The South Side

Syracuse's south side is one of its poorest neighborhoods. As poor as the north side, the east side and the near west side are, none has the concentration and depth of poverty that the south side displays. Many people consider it a ghetto. The Syracuse United Neighbors organization wrote about the housing situation in September 2004:

"There is a housing crisis in Syracuse’s south and near-west side. These neighborhoods make up 15% of the city’s households yet include nearly half of the city’s 1100 vacant houses. Bank foreclosures are booming with over 300 since July 2001. A neighbor is lost here every three days. Ten percent of the houses have more than one property code violation, a rate twice that of any other city neighborhood. Less than one-third of neighborhood families own their home, compared to 40% in the city overall and 64% in the county."

The 1100 number is a drop from a figure of 1200 mentioned in a 2000 article accusing the city government of using HUD funds to renovate expensive apartments downtown rather than to improve housing on the south side. The drop of 100 was likely due to demolition rather than rehabilitation.

An article in the July 28, 2000 edition of the New York Times laid out many of the problems facing Syracuse and especially the south side. By that time, tax auctions and foreclosure sales had "become the norm." The county's population fell by more than 13,000 in the 1990s alone, with an astonishing 92% of that drop happening within Syracuse itself, leading to a "brutal oversupply of housing."

A Forbes article, "Willis Carrier's Ghost," dated May 29, 2000 also had a grim prognosis. It noted approximately one out of every 40 homes in Syracuse was abandoned at the time. According to the article, cheap housing alone is not enough to entice high-growth industries. The companies need nearby suppliers and a skilled labor force, neither of which Syracuse can provide in abundance.

In 2006, a walk on the south side gives an unpleasant impression. Virtually every block has at least one vacant, boarded-up house. Many have more than one on each block. Vacant dirt lots, sometimes overgrown, also punctuate the neighborhood, results of a "de-densification" program which demolishes abandoned houses to create open space.

The Sears Building, on Salina Street between Tallman and West Castle Streets, was once considered the southern anchor of Salina Street. It had entrances on three sides and a large parking lot behind. Much of the detailing was Art Deco, with the characteristic chevrons and an unusual, wavy canopy above the rear loading docks. Today, the parking lot is fenced off completely and the "Retail Store" sign above the rear entrance is crumbling away. The front entrance decades ago lost its doors and was bricked up. A covered walkway on the north side of the building is rusting away.

For many years, the official stance of the Syracuse Police Department was that there were no street gangs in Syracuse, a claim scoffed at by various neighborhood groups on the South Side and by . Only after a string of drive-by shootings and other incidents did the department finally admit in 2003 that there was gang activity. The police targeted the Boot Camp gang, lead by Karo Brown, in 2003. Boot Camp had been known to be active in the area centered around Midland Avenue and West Colvin Street. The police turned their attention to the Elk Block gang in 2005. Sixteen members of Elk Block were arrested that summer. The gangs had been engaged in a violent turf war since at least 1995. Police continue to monitor gang activities on the South Side including the remains of the two gangs as well as the Brick City gang.

The West Side

Erie Boulevard West is only a small commercial strip, lacking the vitality of its eastern counterpart.

538 Erie Boulevard West, which formerly housed the Marshall Penn-York Company, makers of Visual Encyclopedia maps and atlases, is vacant and derelict. The company moved to Armory Square.

Farther west, Erie Boulevard West becomes another Automobile Row, catering mostly to the used car market.

Also vacant is the former Syracuse Cold Storage building, easily visible from the West Street arterial. This Erie Canal-era warehouse is complete with a low, wooden dock on the Erie Boulevard side where barges on the canal may once have loaded and unloaded their freight. The planking on the dock is probably over a century old. The building has fallen into serious disrepair.

Its windowless walls still have the old painted signs on them. The Central City Provision Co. sign is still readable and vivid, but others have faded to near invisibility.

Inside, the building is a mess. Aging ammonia chillers leak their refrigerant into parts of the building. The second floor was at least partially built out as office space, but was apparently never used.

Syracuse Cold Storage was not the only such company to go out of business. The Pioneer Freezer & Cold Storage warehouse cost $12.6 million to build, including a $3.4 million economic development loan from the city. The company went out of business in 1994. The state Job Development Authority took over the title to the building, leasing it to G&C Food Distributors beginning in 1996. However, the city did not negotiate a payments in lieu of taxes agreement with G&C and cannot levy taxes against a state-owned property. So the warehouse is another tax-exempt property, another piece in a staggering percentage of the tax-exempt puzzle. By May 2006, the city was estimated to have lost $1.3 million of taxes from the property.

Alexander Brown and Charles Lipe started the Brown-Lipe Gear Company in 1895. The company manufactured differentials and gears for early automobiles. The Brown-Lipe Gear buildings at the intersection of West Fayette and South Geddes Streets is a reminder of the West Side's industrial past, like the railroad tracks on the north side of West Fayette which once shipped goods to and from those warehouses. Only a few warehouses remain today, including Paragon Supply, which was established in 1888. The rear of their building includes ramps and doors which formerly led to its Erie Canal docks.

Brown-Lipe-Chapin set up a larger factory across Geddes Street from its original building in the early 20th century. The original building, seen at right in 2005, was last occupied up until around 2002 and is vacant today. General Motors acquired Brown-Lipe in 1923 and continued to make gears and differentials. The building was given a generically renamed the General Motors factory. The building was renovated in the early 1990s but appears to still lack tenants. A sign on the side advertises available space of up to ...

On the same block, where Fowler High School stands today, there was once a massive manufacturing complex, with 18 buildings covering 34 acres. It housed the Franklin Car Company until the company closed in 1934. Three years later, it became the first Syracuse site for Carrier Corporation, where it remained until 1947.

West Onondaga and other lost treasures

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, West Onondaga Street was one of Syracuse's finest streets, along with James Street and West Genesee Street. Stately houses and trees lined all three streets, but West Onondaga was the widest and most spacious of them. Unfortunately, as Syracuse declined, its most affluent citizens abandoned these avenues for the suburbs and for the Sedgwick neighborhood, Syracuse's final enclave of wealth within its city limits. Elegant manors were demolished or suffered an even more ignominious fate - being carved up into rooming houses and shoebox apartments. West Genesee Street became "Automobile Row," home of many of Syracuse's car dealerships. James Street saw much of its length near downtown torn out and replaced by bland office buildings. West Onondaga and the South Side became home to much of Syracuse's poor population, displaced from downtown by urban renewal and construction of the interstate highways. Decrepit neighborhoods like this will never come back even as houses and buildings fall to neglect and arson. Developers are understandably reluctant to invest in neighborhoods they perceive as crime-ridden and City Hall doesn’t want to devote scarce resources to a portion of the city with a low and declining tax base, despite the passionate and sincere efforts of neighborhood organizations like Syracuse United Neighbors.

Today, West Onondaga is a corridor of blight. Southwest of downtown, it quickly turns into vacant storefronts with faded "For Sale or Lease" signs, run-down houses and abandoned apartment buildings that have virtually all of their windows shattered. A small former bank which last housed a United Way office is still imposing but vacant. Between them are often empty lots where buildings once proudly stood but finally decayed beyond repair before being demolished.

One of the few bright spots on the street is 377, which was converted by passionate tenants into Syracuse's only co-op building and renamed, naturally, the Co-Op Building.

Unfortunately, directly across the street are two battered and bruised survivors of West Onondaga's downturn, an abandoned apartment building at 360 and its next door neighbor, 366. 366 was built for George Whedon in 1892, either to replace or to supplement his 1890 home at 672 West Onondaga. The house is a spectacular piece of 19th century Queen Anne architecture with ornate friezes, shingle siding and a stone foundation. Seized by the city for non-payment of taxes in 1989, it was vacant and boarded up like many of its neighbors until 2005.

These are two of the vacant apartment buildings at 735 and 664. Both have entrances flanked by carved stone pilasters and topped with pediments. Note the friezes above the windows on 735 and the mostly intact finial urns atop 664's roof parapets. Other fine touches on 664 likely included a curved transom or fanlight made with leaded and beveled glass over the doors. If that still exists, it is now hidden behind the waferboard. Such transoms can still be found over similar but properly maintained apartment buildings of similar vintage like 600 James Street and the "Wolverine" on North Townsend Street.

A handful of lovingly restored houses sit in stark contrast with the numerous eyesores.