I think a lot of upstate NY towns are run down like that. I went to college in Poughkeepsie, closer to NY, and also economically beat up. Port Jervis, also a devitalized (great word, Kris!) pit, and my husband's trainer is from, in his words, "a really terrible place called Utica, NY." I think they once benefitted by being on the Hudson when goods were most cheaply shipped on the water, but they fell on harder times as trucks took over. Poughkeepsie had the same relationship to IBM that Rochester had to Kodak.