Pottsville and the areas between it and places like Hamburg and the Reading suburbs are slowly coming up to speed.

Pottsville itself just had its two hospitals taken over by Lehigh Valley in the last couple years, so the quality of services there and at other offices in the area have increased a bit. There is also a brand-new St.Luke’s hospital that opened last year on route 61 between Pottsville and Orwigsburg.

Pottsville is deceptively large and has different neighborhoods. Not many homeowners actually live in the downtown area; most of the “city” homes are in the blocks that run up from the main drag on Centre Street.

There are a handful of local business owners who have hosted a spate of new restaurants downtown in the last 5ish years, and Yuengling is in the process of handing the reins down from Dick to his daughters, and they are hosting more and more events and becoming more involved in the community.

For someone older not looking for a big scene or anything, it’s really not a bad place. In my opinion, Pottsville is on the edge right now of which way it might go. Plenty of community really steering it in good directions, but also lots of county seat and “city” problems that the local government needs to adapt to quickly.

Pottsville and Orwigsburg would be the only two places in Schuylkill County I would want to live if having access to more modern services is at all important to you.