Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

Hello forum,

I am pleased to be accepted as a member for this great forum. I have joined this forum to get to know more about US, in particular, Philadelphia where I will be moving in Feb 2010 for postdoctoral research stint at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

I have posted my new thread in USA section. Hoping to get some advice as others have received in past.

As I will be a newbie in US, I would probably come across plenty of questions. Sorry in advance for my naivety.

Cheers Brits!!

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

Cheers Doc :thumbsup:

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

welcome to BE

good luck with your move though as the area is a bit of a shitter :)

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

Thanks Sally and Bob.

Any advice on safe and quiet location in Philly preferably nearer to UPenn.

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

HMMMMM ?

Safe location near to Philly ........ Brackley, Northants would be a safe place :rofl:

Seriuosly ..... Lima, which is south of Philly on US1 seems a nice area.

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

Immu,

Don't be fooled, Philly has some very nice areas, it's like most big cities, there are good and bad areas. i will admit there were a couple of bad years in the bad areas there but it seems to be getting under control now. Nice places in the city include: Old City, Rittenhouse square but I reccomend you go to: http://www.city-data.com/forum/philadelphia/ and search there.

The location of UPenn itself is not great....but walking, hoping on a bus or train is easy in the city. Philly has adequate public transportation giving you the ability to live in or out of the city with ease.

It is a daunting task moving over, but I think you'll find it to be a great experience and worth while. UPenn should be able to assist you with information on getting settleled here.

Re: Nottingham to Philadelphia
 

By far the best place for these types of questions is the site NiceOneDelBoy reccomended www.city-data.com. I have been to Philidelphia and it's quite a nice historic city with some fun areas; you can get your bearings on googlestreetview. The universities are very good. You'll basically get two types of polarised opinions about it 1) that it is a criminally underrated city with many beautiful areas, museums and historic buildings or 2) that it is a criminally controlled sewer with out of control gangs and neighbourhoods of run down terraced housing. I suspect both have a point.

The thing to watch out for is that Philidelphia has the third highest homicide rate in America (though the top two, Baltimore and Detroit are in a league of their own). That in itself doesn't tell you a hell of a lot since crime tends to be highly localised (A good example of that is that in Nottingham where I lived I had by far most trouble with crime, whereas in London I have had none despite the problems being worse on paper - this is because of the areas I lived in). So as far as I am aware the worst areas are in North Philidephia like frankford, york and dauphin and West Philly. The worst place is across the river in Camden NJ. Some of these are like warzones (did anyone see Louis Theroux's doc on Philidelphia gangs?). In terms of what is good, I have heard that Manayunk is cool as is the Roxborough area.