no.

>Also, who wants to spend $20+ for NYC?

Well, I mean, people spend $1,000s just to spend 1 week wandering around Manhattan.

Anyway, I like NYC. I like NJ too. Let's not have ugly little sister syndrome, that's Connecticut.

Haven't noticed.

I really do not mind the NYC posting, but the pork roll / Taylor ham post are just a waste of time.

I love Jersey just as much as the next guy but let’s not pretend there’s a ton of shit to do within 100 miles of NYC

I mean, you talk about all the things to do in Jersey, but then you don't mention any of them.

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|| Well, I mean, people spend $1,000s just to spend 1 week wandering around Manhattan.

You got me there.

>Also, who wants to spend $20+ for NYC?

Literally millions of people every year.

Nyc sucks

And each and every one of them descends on Times Square at the exact moment that I'm just trying to get back to the Port Authority.

And I kind of love to hate it!

>Like our state isn't just a transit hub for NYC.

Right. It's one for Philly as well. /s

NYCs proximity is a huge part of NJ culture, like it or not pal.

Nj actually is a transit hub for NY.

Ugh! NYC is a draw for living in northern nj, relative quick and close access to major cities is what keep nj from being Ohio On The Atlantic. Yes promote NJ; we have lots to offer but there’s no reason to ignore the golden cows within arms reach

wish jersey was as walkable as nyc though

It’s much more walkable here id say. No crowds of people to fight through. No chance of stepping in human feces. No crazy people screaming at you.

No way lol. Walks here can be more peaceful, cleaner, etc. but I mean more like getting from place to place by public transit. I just hate how car centric a lot of parts of Jersey are, even the more urban parts. But I guess that’s the rest of America not including NYC and a few other cities

I hope by “walkable” you don’t mean a suburban cul de sac

What is the definition of walkable

What is the definition of walkable

I'm from there and it was just recently I recognized how much of a thing it was. My true beef with people outside of here though is the reality shows portraying what they think we are.

East Bergen/Hudson County is basically another NYC borough.

Okay that’s definitely a different story. Yes, one of the rare things NYC has over NJ is it’s public transit system.

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You can walk all over Manhattan.

I think you should start with your definition then we can go from there.

You can’t walk all over New Jersey?

I’m thinking nice safe places to walk with some scenery along the way possibly. If you mean walkability in terms of transportation instead of cars then yes it’s not as good as nyc in some areas

It’s the greatest City in the world. It’s the cultural and financial center of our country. If you are from North Jersey, NYC is in your DNA because of proximity and because your parents or grandparents came from one of the Boroughs. I was the first person on both sides of a large family to be born in NJ and not a Borough.

No NYC: no Jersey bagels, deli, Chinese food and so many other things.

Yeah that’s more just walking as recreation or leisure which also exists in nyc but generally “walkable” means able to meet some or all of your daily needs within walking distance of your home such as employment, grocery stores, restaurant, entertainment, etc.

So many high end towns would not exist if not for Wall Street and Midtown. Like Ridgewood and Summit would be hick towns if not for Wall Street.

You cannot do anything without a car in most of NJ with the exception of commuter towns like Hoboken and Jersey City. Walking is almost entirely recreational and not functional

Yes

Side comment but I grew up in NJ and never knew Taylor Ham vs pork roll was a thing until this sub. I guess that’s what having immigrant parents does.

Ah okay I see. Although wouldn’t that be canceled out by NYC being about as drivable as NJ is walkable? Manhattan at least. Like you can walk to the grocery store there but you have to walk with a weeks worth of food piled up in your arms all the way home

The trick is making smaller more frequent trips and then there’s a plethora of transit options as well that are not available in NJ if you want to do larger bulk buys.

I think I’d still have to take New Jersey. There’s probably more areas here that are both walkable and drivable at the same time. The last two places I’ve lived in the amboys almost all my needs were in walking distance, had train stations and were also right next to the parkway and turnpike. I’d have to go with that combo over superior walkability

also food, museums, street life, access to daily necessities, public events....

We have better food & access to every necessity lol

We definitely don’t have better food, we don’t have as diverse of a selection of food that’s for sure. NJ is not more walkable by any means either.

For instance: from my office in midtown, i can walk to 5 different ramen places within 15 minutes. From my home in north/central jersey, there are two ramen spots that are both 20+ minute drives.

If you don’t like that the city is crowded that’s one thing, but just say that then

I just typed in ramen to my Apple Maps and 11 places popped up in my area lol

It’s almost like your little slice of Jersey isn’t indicative of the entire state, “lol”

That was also just an example. The food in manhattan is more diverse and generally accepted to be better, that shouldn’t really need any justification.

One of the best parts of the state, and one of our defining characteristics, is proximity to manhattan.

I randomly dropped a pin in a part of the state, somewhere called “penns neck” and searched ramen. 5 places with ramen in the name and 2 others that appear to be sushi + ramen. Our food is just as diverse. The only food I’ve had in NYC that was better than anything in NJ or unavailable here is Kenyan.

And NYC mass transit prices are a fraction of NJ equivalents. The MTA system is the least expensive per mile in the world.

I just dropped one by me. 24 hits - up to 20 miles away, with chinese/sushi spots (not actual dedicated ramen spots)

Food is incomparable imo, although we do have some gems. I’d put NJs food above a ton of/almost all cities/states i’ve been to. I do love it here, but from a food/culture standpoint to me we are more or less a byproduct of the vast amount of food/culture in the city

I despise NYC. It’s loud, it smells bad, it’s expensive, there are too few trees, and it gives me anxiety. I’ll stay up in my Sussex mountains barefoot in the woods, thank you very much.

Edit: downvote all you like, but this is an opinion (which everyone is entitled to) that’s not directed at anyone person and is a completely valid view.

I’ve seen pictures of what it was like down there (I’m up in Sussex so everything is “down there”) before the boom and I gotta say- I think it looked much better. Farms, pastures, trees, etc.

Fact.

NYC is better than NJ but California smokes them both

you cannot claim Italian pastry and pizza. There is an endemic Italian population here in NJ that was making and selling those products to the public at the same time as their New York counterparts— most of them never lived in NYC

you're missing the point. you have access to food an necessitites, but would you feel the same way if you were underage/disabled/unable to afford a car? you are restricted to the ~3 miles around you, which is often not more than a few strip malls, some of which are across very dangerous roads.

yes life is fine in nj provided you can keep up on loan/lease, insurance and gas, and don't mind driving for 40 minutes to get "local ramen" 15 minutes away. but it doesn't compare to (being wealthy enough to afford) life in Manhattan, where everything you need is available within a half-mile walk from your home, and everything in the world is a 6 mile bike ride away (and you don't have to take your life in your hands biking on highways to get around).

So in this hypothetical someone can afford to live in Manhattan but not be able to afford a car? Sure NYC is better than NJ if you don’t feel like hiring a driver

I live in Arizona now but I'm from Howell. People seem to think NJ only borders NY. It does drive me nuts when they hear I'm from NJ and think I know New York, or shocked when people find out I'm a Phillies fan. In terms of food I do think the Pork Roll is the only NJ traditional food (Maybe Tomato pie but that seems to only be a Trenton area thing). Yes I wish NJ would market its own identity. I mean Connecticut is able to distance its self from its neighbors, maybe NJ should try as well.

Bruh I really appreciating you spitting mad factoids. Keep it up. You might be the best commenter so far

Also, the people who talk about the jobs in NYC despite NJ having plenty of white collar jobs (and you can live under 10 minute drive to them).

I'm curious if it's New Yorkers downvoting you or if it's Jersey folk for some reason.

Probably NJ people who live/work in NYC and are offended by my opinion.

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I concur: they used to have an old world charm to them based on pictures.
Now it just feels old and cramped.
The finance industry could, also, be decentralized within a few decades.

Bruh I think this thread got jacked by New Yorkers.

I don't see any ill taste in your comment.

Nearly all of our state looked like that before NY and Philly dwellers moved out of crowded Boroughs in search of a better quality of life. Jersey would have built up even if 95% of those people didn’t commute. My home town isn’t a big commuter town but the population is probably 4x what it was when I was born. It exploded because people fled the growing crime in Paterson and Passaic to a safer place. That had nothing to do with NYC.

I don’t know enough about California to have a real opinion, but my experience is it’s so thoroughly not walkable it makes Jersey look urban.

But maybe i just haven’t seen enough of the state

I was speaking specifically to restaurant food quality

Ahh got it, sorry!

Who hurt you bro? They both can be great and complement each other

My grandparents are from Newark and my great grandparents are from Italy so no not everyone comes from one of the boroughs. Having a cultural impact on surrounding areas isn’t the same thing as saying everyone’s family is a transplant from the city.

I think the “New Yorkers” you’re referring to are just self-aware New Jerseyans.

NYC has food (both diversity and quality), entertainment (nightlife, broadway), culture significantly above Jersey.

It’s unfair to Jersey as a state to say we have better stuff to NY in those regards. We’re great in our own regard.

Of course. My in laws were second generation and their parents entered the US in Boston. Ironically, they moved to Edison when my father in law got an insane job offer from a large corporation in the Garment district. And Edison was a much nicer place to live in the 70s than Dorchester, Massachusetts. Still is.

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Not true. The number of white collar job opportunities in Manhattan dwarf NJ in law, finance, hospitality, advertising, marketing, social media and dozens more. I tried many times to find jobs in NJ in my field and never found one.

Do you think people really want to commute to NY every day if there were opportunities in NJ? I hated commuting but would have been significantly underemployed if I didn’t.

This isn’t true. My great great parents from Italy and Germany came straight to North Jersey. That’s a big misconception that NJ people all have NY/Philly roots, a lot do not. New Jersey also makes all the food you listed better imo and it has nothing to do with New York, they all had their own food joints born and bred in Jersey.

I just replied to someone else that my in-laws parents came into the US via Boston. My father in law moved to Edison because he was offered a monster job in Manhattan. He still has a Boston accent

P.S. American Bagels originated from the Lower East Side by Jewish Polish immigrants. Not NJ. NY deli originated in the same place by German immigrants. Not New Jersey. The first pizzeria was in Boston going back to the 19th Century. Not New Jersey. The first pizzeria in NJ didn't open till 1912. American Chinese restaurants originated in California in the 1850s and came East a few decades later.

Please do your homework before making such statements.

However, I will agree that pizza and bagels are better in NJ than NYC. 2nd best pizza is New Haven.

Ok now I'm just convinced you are posting from Nebraska

Hey NY sports teams, stop playing in our state and go back to your precious New York where you belong.

What makes you think it’s the greatest city in the world?

What we think of as NY/NJ pizza was first developed in NYC though

LOL you’re upstate dreaming in Sussex? You’re basically already in the NJ version of upstate

I’m not going to get into this with you. It’s a stupid question. Most of the world feels it is.

If not NYC, then what do you think is? London? Paris? Shanghai? Tokyo? Those are good answers too.

Yeah I’d say paris personally. I like to ask people because I feel like people just default to that claim so I’m always curious what makes people think that.

OK. Paris is better than NYC in cuisine , culture and history. Hands down. Unfortunately, it is populated by Parisians who are the rudest people I’ve ever experienced in the world with the exception of Muscovites.

NYC has the 2nd best food and a much broader range of ethnic food. New York has far greater diversity. The people are way nicer than the French. You can get by in NYC if you don’t speak English whereas you can’t get the time of day in Paris if you don’t speak French. I speak high school French yet they pretend they can’t understand me.

That was a great breakdown, thanks for sharing.

Yeah lol I made this account years ago when my wife and I were planning on moving up there. Work and life ended up keeping us down here though lol

NJ needs to do like Connecticut and attract those high paying jobs. In 2017 I had to take a CT commuter train from the east to Stamford to catch an Amtrak during the AM rush hour. My trains was packed leading into Stamford and then empited out at Stamford despite the next stop being NYC. All the trains did this, going to NYC at maybe 10% capacity if that

Tomato pie originated in Connecticut. Specifically New Haven. Kind of makes your point because the whole country knows about New Haven apizza and nobody outside NJ knows about Trenton.

Forgot to mention that French wait staff in NY somehow understand my French perfectly. New York is welcoming: Paris isn’t.

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AMEN. Im from NJ and think its sacrilege to root for either the Jets Giants or the Red Bulls.

Agree. My grandparents settled in Trenton right off the boat. My parents grew up there

And all of those things originated in Europe way prior. It’s not like New York created any of those things. It still doesn’t have anything to do with New York. People are always disrepecting NJ and acting like we are a direct copycat of NY/Philly, could not be more false. The real Jersey people don’t care about NY/Philly the way everybody makes it out to be. I like both but I am not associated with them. New Jersey has it all and it is not because of NY/Philly.

Sorry. I have to disagree. The NYC bagel and pizza were different than they were in Europe. Legit American pizza (no pineapple ever) is not the same as it was in Naples. Legit American bagels are more doughy and crispier on the outside than the European version. And the practice of putting toppings on (salt, sesame, garlic) started in NYC. Cheesesteak absolutely started in Philly in the 1930s. It is uniquely American and has no European predecessors.

You seem to have a real chip on your shoulder about the origins of Jersey food. I’m happy that our state has improved on them. Fair Lawn Hot Bagels is often rated the best in the country. Anthony Bourdain rated Camden cheesesteak as better than Philly.

Disco fries are about the only food item that I can think of that was invented in NJ although some claim they are a version of poutine.

P.S. New Jersey would still be mostly farmland if not for those 2 cities.

I completly disagree as well. If they created their own foods with their own origins then yes you fan say one has stole their culture. New York did not invent those foods, Europe did. It’s not like they created an American born food like Pecan pies or Corn dogs. No NJ would not still be farmland if it wasn’t those cities, that could not be farther from the truth. Jersey City became a city in 1618 seven years before New York City. Newark was in the 1600’s. as well. Those two cities are a large part of what makes Jersey go. You can also say how much NJ people has helped build up NYC/Philly as well with how much we have supported those cities for over 100 years. NJ is just getting started on getting revitalized and every part of this state will be.