Welcome to the corner of Edgewood and Boulevard. A well-known intersection that is known for its lively bar scene, magnificent murals, and the lovely smell of vomit and urine. During the day, this spot is fairly quiet despite the normal flow of traffic. I felt safe and comfortable, not worrying about who wants to steal my notebook.
Despite the fair amount of trash and broken glass on the ground, the area almost feels homey. This might be because I feel more comfortable in an edgier part of town covered in graffiti rather than a pristine park that someone obviously cares too much about. To me, there is a certain comfort in knowing that the great architecture others put their hard work and sweat into isn’t being demolished to be replaced six months later most likely by a corporate company that doesn’t really care about preserving the history and integrity of a site. There is an old building that is surprisingly abandoned on the corner, but it hasn’t been stripped down and made into something modern and expensive. Most of Edgewood follows suit, in fact, there is an old department store that has been converted to a bar called the Department Store. This is one of the coolest buildings in this intersection to me because you can still see the original, yet faded, white paint that says “Brown-Hayes Department Store”
It would probably be better if I mentioned that everything I described was seen at 3:30 PM on a Tuesday. Come Friday and Saturday night, Edgewood completely changes. If you planned on driving through this intersection on a weekend night, I highly suggest you take an alternate route. People are everywhere down here. Because the sidewalks are so small, it’s just natural that people start to mingle in the middle of the road. Some people have even been seen parking their car in the middle of Edgewood and jumping up and down on the roof.
Edgewood at Boulevard has been known to be a sketchy area. What else could you expect when you take an area that feeds off of hip-hop and drugs? Overall, the violence on Edgewood has decreased, probably because of the rapid gentrification rate of the area, but someone still got shot a couple times last Saturday night. They still have some work to do in order to make this an overall safe place to drink and party.