This is really too bad, this was a great site and there doesn't really seem to be anything else like it out there. I'm surprised they couldn't come up with a way to make this profitable - and the closure is pretty sudden, wonder what the back story is there.
My neighorhood in Chicago used this pretty extensively and it really helped keep people connected and aware of what was going on. Sad to see that go.
This site has seen a little traction in my neighborhood (which surprised me because there's also a mailing list that about 20% of the neighborhood is subscribed to): https://nextdoor.com – it seems well executed. None of the aggregation stuff Everyblock did, though.
Where I live (northern NJ) everyone knows about and uses Patch. Even non-techy people. I'm really impressed by how quickly they've become the go-to source for local news.
Yeah, Patch hit on a pretty big gap in the news market. The bigger newspapers cut and cut on local reporters, to the point where a daily newspaper might have a half-dozen local stories covering their very large coverage area. Patch can start a micro-site, have someone write an article or two about that town each day, and be much more interesting to people.
My neighorhood in Chicago used this pretty extensively and it really helped keep people connected and aware of what was going on. Sad to see that go.