[catblast01]

Upstate native here. Not sure I’d buy the Chicago narrative at all.

Rochester and Syracuse got their economic genesis in large part from the Erie Canal (leading to the NYC RR which terminated in Chicago), Buffalo to a relatively lesser degree but at no point was the economic magnitude of these ever in the same ballpark as Chicago which was an mercantile center long before the Rust Belt population and GDP peaking. There’s a nice recent article in the Atlantic about Kodak. Much like Pittsburgh (which is probably a more apt comparison) with US Steel and Alcoa.. Rochester relied on a oligopoly of Kodak and Xerox (that willingly gave up doing anything notable with all the great things from PARC). When they dwindled so did the city basically. Chicago has already lost even larger employers than Kodak (Sears, Motorola alone), the economy of the greater Chicago area is incomparably larger - I think even Schaumburg or Bolingbrook alone are bigger than the Rochester metro, certainly if you exclude URMC.

For the Rust Belt, Chicago was always literally the second city in terms of the railroads. So I’d argue all those cities listed prevailed in part because of Chicago.

[Steltek]

In terms of Erie Canal, didn't Buffalo have a bigger slice of the pie? Rochester isn't even really on the canal. Buffalo still has enormous artifacts of the canal industry, like the grain silos.

[catblast01]

What I meant was, since Buffalo already had access to a major waterway it’s rise wasn’t as entirely dependent on it.. ie it had other reasons for being relevant.

And are you kidding?? The Erie Canal ran right through the city (likewise Syracuse, Utica, etc) and crossed the Genesee river on an old aqueduct that is still there today and interestingly carried the short lived Rochester subway. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broad_Street_Bridge_(Rochest.... The Canal put those places on the map and the New York Central maintained them there heading into the 20th century.

[Steltek]

Ah, sorry, not a native. I know it was rerouted slowly over time but I guess my mental map had the canal much farther to the south than it is (aka, eating ice cream on the tow path in Pittsford).

[catblast01]

Yep the waterway through Pittsford was actually also the original canal but it routed north into the city.

The Erie Canal was replaced by the New York Barge canal system which avoided the cities other than NYC and was ironically much larger than the Erie Canal though eclipsed by the railroads in fame by that point. Numerous sections in Western NY such as through Pittsford reused the Erie.

[thekevan]

You have it wrong. Rochester certainly was on the canal. The canal was rerouted. There is a bridge in the middle of the city, a block from Main which used to be an aqueduct, running the canal over the river.

https://www.cityofrochester.gov/eriecanal/

Part of one of the expressways, I490, runs through downtown and still has some of the old canal locks next to it as the expressway approaches downtown.