Ghost towns are not special to the Inland Empire

I live in the Inland Empire of California, which is a cross between a suburb and an exurb of Los Angeles. As such, business and population ebbs and flows like the ocean tides that are some distance away from the IE; in bad times, residential and commercial areas become abandoned, becoming like a ghost town. I wrote about this in my Inland Empire blog last year:

When Peter H. King wrote [his Los Angeles Times piece], I began thinking about the ocean, and how the tides roll in, then roll out, then roll in, then roll out again. (Even King uses the words "sea change" to describe the phenomenon.)

The Inquisitr notes that this problem is not isolated to the Inland Empire:

Since the real estate market began tanking in the US, tales of modern “ghost towns” have buzzed through the media intermittently. Subdivisions and McMansions lay abandoned and often unfinished, a sadly silent illustration of a country full of homes no one can afford to live in.

More here, although a New York Times reference to "the ruins of the second gilded age" may be a bit of an overstatement.

P.S. Yes, there's a musical reference in the title. Geddit?

P.P.S. This post is a test of sorts. More later.