This article in the Times is phoned-in and lazy. Nothing in it is really untrue, but nothing in it is news either. The trouble with the Bronx (especially the South Bronx) is it fails to fit in to any of the narratives that the New York Times likes to tell.
If college students and artists were moving here by the droves they'd wrote about that. If the Bronx were on fire and filled with crime they'd write about that. But it's neither It's urban revitalization without gentrification and this concept is really hard to grasp since there is no narrative that says that an influx of poor immigrants can make a place better.
Wait. That's not true either. Poor immigrants making a place better is basically the story of New York and even the nation.
The thing that makes the Bronx remarkable is that it's done this in the past 20 years-- a time when most of the nation seems to have forgotten how to make places that are good for the middle and working class.
The Bronx has a massive amount of new housing, the abandon lots are all gone, population keeps rising. And the one thing the article got right is that the Bronx is a "refuge from the excesses of Manhattan" --
Is the Bronx perfect? No? But who's perfect? That's not the point.
The writers at the time won't be able to comprehend what has happened until it is history-- Until 10 years time when people look back and wonder that anyone was ever scared of such a calm and wholesome place. These are the good old days before everyone shows up and ruins everything. I'll take the bad articles and enjoy it.