Blog Log Digital

Posted by “Jeff” on wormtowntaxi.com
Nowhere, however, can I find any reportage of Mr. Antonio Hernandez, the owner of the El Delicioso food truck, the center of all this attention and clearly the one person that both WoMag and the T&G should have spent some shoe leather in seeking out and interviewing. Surely the opportunities for such a simple and basic journalistic venture have been more than ample over the past year.

Everybody knows where he is every week.

Unfortunately, however, the media muffins in this town have only one basic agenda for Main South, ie- promoting how dangerous it is. From the looks of the permanent record here, they actually believe their negative propaganda concerning Main South, as well… to the point of being too scared, apparently, to actually enter the area and try to get an interview with the star of the show.

How useful is the garage?

Long-awaited news this morning that the Union Station garage is now open. So what that it didn’t happen last week, like we were told (last week). Monday is close enough.

But one thing struck us immediately:

“The garage will be open from 6 a.m. to midnight.”

Does this just mean you can only enter at those times, or does it mean open as in…open?

The problem is that 6am-12am means that if you want to take the first train to Boston, you have to park elsewhere as it leaves at 5:43. And if you want a late night out, forget about taking the last train home: it gets in at 1:30am. Hey, just chill at the Kenmore Diner for 5 hours, and you’ll be all set.

Nevermind the fact that we’ve been repeatedly told that the garage will partially alleviate parking concerns for businesses in the Canal District area.  It will—as long as patrons leave by the time their carriage turns into a pumpkin.

We’ll be heading over sometime soon to grab photos of the garage.  They promise to be thrilling.

Top cities not named ‘Worcester’ for $500

Money magazine just released their list of the top 100 small cities in America (doesn’t it seem like they release a different version of the same list every other week?) and big surprise………Worcester didn’t make the grade.

Actually, the only cities in Massachusetts that did make the top 100 are Brookline, Newton, and Waltham.  And only one other city in New England (West Hartford, CT) made the list.

But what’s really interesting is to see how Worcester stacks up against the cities countrywide that did get recognized.

Among the highlights(note: some of these statistics seem a bit off by our account, so take them with a grain of salt):

• Worcester’s family purchasing power, at $55,441 is almost 50% of the Best Cities’ Average(BCA): $107,483.
• Similarly, the BCA for Job Growth % between 2000-2007 was 18.72%.  For Worcester? 9.87%
• Worcester has fewer colleges/universities/professional schools than the BCA: 27 to 49
• Other things Worcester lags in(within either 15 or 30 miles): Movie Theaters (16 to 51); Restaurants (1,454 to 4,094); Bars (141 to 408); Libraries (57 to 89); and (11 to 13).  We do, however, have more Ski resorts within 100 miles: 41 to 33.
• While Worcester’s BMI average is on par with the best 100 cities, we have higher rates of hypertension and diabetes
• The city has significantly lower rates of married citizens (38.9% to 57.5%) and residents who have completed at least some college(55.1% to 73.7%)
• Our racial diversity is rated a 90.6, below the national average of 100 and below the BCA of 104.2
• On the positive side, Worcester has a higher Air Quality Index (76.7% to 75.9%) a shorter commute (17.4 to 23 minutes) and more dollars spent on art per person (2.1 to 1.5)

What do you think?  How does Worcester measure up?