New Jersey has 564 incorporated municipalities- many outside of the prettiest and most walkable of them are maligned or hated on. While there are some like Lakewood, Camden, or Clark which have pretty obvious explanations as to why they're not good places, there are others that get a bad rap for no good reason. Such as:

1. Linden- most people only know Linden from the refineries on I-95, and assume that this place is hell on earth. In reality, it's a pretty average suburb with mostly 1950s and 1960s single family homes with some blue collar charm. Has a decent downtown with a good number of hole-in-the-wall "hidden gem" restaurants, as well as many Polish/Eastern European specialty shops. There's been a lot of residential development near its NJT station so it's only going to become a hotter area. Linden is pretty much on par with Union Township, Roselle Park, or Woodbridge, not Newark or East Orange.

2. Ewing- people tend to act like this town is the hood. Lets be honest, it's mostly because it's a standard middle-class town in a county overshadowed by wealthy towns like Princeton, WW, Hopewell, and is majority Black. The area is about as middle class it gets, with a decent school system, yet many act like it's really not much different than Trenton. The crime rate is exactly on par with other middle class suburban townships. Plus, it's also home to TCNJ.

Thoughts? I'm sure there's plenty of other examples of towns like this. List them down below in the comments.