saw a steady stream of white suburbanites flee for suburbs and cities on the outer rim of the metropolitan area. Detroit had the 1967 riots help them in that regard, while the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing and Eugene Connor's "peacekeeping" measures ruined Birmingham's image for quite a while. The major difference between Birmingham and Detroit is the horrific level of decline the Motor City experienced before essentially hitting bottom.

No need to offer links -- just Google "Ruins of Detroit." Birmingham is nowhere near that level of collapse, not even after the tornado that nearly blew Pratt City off the map, but there are a number of people who wish the city would just sink into a hole without a trace.

Take a quick visit to the AL.com website and click a link to nearly any story about Birmingham. You will inevitably find the "collapse fetishists" -- a largely white, largely rural and suburban group of people who constantly rag on the city in a largely non-constructive manner. They hate the current form of government, the mayor, many of the citizens within and the fact that the city has the audacity to tax their precious taxpayer dollars away from them when they stop in Birmingham or Jefferson County to eat/gas up/work/whine. These are also the same people who are glad that former mayor Larry Langford will most likely die in prison, but that's another post for another time.

The collapse fetishists are an interesting mix. You have former Birmingham residents who got out sometime around the 1970s, back when the blacks were supposedly conquering City Hall. These people don't have any love for former mayor Richard Arrington. Then there are the suburban residents who are only concerned about their horrid commute on U.S. 280 and the number of businesses and residents fleeing to their suburban enclaves. Oh, and making sure none of the "criminal elements" from the city make their way over the mountain. Then you have the rural residents of Jefferson County and the other surrounding counties, always eager to apply small government solutions to big government problems, not realizing a 200k+ population city can't be run in the same manner as a 2000+ population township. It never sinks in - they're a stubborn lot. Last but not least are the toney T-towners from Tuscaloosa who wish they were Birmingham, only with less blacks and zero Civil Rights baggage. All of these people want to see the city deteriorate to the point at which it just falls in on itself, as proof that 1)blacks can't run any city properly, and 2)to be able to raze the city and remake it in their own image (and by "their" I mean well connected property and land developers specializing in suburban tract and strip development).

It's not just the Internet sounding boards where people who actively harbor these attitudes, but were too scared or "polite" to express them until given the cloak of anonymity. A lot of people out there are more than willing to publicly state how crappy the city is, why they themselves moved (if they did move) and how they'd like to see the city collapse into a heap of rubble and failure. The Internet's done a good job of exposing more of these feelings, if not amplifying them by a larger factor.

The city government of both cities haven't done themselves any favors. Detroit had Kwame Kilpatrick and a city council that could be summed up with the phrase "Hot Ghetto Mess." Birmingham had a city council that often engaged in internecine bickering and a series of mayors who failed to adequately address key issues affecting the city and often got caught up in their own avarice. None of the people involved in both governments are saints, but they are constantly indicted as proof positive of the failure of black leaders to govern effectively.

That was what the whole ruckus over Patrick Cooper was all about. A clean-cut Yale-educated (although he flunked out during his sophomore year) fresh face placed in the role of Great "White" Hope™ for a city "tarnished" by what most whites saw as cliquish, corrupt black leadership. In the end, Cooper wound up with only 29.5% of the 40,000+ ballots cast, while Langford walked away with 50.3%, enough to avoid a runoff. In that election, only three of the nine districts in the city went for Cooper, and those three districts were concentrated in the northeast and southeast portions of the city. Even after Langford vacated office in late 2009, Cooper came up short once again, this time being bested by current mayor William Bell, 54% to 46%. When Cooper lost, most of the AL.com commentators threw hissy fits over the city continuing down a "dark" road.*

Keep in mind that both cities have majority-black populations, with most whites living along the suburban and rural fringes. Both majority-black cities are more or less inclined to vote for mayors who represent the best chance of understanding their concerns, and given the history behind both cities, non-black mayors don't have a sterling track record when it comes to listening to and understanding the black community. Collapse fetishists hailing from rural and suburban areas could care less about the concerns of the black community, only that they see an "out of control" black criminal element under feckless Democrat leadership and a need for a hard-nosed conservative to waft into office and set about "restoring order." There's little to no understanding about the underlying socioeconomic and educational problems that create and maintain poor living and educational environments in the inner cities, only the understanding that the problem can be "solved" by Nixonian "law and order" posturing and the relocation of unfriendly black and Latino faces elsewhere so suburban whites can feel "safe" enough to venture back into the city center.**

I don't want to be too hard on these folks -- Detroit definitely has some serious issues regarding crime, largely vandalism and arson. The "Devil's Night" tradition, copper scavengers and general neglect have wiped out most of the housing stock in Detroit. The city was once home to a treasure trove of architectural delights -- and now whatever buildings that aren't barely standing are now being cleared off and turned into pasture. Birmingham has it's own issues, but it's blessed in that it's nowhere as bad as Detroit is right now. Hopefully Dave Bing is doing his best to mitigate and hopefully reverse the damage done over the decades; it's a hell of an uphill battle.

But the collapse fetishists, the people who, day in and day out, hope that the city hits rock bottom so it will grudgingly accept a preferably white conservative savior and retool itself to suit the sensibilities of suburbanite and rural whites, those folks gotta go. These same people who constantly criticize the city are usually nowhere to be found when it comes to putting in some work to help repair and improve the city. Funny that.

*The sooner AL.com restricts comments to the "Email us for feedback" links like other, semi-respectable news outlets, the better.


**This is perhaps one of the biggest reasons A.C. Roper, Birmingham's current police chief, is so loved. He does crack down on crime.

If you ever looked at a road map of the Birmingham metro area, you'll notice instead of having a full loop like all other respectable cities, Birmingham has a V-shaped bypass serving the southern "Over The Mountain" portions of the city and outlying areas. This is Interstate 459, built in 1984 to spare east- and west-bound travelers from 1-65 the indignity of traveling through Birmingham, and more importantly, the much-maligned I-65/I-20/I-59 interchange known as "Malfunction Junction." It's one of the few roadways in the U.S. where you end up traveling on the wrong side of the road on purpose. And it eats trucks, tankers specifically.

After I-459 was built, bupkis. The fine minds at ALDOT thought about finishing up the loop, and promptly fell asleep for the next 20 years or so. This is what ALDOT does. They think up half-baked and half-assed solutions, and then they sleep on them for about 20 to 30 years. Eventually, they'll wake up and get around to building the damn thing, which usually takes anywhere from a speedy 4 to 5 years or perhaps another 10 to 15. Either way, you get a highway that's at least 5 to 10 years behind the curve, a question that should have been answered 5 to 10 years ago. It took them about 30 years to realize Huntsville needed an interstate highway and that Decatur wasn't gonna break past 65,000 in population anytime soon.

Needless to say, I-459's been a boon to the once-rural but now thoroughly suburban areas of southeast Jefferson County and northwest Shelby County, and not so much for the areas around Bessemer and McCalla. The main issue is how I-459, like most urban and suburban loops, enabled urban sprawl along and beyond its boundaries.

Now let's look at northern and northwestern Jefferson County. It's still largely rural as all get out, thanks to the vast majority of suburban development happening towards the southeast. When it comes to trendy suburbia, west Jefferson County gets no love. Well, ALDOT's woken up from yet another long nap to kick-start construction of the Northern Beltline.


And here it is, the Northern Beltline, a.k.a I-422. Approximately 52 miles and $4.7 billion dollars of blacktop boondoggle. That comes out to approximately $90 million per mile. At this point, you'd think the road was gonna be paved with solid gold. Also note the hilariously wide arc of the overall route, staying well outside of Birmingham city limits for the most part, passing through a collection of stereotypical small towns and parcels of land owned by USS Real Estate, Jim Walter Resources and several other local interests. Little wonder about the price tag.

The roadway technically begins where I-459 ends, trudging its way through miles of backwoods Alabama landscape and underfed small towns, eventually connecting with I-22 at Graysville, a sleepy small town that, once upon a time, had exactly one traffic light. After passing through Mayberry, the Northern Beltline suddenly grows another branch, headed southwest towards Graysville's larger speed trap cousin, Adamsville. From there, the Beltline continues a northern arc across I-65, Pinson, Centerpoint and a number of other small cities until it finally ends....not at I-459 in Roebuck. Nope, instead it terminates somewhere near the otherwise insignificant city of Argo, about 10 miles away from I-459. And there's some talk about the Beltline extending further into St. Clair County so it meets with I-20. No wonder people are scared it's gonna grow into an "out-of-control" spiral.

The only benefit to the Beltline is the ability to direct truck traffic around the city and away from the aforementioned Malfunction Junction. And it remains seen if law enforcement and ALDOT will have the attention span and the testicular fortitude to enforce a ban on through traffic for trucks.

So, will building start at I-459? Nope. It's gonna start somewhere around here (skip to 5:55). In the middle of nowhere. There's an analogy somewhere, I just can't put my finger on it.

The Northern Beltline has the distinct displeasure of stomping through several fragile ecosystems made more so by years of industrial pollution. Black Warrior Riverkeeper and the Southern Environmental Law Center are not pleased about the Beltline coming to fruition. As much noise is made over environmental affairs in the state, moneyed interests and big industry usually wins out.


My biggest concern is sprawl. Living outside of Atlanta's I-285 perimeter's given me a front-row seat to how suburban sprawl plays out when left unchecked. Left to their own devices, property developers will build communities and shopping centers with absolutely no regard to traffic flow and commute times -- that's not their problem. Given that and Atlanta's "fuck a grid, mufucka" road layout (a Southern tradition), and you're left with one of the most excruciating commuting experiences this side of L.A. At least Atlanta has MARTA rail -- it helps a little.

It's a big reason why U.S. 280 remains a jawdropping clusterfuck of stop-and-go retail and residential traffic. It's why, in a few years' time, Shelby County commuters will clammor for the widening of Grant's Mill Road, a roadway that happens to cross over Lake Purdy, a large water reservoir for the city of Birmingham. If the Northern Beltline is built, property developers will go nuts. And when that happens...

Before plunging face-first into a decades-long project answering a question that should had been answered back in 1980, let's first try to learn the lessons of Atlanta's I-285, if only to avoid GDOT's screwups and crib their better ideas...nah. Chances are we'll multiply their screwups by a factor of 5 and pocket the kickbacks and graft that come from it.

• Cities can unify basic utilities and other services that would otherwise be duplicated between cities, potentially saving taxpayers money.
• Cities under consolidation will have a broader tax base for funding important infrastructure repairs and improvements.
• The entire county can move forward with economic development as a unified team, as all cities can now reap the rewards of new businesses, attractions and services that make the metropolitan area more appealing to outsiders.
• Suburban taxpayers will finally have to "pay their fair share" and help fund the services and obligations of the city and county they work in.

The above is a quote from a commenter at The Heaviest Corner, a blog that gives a great deal of insight into what makes the Magic City what it is today.



This is the city of Birmingham, Alabama.

It originated as a company town, methodically planned out by men of industry and vast wealth, situated on a number of coal seams that made coal mining and steel production a no-brainer. Located smack dab in the middle of a county staring down the biggest bankruptcy this side of Orange County, CA, the population is currently at 212,000 and falling. It was hit hard by the loss of the steel industry, with a high number of the plants and foundries closing shop around the 1970s, only to reinvent itself as a medical research mecca of sorts, with the University of Alabama at Birmingham at the forefront. With high crime rates, deteriorating city sectors, a laughably corrupt government and a people still divided by racial and urban/suburban strife, this city is hurting. Big time. But there is hope.

The most recent news of progress is the planned baseball stadium for the "AA" minor league Birmingham Barons, near the recently-developed Railroad Park. The current stadium is located in Hoover, a suburb that's a rather long and inconvenient drive for most people near the city center, and the current attendance numbers reflect that.

And then there's Railroad Park itself. Located along the rail lines that divide the north and south ends of downtown Birmingham, it's a 19-acre oasis of greenery among an otherwise urban backdrop. And by all accounts, people love it. It's also proof positive of how a little urban redevelopment can help revitalize a dying city.

But as the quote suggests, this city still has a lot of problems to deal with. More of that after the jump.