My first apartment after leaving Madison fifteen years ago (for a job at an ad agency here in a Milwaukee suburb) was in West Allis. Frankly, the city had very little going for it. My needs were met: the apartment was cheap, near work, close to a Bally's gym, and I could withstand the fumes eminating from the Kentucky Fried Chicken across the street.
I'd gotten there within a year of the city's loss of major employer and namesake, Allis-Chalmers. It was a pretty bleak time. But West Allis didn't just roll over and die; they maintained a solid commitment to investing in their infrastructure in order to maintain high appeal for residents and businesses. The industrial tracts that were eerilly vacant while I lived there are now home to attractive commercial, retail and residential buildings, both new and repurposed.
West Allis is now seeing the $83 million Six Points Crossing mixed-use neighborhood emerge, and a $2 million renovation of the 75-year-old Farmers Market is complete. These great pictures appear courtesy of M. Newman, whose other Milwaukee-oriented work can be seen on Flickr under the name "mzn37."
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