Why is everyone so hard on Norristown?

[cjg332]

I recently bought a house here and I like it here.

Do you guys have specific complaints?

[shiloh]

I used to live in Norristown but left more than 15 years ago. I lived and worked there for more than 10 years. Some parts of town are fine, but when I was there, much of the central part of the borough, a lot of the East End and a fair area of the West End were often downright dangerous at night. Lots of street crime. Lots of panhandlers, petty thieves and vandalism. I lived on Markley Street, not far from the Eisenhower school. Not the worst area in town, but not the best either. The school district was a mess, particularly the schools in the borough (and the high school). The borough government was corrupt (just look up former Mayor Ted LeBlanc and borough manager Anthony Biondi for just a small flavor of borough government in action). Other than that it was great.

Seriously though, I hope things have changed in the many years since I left the borough. I'm glad you like it there and wish you well -- Norristown needs more good citizens.

[Vsgiovinazzo]

I recently bought a house here and I like it here.

Do you guys have specific complaints?

There are some really bad areas...just know what areas to stay away from ( trust me )

[sykopompos]

I try to stay out of norristown as best as I can, even try to avoid driving through it. I had friends that have lived there. I remember trying to find a friend's place and driving thru a intersection where there was alot of people than hearing gun shots and then they were all gone. I had another friend who lived down there and multiple times I seen seen fights were guns were drawn (thankfully no one shot) to end arguments. After that the only reason I go down there is to go to the courthouse or treeline sports. There are some nice parts of it but I still rather avoid it.

[cjg332]

Thanks for the input! Here is what i replied to someone else in a PM

yeah i know the area well and grew up around here but not in Norristown itself. I live near the zoo, and i know the "bad" areas. I stay away from them when i can, but you can get some of the best authentic Mexican food in those areas.

I guess my point was that like philly, it has good areas and bad areas. I just didn't like how a lot of the posters were referring to it when the were from Chester and bucks counties. One guy had his profile listed as Bridgeport ( just over the river) witch is like the armpit of Upper Merrion, and he commented negatively about Norristown as well. I guess they think there better cause they are associated with King of Prussia. I will admit that they did dress up 4th street (Bridgeport's Main st) a bit recently, but they are dressing up Norristown too. Its a slower process because its bigger and doesn't have UM to help it out. The Dekalb St beautification society has done a pretty good job on the south side of Dekalb. Also US Maintenance in conjunction with Center Studio has put millions of dollars into rehabbing the old abandoned Ports of the World building bringing up the North Side of Norristown. Abandoned breweries are now new self storage areas. We just need to get rid of all the crappy Chinese places and check cashing facilities. Drugs are a problem everywhere. I truly believe the the problem isnt supply. As long as there is a demand for drugs, "entrepreneurs" will find a way. When i was a young little pothead, we used to get all of our weed in KoP. Also, The Montco DA Risa Ferman headed a huge joint effort on a drug bust recently check it out here:

http://da.montcopa.org/da/CWP/View.asp?a=1625&q=84526


Overall, Norristown is a great place to get really good food. There inst much of a night life here yet, but that wont happen until people stop stereotyping Norristown as a blight on Montco. It wasn't that long ago that there was no night life in Center City either.

I think the biggest crime here is the property taxes. haha.

[Remington788]

Bridgeport is a borough unto itself. It is not part of Upper Merion Township. King of Prussia is a postal designation, there is no town.

Bridgeport has its own government, police department, fire companies, its own little league. Its school district merged with Upper Merion many years ago to form the Upper Merion AREA School District.

[goforbroke]

I've lived in Norristown my entire life minus my brief stay in Philly for a couple years. It's really not that bad but there are certain parts majority of people have no business traveling through unless you are looking for something......

Definitely not the best school district in Montgomery county because I think they are in the bottom tier of the bracket. Unfortunately that is nothing new. I plan on moving before I have children so they get a better education.

It's interesting a few people mentioned hearing gun shots on numerous occasions. I haven't really heard many gunshots through the years.

Words of caution or even a heads up a good portion of people in N-town are carrying whether it be legal or illegal. This is more directed to the guys "hanging" around doing nothing on the streets. On that note nobody is really going to mess with you unless you are looking for trouble. The town is really dead at night into the weeeee hours of the morning. Once in a while I go for MTB rides at 1AM or 3AM and nobody is really outside besides the few drug addicts, but they won't bother you.

[carrguy1]

As most have said there are some parts that are OK and some that aren't. I've never lived there but I've driven through enough to know when you are in a bad part.

A few years ago I was coming home from a wedding from a part of the town I wasn't familiar with and the GPS told me to drive down a narrow, one way street. I had my wife, brother-in-law, and his finace with me. It was dark. I could tell that the row homes weren't nicely kept. People were all over the street, sitting on front steps, roaming around. There was a car parked but running pointed the wrong way on the street and since it was a narrow, one lane, one way street, there was no way for me to get through. I couldn't even see if there was anyone in it because the headlights were on and pointed at me. My normal reaction to this kind of behavior is WTF is going on, move your car a*hole, start beeping my horn etc. I didn't beep because I already had a bad vibe. I waited a little while and it was like the longer I sat there the more restless the people were getting, looking at us, starting to walk toward us. It was like when you're hunting on a farm and you walk through a cow pasture, all the cows get interested and start walking toward you (that is not meant to be a racial metaphor, just a regular metaphor). I decided it would be best if I backed out of the street and found a different way.

On a more regular basis I drive up Markley St. toward Germantown Pk. I don't know what it is with the people that hang around there in the afternoon/rush hour but they will seriously just walk off the curb into the street, not even at a cross walk with traffic coming at them. It's like they're daring cars to hit them. I had about 5 little kids, maybe 6-10 years old jump out in front of me one day from in between parked cars. If I didn't have good brakes they all would have been done.

[BenP]

Based on facebook postings, most of the shots fired happen around Kohn st even though I usually don't hear them. The only time I heard shots is when some guy got shot out front of my apartment at 3am.