Scariest places in the USA
 

Another thread included photos of Detroit's decline. It got me thinking about the scariest places I've ever been to in the US - places where I saw crime or otherwise felt unsafe.

New Orleans (circa 1991) - walked from the French Quarter to my hotel on Canal St late at night. There were lots of shady looking locals around and I honestly thought that my wife and I were going to be attacked at any moment (thankfully we weren't). Around this same time, a few foreign tourists had been killed in New Orleans.

Gary, Indiana - I have no idea what made me think this would be a good stop on a drive from Toronto to Chicago. After a short drive around, I realized that my life was in danger and I got the hell out as fast as I could and back onto the interstate to Chicago.

San Francisco - really enjoyed my trip to this city but not before I encountered The Tenderloin district. Foolishly I had booked a hotel in this area before I knew about its reputation. I was in the hotel for less than 10mins before I realized it was full of drug dealers, prostitutes and other undesirables! The hotel wouldn't let me cancel my reservation but I left anyway and had my credit card company take care of it.

Baltimore, Maryland - the harbourfront area is great but there are some awful neighborhoods not far away that I managed to wander into.

Washington, DC - a beautiful, safe city if you keep to the tourist areas and NorthWest DC. Just stay away from SouthEast DC. Enough said.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

I am not keen on Detriot, I only ever go there for the airport or the INS center... the INS center is not in the best part of town either.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Some more came to mind...

Venice Beach, California...great during the day but the guys running the hostel I stayed in told me not to go out at night

Miami, Florida - witnessed a full scale police bust on the street (guns drawn) while waiting at a downtown bus stop...I think it was a drugs bust

Hollywood, California - same as Miami above

Tampa, Florida - a wacko pulled a knife on someone in a downtown shopping mall in broad daylight while I was there with my wife, my sister and my mom...later we walked into a very shady bar....turned around and left very quickly....Tampa is not my favorite Florida destination

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

You ever been to Flint, MI? I've heard that's as bad or maybe even worse than Detroit. I've heard bad things about Newark, NJ but I've only ever been to the airport. I've also heard Camden, NJ is bad but never been there.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Nope never been to Flint... there are some areas of downtown GR that are none too great!

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Isn't this going to be just a repeat of the Crappiest Places in the US thread?

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

I thought it was the that thread. I wish peeps wouldn't do that...it does my head in. :eek:

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Well maybe, but using the word "scariest" made me remember Liberty City, FL, which was easily the worst place in Florida but has improved by orders of magnitude in the last ten years to almost unrecognizable levels.

However back in ye olde days I went there a couple of times and parts of it were like a third world country, kids with no shoes looking through garbage cans.

Some years back some German tourists took a wrong turn and stopped at a gas station to get directions - and were shot dead (bear in mind the main road from MIA to downtown Miami is just south, make a wrong turn up State Road 7 when you're aiming for I-95 and you will be in Liberty City). They'd been in the US less than two hours. I think at one point I remember reading that every tourist who had been murdered in Florida had been murdered in Liberty City, with the exception of someone who pulled into a rest stop up around Orlando.

Opa-Locka, which is next door, is pretty bad too. I remember one New Year's Eve, a cop was shot in the back of his head while sitting in his cruiser when everyone opened fire at midnight. Anyway he survived because the bullet went through the head rest. They got the crime scene people out there and found cartridge cases from 23 different guns within a few yards of his car. They did actually get the guy who did it because he confessed, he'd been shooting into the air, dropped his rifle and fired into the street by accident.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

I remember reading about that poor tourist.

I found myself in South Central LA just after the Rodney King riots - sure fire cure for constipation you might say ;)

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

In downtown LA, late afternoon, my husband and I wandered a few blocks east of Pershing Square, into the Jewelry District. I've heard people say 'oh, if you think the JEWELRY DISTRICT is scary, then don't ever go to X/Y/Z'. Well, maybe we were unlucky or maybe I'm just a Euro-pansy, but I thought the Jewelry District environs was pretty damn scary. So many people dressed in rags, screaming at their own personal demons or asking for money. We turned around when a junkie next to me at the crosswalk did a massive rainbow puke onto the street and then strolled off. Later, I read the LA time series of articles on Skid Row -- very, very sad and scary reading.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Three months after arriving in New York the British firm of Quantity Surveyors I was working with moved me from our offices in mid-town Manhattan onto the New Yankee Stadium project in the Bronx which was a bit of a culture shock. The area around the stadium is not the worst part of the Bronx but you definitely stuck to the main route between the subway and the site and you didn’t hang around once it started to get dark. You would read about the murders and arson attacks in the paper. Most of the locals were OK – you just got this overwhelming sense of despair with most adults out of work and just hanging around aimlessly and all the kids skiving off school and you just couldn’t see it ever changing.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Stockton California, on the wrong side of the cross town freeway, 7am and the prostitutes were still out, trying to get Dh to pull over, never mind I was in the car.
Same area, alone, looking for an address for a patient I had to visit, found the house, full of "family" who looked a bit suspect to say the least. Saw the old lady, a real treasure, but probably a total hard ass in her day.
I saw many gang infested, druggy neighborhoods where the only reason I got in and out safely I'm sure is cause I was there to look after one of their own.
Thanks for that I was going to go back to work doing this job again (same area) now I remember why I quit.
Senile old men with loaded guns under their pillow can be scary too :eek: I need a better line of work.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

We managed to take a wrong turn in Detroit, after going to a show at the Fox Theatre. If nothing else it was an interesting experience, and one which I don't particularly want to repeat. I swear the only businesses that are doing well down there are the crack houses.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

Dunno about the whole country (Maybe Camden NJ). In my State (from what I have heard):

All of Lawrence MA
Parts of Lowell MA
Worst of all - Mattapan (AKA Murder-pan) Greater Boston
Holyoke MA - Though I think it may just be seriously depressed rather than dangerous
Springfield MA - ditto?

....and possibly (though it may have cleaned up it's act) Lynn, Lynn the city of sin, you never come out the way you went in. Ask for water they give you a gin the girls say no but always give in etc etc..

And i'll put a shout out for my city Fitchburg MA though it is really just a bit crap rather than scary. Toughest hood is probably Cleghorn and a pub called 'The Paddock Lounge' on Water Street where one poor guy got stabbed in both butt cheeks the other night.

Re: Scariest places in the USA
 

It's all the worst parts of a scary city, with none of the decent bits of sin... :D