<p>As a (somewhat) native New Orleanian, I think there has been a huge misconception about how bad the crime is in the city of New Orleans and around Tulane in general. Is it too much? Yes. Is it worse than most US cities? No. I came across this today on Forbes.com</p>
<p>Americas Most Dangerous Cities (from Forbes Magazine 2009)</p>
<p>15) Philadelphia, PA ----University of Pennsylvania and Temple and Drexel
14)Charlotte, NC ----Davidson College
13)West Palm Beach, Fla
12)Baton Rouge, La ----LSU
11)New Orleans, La ----Tulane University and Loyola New Orleans
10)Baltimore, Md ----Johns Hopkins University
9) Nashville, Tenn ----Vanderbilt University
8)Charleston, SC ----College of Charleston and The Citadel
7)Little Rock, Ark
6)Orlando, Fla ----University of Central Florida
5)Stockton, Cali
4)Las Vegas, Nev ----UNLV
3)Miami, Fla ----University of Miami
2)Memphis, Tenn ----Rhodes College
1)Detroit, Mich</p>
<p>*The stats used were defined as Violent Crimes by the FBI (murder and non-negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault) </p>
<p>I placed the names of schools located in those cities to show that Tulane is no more dangerous than a lot of other universities in urban areas. Keep in mind that Forbes was not ranking the most dangerous college towns but instead just the most dangerous cities. If you wouldn't send your kid to Penn or Vandy or Johns Hopkins due to crime then I understand avoiding New Orleans. Otherwise, I think this puts the city into perspective and shows that New Orleans, for all its problems, is sadly only following a national trend. New Orleans did not even make their top 10. Hope this helps.</p>
<p>It’s not so much that a school is in a dangerous city that concerns most parents as it does when a school is in a dangerous neighborhood. The most dangerous parts of some of the safer cities have more problems than the safer areas of those cities considered dangerous. </p>
<p>I love Chicago and find the down town a great place to be, but the area around UCH was pretty raunchy some years ago. Hopkins Medical schools is in a lousy area. Also it depends on how the campus is situated in the neighborhood. THough parts of the Bronx around Fordham U is not considered so great, the campus itself feels very secure. There are parts of UPitt that abut some dangerous projects. Those things are what can make the difference in feeling safe or not.</p>
<p>That’s a great point. I guess since New Orleans isn’t that large of a city and the fact that the poorer and richer areas are so dispersed throughout the city it’s unique in that sense. Tulane and Loyola aren’t in a bad area or good area because there aren’t really bad or good areas of town. There might be one block of one street here or there that is worse than another, but no real ‘bad parts of town.’</p>
<p>Note that the University of Miami is not actually located in the city of Miami, but rather the upscale suburb of Coral Gables, FL. My UMiami kid is considering Tulane for grad school.</p>
<p>This list is a joke. I have lived in Memphis, Charleston and currently Nashville and there is no way any of this is accurate. Birmingham, Al should be on this list as well as Atlanta and St. Louis.</p>
<p>I was definitely surprised St. Louis and Birmingham weren’t on the list. I have family in B’ham and used to live in St. Louis.</p>
<p>Apparently Memphis only had 2 (per 100,000 popul) violent crimes less than Detroit. Keep in mind too that this isn’t murder alone but instead is murder and non-negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery and aggravated assault.</p>
<p>Parents will always worry about crime, and some kids will always want urban schools. It really depends on a family’s experiences with urban living. Just being in the city makes some suburbanites uneasy.
My d goes to school in Milwaukee, and her beautiful campus borders some dangerous areas. Another thing to look at is the university’s response to safety. D’s school has a great LIMO ride program during the night hours, as well as many other initiatives. And I don’t think the kids feel like they have to stay on campus in order to be safe – there’s a lot of nightlife they go out and explore. It takes “urban smarts,” which some kids don’t have. I am happy to report that crime is way down around her school, and has been declining for years. But I know parents who won’t even let their kids take a look at the school.</p>
<p>Not trying to kill the messenger at all, I am just recalling my experiences as a medical student, resident and physician and witnessing the victims of some pretty awful crimes that came into the ER in Charleston, Birmingham, Memphis, Long Beach,CA and Nashville in particular. I think that is more accurate than a Forbes list. Memphis and Birmingham were the worst, followed by Charleston, and in Nashville we get a lot of trauma but not nearly as many shootings or stabbings as many of those cities on the “list”. We get some pretty bad accident victims, but not nearly the amount of victims of violent crimes compared to some of those cities.
I also think that Memphis should be fairly high on the rape list and sadly even in "nice’ residential areas of Memphis few people feel safe enough to go walking or running unless they have a dog with them. The entire time I lived there I almost never saw anyone out walking or running. In Nashville it is unusual to no see people out walking or running.
I am also surprised to see that places like Compton, Long Beach, Inglewood and many other inner city areas in the LA area were not listed. USC is in a horrible location, for example.
That is why I think this list is totally inaccurate</p>
<p>Refer back to posts #2 and #10. What is said here relates very much to the area near USC, and how USC responds to the community it is in.</p>
<p>My H is on faculty there and I think the only time he had concern, and rightfully so due to the randomness and conflagration of the violence, was during the riots of 1992. Interestingly enough, USC came though that unscathed, and why? It’s because USC spend sweat equity and cash to make connections to that neighborhood and some of those locals end up attending USC. Thinking back in hindsight, I believe if there was a big threat to the campus, some large parts of that neighborhood would have fought back. They didn’t want to soil their nest.</p>
<p>hope4freeride, I do understand what you mean. The list does seem somewhat strange.</p>
<p>Keep in mind though that drugs shift through areas over time and crime follows those waves. Had you done your residency in New Orleans, for example, 15 years ago you might have the wrong impression of the city. For instance, I moved to New Orleans in 1992. It was the murder capital of the country by far. In fact, they say the high murder rate we achieved that year will never be duplicated by any city in the US again. New Orleans cleaned up with the help of the FBI, the new police chief, and time. </p>
<p>My family in Birmingham are afraid to go into certain parts of town. I think that is the point where this list is causing confusion. I’ve gotten the impression from family in B’ham that violent crime is contained to certain areas. The FBI stats may incorporate surrounding ‘suburn cities’ that offset the data. I’m not sure if they do. If they included Mountain Brook and Vestavia Hills, it would have negated a lot of crime that occurred in Birmingham proper. Also, if you worked in or near the ER, you wouldn’t have seen the people that died on the streets or those that went to another trauma center. In New Orleans, high trauma patients were routed to Charity over Tulane, LSU, Oschner, ect. Frankly, Birmingham may have not been mentioned for some other strange reason.</p>
<p>I encourage you to visit the link I posted above to see how the FBI stats are compiled. I noticed that some cities are separated in the ‘ranking’ by only a couple violent acts. There may be enough rapes, ect. to offset the number of murders in another town. Man, this is becoming a depressing thread. </p>
<p>Anyways, the spirit of the thread was to address concern about New Orleans in particular due to the rise in crime that occurred directly after Hurricane Katrina and was (and rightfully so) covered by the national media. What bothers most New Orleanians is that after the crime went way down after the gangs had had their fights over territory, no one ever mentions that the city is much safer now. While I understand it’s not ‘sexy news’ it’s important because cities like New Orleans depend on tourism and Universities in New Orleans depend on parents being able to let their kids come down here for college.</p>
Here’s the link: [America’s</a> Most Dangerous Cities -