Like I said, it is no issue to me, play with the numbers any way you wish.

As w/ anything else... There are areas which may be a bit more dangerous in NY. A friend of ours got shot in by a snipper in Brooklyn last summer (a couple of days after telling us how cool Brooklyn was and that we definitely should come visit.) 

Our tattoo artist was telling us how he heard gun shots a couple of nights a week when he lived in Queens.

Here in Manhattan, I saw a man running on 42nd between cars w/ a 12 gage last summer, policemen after him. And of course, there was the shooting this morning near the Empire State Building. 

There are places I'd avoid, but as Sharke points out, it is a very densely populated place.

You guys are just bitter NYC barely made the top 10. I mean excuses like "population density" and "murders-per-capita." Why not murders per square mile? It is all in how one chooses to work the figures.

scook


Like I said, it is no issue to me, play with the numbers any way you wish. 

How is that playing w/ numbers? Of course there's bound to be bigger numbers when there's more inhabitants. 


184 murders in Chicago, close to 3 millions inhabitants. New York is more than twice as populated (8 millions) and counts 277. 


Unless those 277 are strictly random bystanders getting shot, there's bound to be husbands killing their wives, domestic violence, gangs and drug dealers fighting each others, and such in there.

But If a woman is married to a lunatic, she's just as much in danger whether she lives in NY or in some remote location. And in neither cases does her lunatic husband poses a threat to the rest of the inhabitants.


In NY, she'd be one of the 277 on 8 millions. In a small town, she'd be one of 2 or 3 on 30 000.

The difference between total shootings and per-capita shootings is not "playing with the numbers," it's a crucial distinction. Per-capita tells you how likely it is that YOU will be shot in one area as opposed to another. I think places like NYC get a reputation purely because when you have so many people crowded into such a small area, you're obviously going to get a lot of messed up stuff happening, which when spread over a larger area of the country wouldn't raise so many eyebrows. 

Yeah certain areas of New York have always been and will always be dangerous. In some neighborhoods you can't let your kids out to play without worrying about them being hit by a stray bullet. It's amazing how stark the contrast is, even between one avenue and another. I'm on Avenue C in Manhattan which is pretty safe (although it wasn't 15 years ago), yet one block over to Avenue D is another matter. I hear shots from the projects over there all the time. The projects are situated in the oddest places in Manhattan, like over on 9th Avenue you have one nestled right between streets containing boutique lofts and luxury doorman buildings. There are murders there all the time. I can't imagine what it must be like to pay $1million+ for an apartment, only to step out of your front door into a project setting every day. 

Incidentally I was on the scene of the ESB shooting this morning, came out of the Herald Square station about 15 minutes after it happened, saw the craziness over on 5th and had to go investigate. It was pretty mad stuff. Nothing gets the adrenaline rushing like a New York "incident" with cops and sirens and people shouting and screaming. 

Are those the population figures SMSA or political boundaries or what? Bear in mind the FBI numbers are under reported and we would need to do a quite bit more research to really get to the heart of NYC's murder problem.

Rain

Unless those 277 are strictly random bystanders getting shot, there's bound to be husbands killing their wives, domestic violence, gangs and drug dealers fighting each others, and such in there.

I think the vast majority of shootings in New York are of the "one thug shoots another" variety. It seems like in most cases, the victim has a colorful criminal background so the feeling is it was bound to happen to him sooner or later. When I first moved here I was a little perturbed by the shootings and felt a little threatened by it, now I've come to realize that the gangs are just perpetually shooting each other, and as long as I don't get myself involved in any of that crap, I'm going to be pretty safe. 

scook


Are those the population figures SMSA or political boundaries or what? Bear in mind the FBI numbers are under reported and we would need to do a quite bit more research to really get to the heart of NYC's murder problem.

If such is the case, wouldn't it be the same for every other city we're comparing NY to?

Per-capita would tell you how likely something would happen within a population not within an area. I would imagine "per square mile" would be a measurement related to area. I suppose you could mash up persons per square mile and get some kind of figure. That what makes stats so much fun. Anecdotes notwithstanding, I still think you guys are bitter about being so unhip.

I think a place could only be cool if the masses didn't know it was cool (or, even better, if the masses didn't even know about it at all!).