Here people can view the 65 most dangerous major U.S. cities for 2019:
As should be expected, New York City does not appear. Worsening crime in NYC since 2019 represents a deeply concerning change. However, New York remains an admirably safe location by large U.S. city standards:
This is misleading. Almost all of Staten Island, most of Queens, half of Brooklyn, and even pockets of the Bronx are low density urban or high density suburban in feel and layout. There are endless blocks of single family and duplex homes that blend in with places like Nassau and Westchester counties. Rather than take Manhattan alone (or, relevant to this discussion, Morningside Heights alone), we take an eight million person municipality and compare it to no name cities like Akron and Bridgeport that are tiny, insular, and more homogenous. There isn’t a major cultural trope for your children to move to Akron or rust belt upstate NY towns to pursue their dreams.
Up until the current Mayor/City Council and State government, implemented various changes to policing, the justice system and the homeless……the City felt safe. Although there have always been homeless on the streets, they were generally not aggressive. Criminals and predators generally were concerned about being arrested and prosecuted and thus generally refrained from criminal activities in most parts of Manhattan. There was a general feeling of safety and security on the streets and in the subways. That feeling is gone.
Of course I am making generalizations and there are exceptions.
For those of us who would spend time in Manhattan on a regular bases, the City now feels dangerous. You have to be on your toes at all times, and even that wont always help you. Want examples?….you can find plenty.
The homeless population is higher, they are much more aggressive and violent. There are clearly a lot more people with mental illness on the streets.
The real criminals and predators do not fear arrest or prosecution. The justice system has become a revolving door and the police have taken a much more hands off approach.
You can disagree with me, but my opinion is based on my observations and experience….and I assure you most regular NYC visitors and residents would agree with me.
I am hopeful and optimistic that positive changes will start in January. I have a D starting grad school in the city next year.
Having said all that, FOR NOW I would think twice before sending an 18 year old kid to college in NYC, Chicago, St. Louis, LA, Atlanta and other cities in similar peril.
Okay, let’s try it your way. In 2020, the “Murder Rate” in Morningside Heights (26th Police Precinct) was 4.04 murders per 100,000. https://maps.nyc.gov/crime/. Let’s see how that compares:
Looks like Morningside Heights is much safer than any of these places.
That’s really low, to introduce measurable facts. 
I don’t necessarily disagree with you. Not completely. I am a consummate New Yorker; my nose bleeds the moment I cross the Delaware river; I hate driving; I think of Queens as a suburb. But, IMHO, I think the pandemic had a lot to do with it. That was when the middle-class abandoned the subway system in droves. The city did everything it could to keep the homeless out of the tunnels and train cars. It even shut the system down after 2A.M. which was something we thought only happened in Boston. Ridership is back up, but a sense of foreboding still hangs over it. It’s going to take a while for The City as a whole to regain its swagger
4.04 in 100,000 is a crazy rate. Certainly higher than almost all suburbs and rural towns. Bridgeport, despite Wikipedia sanitizing its formation, was a planned low income community. Akron is an economically blighted area that will never recover. Both are basket cases beyond repair, I am unimpressed morningside heights is safer than two of America’s biggest mess ups. Regarding St. Louis, people have complained about the city rates being used when a county rate is more appropriate. Regardless, anyone familiar with Japanese or Singapore violent crime rates would find you are numb to staggering levels of criminality and barbarity
Not exactly measurable. The NYT ran an annual “hospitalization rates for gun violence show police departments are under reporting crime for political ends” expose until about 2014.
I think until you post 2020 figures from a more reliable source than the FBI, those comparative numbers will do.
I suspect political pressure to “round down” exists in all of those places, including those with the highest counts!
Filmmaker, Michael Moore would agree with you.
Let’s keep politics out as much as possible. Suffice it to say the pressures in nyc are of a far different nature than St. Louis or Akron, which don’t have electoral choice in any meaningful sense. Hence they remain dysfunctional places with zero chance of substantial recovery
This type of a relationship between a city and its surrounding area would seem to describe Los Angeles even more so than New York City. Nonetheless, LA reports a murder rate 2.7 times greater than that of NYC.
I am unsure if you mean LA the city or LA county. Either way, LA has unique crime sources and history among major American cities. Downtown proper is relatively small, and there are only a couple of other highly dense, vertical urban areas in LA county many of which are very safe (e.g. century city). It is an interlocking set of suburbs, many of which are afflicted with violence and gangs. People often mistake it’s denser suburb layout with safety.
Sound like a good resolution to have:
Ahem?
Reading all these replies, it sounds as if mitigating factors exist for the much higher crime rates in every other part of the country mentioned by other posters - somehow leaving just MoHi with its moderate rates (even within NYC) to stand out as a real-life Gotham City. 
According to NYC Crime Map, it’s more risky for suburbanites to visits shows on Broadway, visit the 9/11 memorial, catch the boat to Lady Liberty, or go shopping or visit the xmas tree on 5th Avenue - vs. attending Columbia University.
“As much as possible”. These stats underreport
It is not inconsistent. I recommend most students go to college in the suburbs or a rural area. The former should provide easy access to urban life in many cases. Those parks, concerts, restaurants, and amenities can be accessed in Ann Arbor. Trust me, I am not telling any American youth to set foot in Akron or Gary or Flint or Compton.
That’s fair enough. There’s nothing wrong with your absolute personal preference for rural/suburbian campuses.
Thank you for explaining your motivation behind this exchange.
Is it? If murders per 100,000 are the measure, then Morningside Heights is safer than the whole of New York City, New York State, the United States, all of which have murder rates which are higher than MH. It is also safer than 35 individual states, including rural states such as North Dakota, South Dakota and Montana.
Four homicides per 100K is too many. Even one would be too many. But relative to the rest of the nation, it is far from “a crazy rate.” There are many great colleges located in cities and towns with much higher rates. Are you careful to warn away parents who want to send their kids to all these schools too? Or do you just have a problem with urban areas like South Chicago and Upper Manhattan?
Recall that you are the one who wanted to use Morningside Heights in the comparison with the cities on that list. You claimed that using NYC was inaccurate because “almost all of Staten Island, most of Queens, half of Brooklyn, and even pockets of the Bronx are low density urban or high density suburban in feel and layout” and they “blend in with places like Nassau and Westchester counties.”
Yet now that it turns out that Morningside Heights is not only significantly safer than all the cities on the list, but is also safer than NYC as a whole, you move the goalposts and insist that we compare Morningside Heights to rural and suburban settings? Last I was there, it was neither.
But even if you compare Morningside Heights to small non-suburban cities nationwide, MH is again safer than average. According to FBI stats, for 2019 Non-Suburban Cities with populations between 25K and 50K had a murder rate of 4.8 per 100,000.
Yes, it is; East Asians think we are full of barbarians and fools who enable said barbarians. They would never tolerate any of the murder rates you describe.
Let’s assume your deflated 4 in 100k is accurate, which for many basic reasons it is not. The notion of random acts of violence in ND, SD, MT is laughable. The murders there are generally infra-familial or crimes of passion. Some roustabout isn’t mugging anyone in Fargo or selling weed then stabbing the 18 year old girl. Students there have no reason to be concerned even if they post a 4 in 100k too.
I don’t appreciate telling 18 year olds to live out their fantasy of being like the cool people on “Friends” or “Seinfeld” while glibly explaining away horrific crime in Morningside Heights, an area that is distinctly unpleasant, crime or no crime. I mentioned some urban neighborhoods on this thread that are safe and nice to go to school in, please read. Given the utter cluster mess of American cities, yes most 18 year olds should avoid them when possible. It’s also incredible how people lose their minds over saying American cities are in the gutter on any sane measure and feel the need to censor any such claim.