Hmm… I’ve taken Amtrak on a couple of occasions. What don’t you like about it?
FTR, I’m pushing 40, and my “party days” are long behind me. I currently live in a quiet apartment complex out in the 'burbs, about 10 miles from downtown. I’d most likely be interested in the same kind of setup in Milwaukee.
Speaking of which… my apartment isn’t huge, it’s a one-bedroom, around 650 square feet, in a complex of 150-200 apartments. It’s not the nicest complex in the world, but I’d rate it above average. I’ve got a patio, a dishwasher, and a washer and dryer. I’m currently paying $667.00 a month. How much would something comparable go for there? I don’t care about other amenities on the grounds, such as a pool, gym, etc.
I think what you’d be looking for is one of the apartment complexes in Oak Creek/Franklin/Greenfield etc… Look towards the southern end of Milwaukee County (I have no idea what rent is on the East Side). That would probably give you what you’re looking for and be a 15-20 minute drive to get to UWM depending on where exactly you are and what traffic is like. Also, that would put you much closer to malls, department stores, Target, Walmart etc. The only thing you’d really be farther away from is locally owned restaurants, since there’s a high density of those downtown/east side/third ward. There’s also considerably less bars and college-y stuff once you get to that area.
I stand corrected. I think my memory has been tainted by those winds coming off the lake.
The internet has a bunch of cost-of-living calculators. I’d be surprised if all of them didn’t tell you that Milwaukee housing is noticeably cheaper than Portland.
Well yeah, the winds themselves carry a bite in winter, but overall, the lake keeps us about 10 degrees warmer by the lake (as opposed to about 10 miles inland). OTOH, we also get more snow because of it.
But not as much lake-effect snow as the Michigan side gets, since the prevailing winds are out of the west. So we are usually not buried in it along the shoreline, like the snowbelt places such as Muskegon, Buffalo NY, etc.
It’s true we do stay warmer along the lake in the winter, often by as much as 10 degrees, unless the lake freezes over for a few miles offshore. THEN it can really get arctic! Fortunately that doesn’t happen real often.
QtM, who has his year-round hot tub on the shore of Lake Michigan, and enjoyed it, and the 5 degree temps, just last night!
I’ve been there twice for Irishfest Summer School (one of the few places you can find a group of Sean Nos singers to study with in the US.) I stayed in the dorms, which were newer than most, so allowed more privacy. The room I rented was about 15 x 15 including the bathroom, which had the typical shower/toilet/sink all in one unit. The view was tremendous though, and the shared kitchen was very nice.
Parking has been addressed, but yeah, ditto. And this was Summertime, I can only imagine during the Autumn semester.
The local German restaurants are incredible - don’t forget to try deep-fried spinach. (Yes, really.) And a cheap, delicious, meal can be found at the hospital cafeteria across the street. The campus food court was surprisingly good as well.
The people were super friendly, just like you always hear about the Mid-West. And they seem to actually follow the traffic laws, which is astounding. I’ve never heard a car horn there.
There was an enormous amount of walking even within the campus, and lots of stairs, I don’t think it’s particularly handicapped friendly. I haven’t tried to go back since my back injury for that reason.
There’s a soft-serve ice cream place called Kopp’s, and it also sells stuff like hamburgers, milkshakes, and the like. I’ve heard lots of people describe it like it was the best restaurant in the world, but I personally didn’t think it was all that great the couple of times I went.
mmmm Kopps. I make my way there at least twice a week.
The Big Pond was very cool today. Waves breaking 50-100 yards from shore that looked like iceburgs. There was a visual effect that made it look like you could see land across the water… dark water on the horizon.
I live a few miles North of mwakee (correct pronunciation for a local).
I always love seeing the dense low lying clouds over the lake in winter, they look like mountains.
32 responses and not one mention of Summerfest? Does “11 days, 11 stages, over 800 bands” ring any bells?
They didn’t have Tom Petty last year…they are dead to me. (I hope they have Tom Petty this year).
BLASPHEMER!!! Oh, don’t get me wrong. I can understand a person not really liking the burgers that much (not me mind you.) I can’t let you get away with mislabeling what they sell as ice cream. :dubious: They sell frozen custard. 
It may not seem like a major distinction to you but I assure you it is.
I went to UWM and still live in Milwaukee so I wanted to comment on a couple things others have mentioned.
There is a parking structure at UWM. It is below the Student Union and woefully inadequate. The parking issues everyone else mentioned is pretty accurate. You have two choices. You can move close to campus or into a dorm and be able to walk or move further away and deal with the parking.
The nice thing about living on the East Side, which is where UWM is located, is that you have pretty much everything you need without leaving. Bayview is not a bad choice, it’s a pretty short trip across the Hoan Bridge and up the lakeshore to UWM. If you choose much further south you will likely end up taking I-94. We don’t have nearly as much traffic as Chicago but we don’t have nearly as many lines either, we definitely have rush hour traffic. If your commute hits those they will most likely be more than 15-20 minutes from the south side.
JoeyP and Quadgop have already mentioned that it is cooler by the lake in spring/summer and warmer by the lake in fall/winter. The one thing they didn’t mention was that when it gets hot here we usually have a pretty good amount of humidity. Someone earlier mentioned the nice summer we had in 09. That was a really nice summer, it’s usually a fair bit warmer.
gaffa mentioned Summerfest. It’s the largest music festival in the world. There is also an ethnic festival at the lakefront every weekend starting from Memorial Day and past Labor Day. Along with a whole bunch of neighborhood festivals.
Milwaukee does have a pretty much beach, Bradford Beach. I just went on Friday. 
The surrounding countryside to the south is flat/low rolling hills. It’s certainly not as flat as the area ouside Chicago. ( 
HISSNLISSN) It becomes hillier/woodsier as you go north and west from the city.
For rail travel between Milwaukee and Chicago you have Amtrak and the Metra to choose from. I don’t know how often the Metra runs but I think it is less expensive than Amtrak. The Amtrak run goes 3-4 times a day during the week I think.
If you are going to be driving here in winter you will need to learn how to drive in the snow. You won’t have to worry about people thinking you’re a “pussy” for keeping tire chains on all winter. Tire chains are not legal here, you won’t have them on at all.
I live in Chicago but have an office in Milwaukee that I love to visit (in the 3rd Ward). I recommend you take a look at the Public Market on Water Street. It has a bunch of different vendors that offer artisan breads and bakeries, fresh seafood and varying ethnic cuisines. I definitely suggest a stop at “Real Chili” (there are two on Wells St.). It’s a chili parlor, where you can order bowls of mild, medium or hot chili (with or without spaghetti, beans, hotdogs, etc…).
The lake is really dirty, there’s plenty of strange people around the city, but at the school, the people are more or less… normal. There’s nothing that special about the city, but there’s also nothing terrible about it either. It gets really cold in the winter and fairly hot in the summer (usually not more than 20 below in the winter, and no more than 97 in the summer. key word usually). And yeah, it does get pretty humid.
Like the others said, Summerfest is great. Milwaukee, the city of festivals. Irish fest, beer fest, street festivals, everything. Riverwest is a pretty cool part of town. It’s a little dangerous at night, but living prices are very cheap. Also a very "hipster"esque part of town.
There’s a wide variety of restaurants, I’d recommend the Twisted Fork on farwell (pretty unique, but not too weird food, they have really great appetizers)
Hwy 100 is pronounced “highway a’hunnerd.”
When people say “bubbler,” they’re talking about a drinking fountain.
I grew up in the Milwaukee suburbs and go home to visit about twice a year.
'Round about April, you will start to notice a distinct stench near the lake. That’s the alewives - small silver fish that look like herring and die every spring after mating, washing up on the beaches to rot in huge numbers. Enjoy!
As others have said, the Milwaukee Zoo is quite good. A zookeeper I knew who worked there told me that the best time to visit is during cool to cold weather in the fall and winter, when a lot of the animals are more active than they are during the summer heat. If you manage to catch site of any of the zoo’s wolves, count yourself lucky! They are notorious for keeping out of sight.
The suburbs Joey P mentioned are nice - I grew up mainly in Greenfield and Hales Corners. I liked Hales Corners better, mainly because it borders Whitnall Park - a very large park that contains a great sledding hill, playground, tons of hiking paths, a few ponds and the Boerner Botanical Gardens. Boerner is a great place to go during the spring and summer, especially if you have a date. 
If you like downhill skiing, there is one place you can go - Crystal Ridge. Just try not to die laughing - we don’t have mountains, and we barely have hills, so we use the next best thing: an old landfill. There’s a wolf preserve nearby, and I once heard the wolves howling during a nighttime ski session.
The best store ever is American Science and Surplus, which carries all kinds of knick-knacks, scientific paraphernalia, and military surplus. If you have an interest in chemistry, electronics, or bizarre home decor, they are the place to go!
For camping and outdoor gear, check out Sherper’s. Growing up, they were a small, crowded military surplus store where we bought camping equipment and long underwear, but several years ago, they expanded into a much larger store. They have better prices than most of the chain stores like REI. Also, buy thee some long underwear!
Since you’re going to UWM, you might also consider living in Shorewood. It’s just north of the city, quite close to the campus. There are lots of duplexes and apartments to rent, and the population is a combination of UWM students and middle-class professionals. It’s more hip and a bit more urban than the other suburbs mentioned, and has more night-life: movie theaters, cafes, restaurants, etc.
The bus system is good but not great in the city and nearby suburbs, but you will need a car. Depending on how close to the UWM campus you end up, you might be able to take a bus and avoid the parking situation.
I-94 is an East-West interstate, except where it jogs North out of Chicago to connect with Milwaukee. So to head south, take I-94 East, and to go north, take I-94 West. The confused me to no end once, shortly after I had my drivers license.
Okay, so I’ve been thinking about driving in the snow…
When we had our storm here in Portland a little more than a year ago, the snow was quickly compacted onto the roads, and as I wrote above, no attempt was made to do anything about it. So after the initial blast of snow, it was like trying to drive on a frozen lake - everything was covered in ice.
It could be that it was only like that in my immediate area, but when I left for California two days before Christmas, I-5 wasn’t any better. At that point, it hadn’t snowed much in several days, but it hadn’t rained either, and it was still cold enough that nothing was melting. I could not see the road. There were ruts in the ice, carved by traffic, that everyone followed. Traffic was moving along at about 10 mph.
I have a hard time believing conditions would be like that in places where it snows all the time every winter. Correct me if I’m wrong, but my impression is that in such places, the powers that be actively work to improve the roads after a heavy snowfall, using salt, plows, whatever. As an example of this, I wrote of having to stop for the night in Northern California last week because I-5 was closed due to snow. The next morning, I had no problems going over Siskiyou Pass - the highway had been plowed, and I was driving on bare pavement.
Isn’t that what it’s like in places that get snow every winter? They don’t let it get as bad as it was in Portland a year ago, do they?