There you have it! Not only does Seattle have clean streets, great cultural opportunities, and beautiful summer weather, but it’s also a haven for people who have ditched their fiancees and run off with someone else!
[sub]ducking and running, very very fast.[/sub]
Try Boston, MA - Its not too big and its a pretty fun place for young people.
clean streets, low crime, low cost of living - well, the streets are safe and clean at any rate. Besides you could always live right outside Boston. It’s a lot cheaper.
lots of culture (museums, parks, libraries) -
garden-friendly weather and mild winters - Um, yeah the New England winters kind of suck. But close to plenty of skiing in the winter and Cape Cod and Newport beaches in the summer.
a university - BU, BC, Babson, Bently, Brandeis, BHarvard
ethnic diversity, nice people, left-of-center politics - Plenty of diversity if you like white.
nearby camping and hiking - Couple of hours from NH, ME, VT, etc.
Thanks for the great responses so far. I won’t be moving for awhile but I’m planning a big road trip this September to scope out some cities.
Funny, I’ve heard a lot of good things about Madison from different people. Maybe I can forget those cold winters if it has everything else going for it.
caveman, you make Austin sound so good that I might just drop all my preconceived notions about Texas and check it out.
I have often said that I would go back to Madison in a heartbeat.
Madison is a great town. It just feels laid back. I regret that I’ve never had an opportunity to visit it more.
Also, Austin and vicinity is the only pleasant place in Texas, IMHO. I spent a summer in Dallas, and one week took a road trip over to the coast and down to Galveston, and then back up via Austin.
To make a long story short the entire trip royally sucked, except for Austin.
Hmm…I’m considering moving cross-country myself. Any dopers have words of wisdom about Orlando FL?
:eek:
Low compared to where?! You have to go WAY outside Boston to find a reasonable selection of apartments for less than at least $800 a month for a studio or basic one-bedroom. The rents in every metro neighborhood (e.g., Brighton, East Boston, Dorchester, Somerville) have nearly or more than doubled in the last few years. Even Roxbury (a neighborhood with an undeserved reputation as poor and dangerous) can get $1,500 for a two-bedroom, admittedly much cheaper than in town but still expensive.
Lifetime Madison resident checking in (minus my 5 years at school).
It IS a great city. Has everything the OP is looking for 'cept the winter stuff. Also a BIT light on the culture thing. Not a whole lot of museums and such, but the ones we do have are nice. If you really need to see the latest plays and whatnot, Chicago is a 3 hr drive away. Also, the $100 million arts center is being constructed downtown as we speak.
Cost of living- OK, depending on where you are coming from. Much better than say, Denver or Silicon Valley. Average house is ~$165,000. That will actually get you a real 1700-2000 sq ft house, not a cracker box. Property taxes suck, expect to pay ~$23 per 1000 of house value per year.
Other than that, great place to be
Any opinions on Denver or Boulder? My wife and I are considering moving there; we know the cost of living is a big factor there (especially Boulder…youch). Anyone with thoughts on how it rates in the other catagories?
I’d vote for Santa Cruz, but the cost of living is astronomical. It’s also pretty small (50,000 people) and hardly counts as a city. Awesome place, though.
But, I can reccomend downtown/midtown Sacramento.
It is a pretty place. The streets are lined will thousands of trees. Seen from above, downtown Sacramento resembles a forest. The houses are a charming mix of Victorians and old craftmens style. Amazeingly for a city in California, they are still fairly affordable. If a house is out of your price range, there are some really cool apartments in Old Sacramento. Old Sac is a somewhat touristy rennovation/recreation of Sacramento in the 1800s. It is right on the river (Sacramento has two major rivers) and has full of wooden sidewalks, horse and carriages and unusual shops. The apartments there are a lot of fun- it is like living in Disneyland!
There is a fair amount of culture in Sacto. There is “art second Saturday”, where once a month all the gallerys hold open houses. The actual art museum scene is somewhat lacking, but the major art musuem, the Crocker, is partially in a wonderful old home that Crocker the railroad tycoon built. There is a thriving music scene that has birthed a surprising amount of somewhat major bands (Cake, Deftones, Simon Says, Oleander). Beyond that, there are a couple hard working people that have devoted their lives to local music in Sacramento, and the scene in very cohesive and wonderful. There is even a weekly magazine devoted to local music. There are several independent movie theaters, some of the quite beatiful. If you desperately need a dose of “high culture”, you San Francisco is only and hour and a half away.
There are parks all over the place. Capitol Park (by the Capitol) is several blocks of trees and gardens. McKinley park has the most awesome playground I have ever seen. There are many other major parks in Sacramento that offer swimming pools, nature centers, a zoo, a couple kiddie amusment parks, and all kinds of ammenities. There is a ton of parkway along the river, which is great for biking and hiking. Neighborhood parks abound. If you go east out of Sacramento, you soom reach Folsom Lake, which is a fun place for a day at the “beach” and boating. Further out, you hit serious mountains. The Sierras make for some awesome camping. It also has quite a few wold reknown ski places.
One major drawback to Sacramento is the summers are hot. Very hot. I like the heat, and enjoy the excuse to sit in the shade or swim, but the summer heat really does get to people, though. Sacto winters are pretty mild, and fall and spring are beautiful.
There is a rather large state university (CSU Sacramento). It is also within easy reach of University of California Davis.
The kind of people you meet in Sacto depends on where you are. Downtown, business people swarm the streets by day and quirky people populates it’s nights. Midtown people are a friendly and neighborly bunch. There is a real sense of neighborhood in midtown- you can walk almost any place you need to go, people hang out on their porches and hold barbeques, and people smile at each other. The midtown area is definatly on the left end of things, with the CA Democratic party headquarters, femminist bookstores, clothing stores that range from vintage clothing to transvestite clothing and the headquarters for Sac’s liberal weekly paper. Taken as a whole, however, Sacramento is a very diverse place. It is smack in between the (conservative) mountains and the (liberal) Bay Area. In Sacramento, cowboys and transvestites coexist. It is a crazy place, the only one on turnleft.com’s list of both “top 100 liberal friendly” and “top 100 least liberal friendly” places. I kind of appreiciate the true diversity of opinions in the place.
There is also lots of ethnic diversity. In my 2000 person high school, 64 different languages were spoken.
The main drawback to Sac is it has a major self esteem problem. The whole place has a near terminal case of San Francisco envy. People are so busy begrudging that they are not a “world class city” that they overlook the wonderful things about Sacramento. It is a city that still needs to find itself. The potential is there. I can see it become like Olympia or something like that, but it isn’t quiter there yet. Sacramentans still need to realize the wonderful things their city has to offer.
May I suggest my home town and Texas’ best kept secret, Fort Worth?
Per your criteria:
1) the usual: clean streets, low crime, low cost of living Does well on these (as well as a city of 500,000 can be)
2) lots of culture (museums, parks, libraries) Yes, definitely here. World-famous Kimbell Art Musuem and the Amon Carter Museum, the Bass Performance Hall, lots of Old West cowboy-type stuff, such as the Stockyards National Historic District, the Cowgirl Hall of Fame, the annual Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo, Trinity Park, Forest Park, Lake Worth, etc.
3) garden-friendly weather and mild winters Good in this category, if you can stand the summer heat
4) a university Yes, Texas Christian University, Texas Wesleyan University
5) ethnic diversity, nice people, left-of-center politics Yes here, except for the politics. But there are few places in Texas that would qualify as left-of-center - Austin, maybe?
6) nearby camping and hiking Can’t really speak to this, as I’m not an outdoorsy kinda person.
Add another vote for Charlottesville. During my recent move, we seriously considered moving there. We subscribed to the paper for a year, checked out the Web sites, and spent two days there without the kids.
What makes the place very special were:
It’s an independent town. That means it’s too far from Richmond to be directly affected by it. Some people commute to work there, but C-ville still needs shopping centers, theaters and a viable downtown.
The university is a big deal. Big school, good programs.
Housing was reasonable, as befits a university town. There are also plenty of housing for the wealthier classes.
The weather was beautiful. We went during summer, and the mountain breezes were both refreshing and kept the mosquitos away.
Now, we didn’t move there. I’m in journalism, and the newspaper there was too small in circulation to be a step up, plus they weren’t hiring. My wife also had had enough of the South, so we ended up farther north. We like where we live, but I don’t think it will fulfill your criteria. But C-ville has a lot worth looking into.
Excepting the cost of living (cheaper than Denver and Boulder, though) and ethnic diversity (it’s perhaps the most Caucasian city you’ll ever encounter), Fort Collins, Colorado might meet the bill. Vibrant downtown, cleaner than an operating room, progressive politics, very strict zoning and growth controls, a vibrant downtown, almost no crime to speak of, culture galore, Colorado State University, foot of the Rocky Mountains and adjacent to hundreds of thousands of acres of public land.
Santa Fe, New Mexico is a bit cheaper than Fort Fun, but it’s also a bit smaller. Add ethnic diversity and even more culture, but subtract a university.
For all those touting Chattanooga – I thought it was a rather ugly city myself. Wonderful setting, horriblr built environment – probably second to El Paso in the amount of billboards I’ve seen in any metropolitan area.
Do NOT start thinking you can endure Madison winters for the sake of all the good things. I nearly froze to death. There was snow on the ground from Oct. 2 until May 17 one winter. I moved south in spring as soon as I thawed out.
I would say San Diego or Ventura are your spots but they’re too expensive and anyhow there are too many people in California and I want everyone who moved here after me to please leave.
Dude, move to Burlington, VT. Ranked #1 most liveable city in the US by A&E, as well as making many other top 10 city lists.
VT has the lowest crime rates, lowest unemployment rates, very clean streets, rent is reasonable. There is one large university, and a few smaller colleges. We got culture up the wazoo, man. Great garden weather (we’re a farming state, for crying out loud.) The winters aren’t bad, not too cold, but a fair amount of snow, which is almost always plowed by morning. Lots of cultural diversity, a LOT! Camping and hiking near by? Of course, it’s Vermont! Left-of-center politics? How bout the only state with NO republican in it’s major seats of government (Governor, both Senators, congressman.) And does Civil Unions ring a bell?
I think the search is over my friend, the search is over indeed.
Lexington, KY has just about everything on your list. It could have more in the museum department, but it makes up for it by having more good music than a town its size has any right to. I wouldn’t exactly call the politics left-of-center, but the campus political consciousness is finally coming into its own.
I, too, am making a move next year. So far the most likely choices for me look like Greensboro, NC, Charleston, SC, Cincinnati, and San Antonio. (Or pretty much anywhere else.)
Dr. J
I fifth Austin! By far the best city in Texas. http://www.experienceaustin.com/moving/movcontent.html
It’s a pity you have to stay in the US.
Amsterdam has it. And more! 