A skid row or skid road is a run-down or dilapidated urban area with a large, impoverished population. The term originally referred literally to a path along which working men skidded logs. Its current sense appears to have originated in the Pacific Northwest.^[1] Examples are the Downtown Eastside in Vancouver, Pioneer Square, Seattle, Washington,^[2] Old Town Chinatown, Portland, Oregon^[3], Skid Row in Los Angeles, and San Francisco's Tenderloin District.

Origins[link]

The term 'skid road' dates back to the 17th century, when it referred to a corduroy road made of logs, used to skid or drag logs through woods and bog.^[1] The term was in common usage in the mid-19th century and came to refer not just to the corduroy roads themselves, but to logging camps and mills all along the Pacific Coast.^[4] The source of the term as an urban-landscape reference is heavily debated, and is generally identified as originating in either Vancouver or Seattle.^[1]

One job on the skid road was lubricating it to make the logs slide more easily. The person with that job was called the "grease monkey"^[5], predating, and probably giving rise to the modern usage of grease monkey as a mechanic.

Vancouver[link]

The 100-block of East Hastings Street in Vancouver, British Columbia, the heart of that city's "skid road" neighborhood, lies on a historical skid road. The Vancouver Skid Road was part of a complex of such roads in the dense forests surrounding the Hastings Mill and adjacent to the settlement of Granville, Burrard Inlet (Gastown).^[6]

The city began as a sawmill settlement called Granville, in the early 1870s.^[7] By at least the 1950s, "Skid Road" was commonly used to describe the more dilapidated areas in the city's Downtown Eastside,^[8] which is focused on the original "strip" along East Hastings Street due to a concentration of single room occupancy hotels (SROs) and associated drinking establishments in the area. The area's seedy origins date back to the early concentration of saloons in pre-Canadian Prohibition (1915–1919) and its popularity with loggers, miners and fishermen whose work was seasonal and who spent their salaries in the area's cheap accommodations and public houses.

Opium and heroin use became popular early on; Vancouver was for many years the main port-of-entry for the North American opium supply. During the Great Depression, the railway rights-of-way and other vacant lots in the area were thronged by the unemployed and poor, and the pattern of social decay became well-established. In the 1970s, the endemic alcohol and poverty problems in the area were exacerbated by the expansion of the drug trade, with crack cocaine becoming high-profile in the 1980s as well as a reconcentration of the prostitution trade in the area because of the relocation of hooker strolls in conjunction with city policy for Expo 86.

A portion of Vancouver's Skid Row, Gastown, has also been gentrified; however it is in a difficult coexistence with the nearby impoverished Downtown Eastside along East Hastings Street. Downtown Eastside is infamous for its open drug trade, drug-related deaths (Vancouver's Skid Row has the highest per capita heroin-related deaths in the entire North American continent), prostitution and the highest rate of HIV and Hepatitis C infection in North America.^{[citation needed]}

The poorest urban area in Canada,^[9] it is wedged between Downtown, Chinatown and Gastown. These areas are frequented by tourists, and East Hastings Street is a major thoroughfare. These avenues of exposure make the Downtown Eastside a highly visible example of a skid row. The Downtown Eastside (sometimes abbreviated D.T.E.S.) is also home to Insite, the only legal intravenous drug safe injection site in North America, part of a harm reduction policy aimed at helping the area's drug addicted residents.

Seattle[link]

Seattle's historic Skid Road district (now better known as Pioneer Square) centers on Yesler Way. This road is often said to have been the original "Skid Road" in the literal sense serving a saw mill owned by Henry Yesler. Yesler acquired land from Doc Maynard at a small point of land at what is today near the intersection of 1st Ave and Yesler Way. He also acquired a swath of land 450 feet wide from his property up First Hill to a box of land about 10 acres in size full of timber spanning what is today 20th to 30th Avenues. His mill was built on the point of land that looked south towards a small island (Denny's Island, part of his land purchase from Doc Maynard) that has since been filled in around and is the heart of today's Pioneer Square.

The Skid Road was built on that 450 foot wide slice of land from the top of First Hill to the mill on the point. Since the building of the mill much of what is today's Seattle is the result of extensive terra forming by the local people to make the hilly landscape of Seattle habitable. At the time of the building of the mill it was some of the only flat land available. The Skid Road became the demarcation line between the affluent members of Seattle and the mill workers and more rowdy portion of the population.^[10]

Los Angeles[link]

Los Angeles's Skid Row in an area of Downtown Los Angeles, formally known as Central City East, has one of the largest stable populations of transient persons (homeless) in the United States.^{[citation needed]} Local homeless count estimates have ranged from 3,668 to 5,131. The 2011 point in time homeless population estimate for Los Angeles' Skid Row was 4,316.^[11] L.A.'s Skid Row is sometimes called "the Nickel", referring to a section of Fifth Street.^[12]

Several of the city's homeless and social-service providers (such as Weingart Center Association, Volunteers of America, Frontline Foundation, Midnight Mission, Union Rescue Mission and Downtown Women's Center) are based in Skid Row. While downtown Los Angeles has experienced a recent revitalization, developers have mostly neglected Skid Row.^{[citation needed]} Between 2005 and 2007, several local hospitals and suburban law-enforcement agencies were accused by Los Angeles Police Department and other officials of transporting those homeless people in their care to Skid Row.^[13][14]

The name Skid Row is sufficiently official that the fire apparatus at LAFD Fire Station # 9, the fire station that serves the neighborhood, have historically^[when?] had "Skid Row" emblazoned on their sides.^{[citation needed]} On 1 June 2006, the Los Angeles Times reported^{[citation needed]} that fire officials plan to change the legend on the vehicles to read "Central City East". Many residents support the change, but it is opposed by firefighters and some residents who take pride in the sense that they live in a tough place.^[15]

In recent years, the Safer City Initiative set to clean up Skid Row was enacted by the city and police department and has resulted in dramatic changes in the area.^[16]

San Francisco[link]

O'Farrell Street in the Tenderloin section of downtown San Francisco, near Union Square

The Tenderloin neighborhood is a small, dense neighborhood near downtown San Francisco. In addition to its history and diverse and artistic community, there is significant poverty, homelessness, and crime.^[17]

It is known for its immigrant populations, single room occupancy hotels, ethnic restaurants, bars and clubs, alternative arts scene, large homeless population, public transit and close proximity to Union Square, the Financial District, and Civic Center.^[17] The 2000 census reported a population of 28,991 persons, with a population density of 44,408/mi² (17,146/km²), in the Tenderloin's 94102 Zip Code Tabulation Area, which also includes the nearby Hayes Valley neighborhood.^[18]

During the 1960s, when development interests and the Redevelopment Agency were using eminent domain to clear out a large area populated by retired men in the South of Market area, that area was termed "Skid Row" in the media. The City's convention center was built after the clearing of long term low-income residents.^[19][20]

New York[link]

In New York, Skid Row was a nickname given to the Bowery during much of the 20th century.^[21]

Popular references[link]

• 'Skidrow' is the title of a playable multiplayer map in the video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Its design takes a very similar appearance to a typical skid row.
• The term was memorialized in the song "Skid Row" from the musical Little Shop of Horrors. In the 1960 original motion picture The Little Shop of Horrors are featured cinematic shots of Fifth Street with many interior scenes filmed on soundstages.^{[citation needed]}
• "Skid Row" is the name of a country song performed by Merle Haggard.
• "Skid Row" is the name of an American heavy metal band formed in New Jersey.
• "Skid Row" is also the name of a Dublin, Ireland-based blues-rock band from the late 1960s and early 1970s that included such musicians as singer Phil Lynott and guitarist Gary Moore, both who later were part of Thin Lizzy.
• Kurt Cobain, playing in a band that at the time had no name, came up with the name "Skid Row" to put on the marquee at a gig on the spur of the moment. That band's name would change frequently after that. He would later go on to form Nirvana.^[22]
• SkiDRow is one of the prominent warez groups in software. Whether this is based on the band is unknown.
• In the 1976 film Rocky, the title character grows angry when finding out that his gym locker has been given to another boxer. He asks the attendant, "You put my stuff on Skid Row?"
• In Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble, there's a level called "Skidda's Row", which derives its name from Skid Row.

See also[link]

• Stingaree, San Diego
• Skidder
• Homeless dumping
• Deinstitutionalization

References[link]

Notes[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Holbrook, Stewart H. (1961). Yankee Loggers. New York: International Paper Company .
• Newell, Gordon (1956). Totem Tales of Old Seattle. Seattle: Superior Publishing Company .
• Morgan, Murray (1960). Skid Road. Ballantine Books  (revised edition; first edition was 1951).

External links[link]

• Some Seattle history
• Pioneer Square history
• Guardian Article