The value of this one should never be underestimated, pretty much sums it up for me. What everyone else said too.
Mostly about culture and the arts. Simply can’t go to a play or see your favorite band in small town.
For instance, are there any hot spots in your town where you can play blitz chess in the park? I live in Minneapolis and I know a few.
Whatever weird thing you are into, you can find 100 other weirdos that are into it just as much…
Being a musican, and an IT Professional, I’d have to say there is no better location than a major city.
First music. As a musician, a small city just cannot compare. A large city like Chicago has dozens of music venues, each catered to a specific crowd, or taste. There’s always an audience you can find. Play an unusual type of music? Laws of probability dictate that you’re much more likely to find fans if you have a large audience base.
Similar lines apply to the IT field. In a large city you’ve got ten-fold the number of potential employers, giving you more control of who you work for. Yes, there is a larger workforce to pull from, but there are more choices for each of those workers. My company recently started moving an IT division to a rural town, a few hours south of Chicago. Trying to entice folks to move, they touted the cheap land values, and small town living. Guess what? Nobody wants to move. I’d think people would be afraid to get ‘stuck’ in a job without any recourse besides moving.
Food can’t be emphasized enough. I can get GREAT food of any style. There’s a large Indian area on the North Side of Chicago, where you have your pick of Indian and Pakistani food. There are plenty of options for any type of food you can think of. I’ve been trying Moroccan cuisine the last few months. I just checked out an Afghani place the other week - nice.
Deffenetly the 24/7 lifestyle is unique to a large city. If you happen to be a college student, work the late shift, or are a insomniac, you can find plenty of good food at 4am. I was disappointed when I visited Portand, OR, and found that it’s not ‘major’ enough of a city to have nearly anything 24 hours! i couldn’t find anything to eat after 9pm. I can go to a 24-hr laundrymat in Chicago at 3am, pop out for a few to have a beer or two at a 4am bar, and then go have some killer food.
I live in Minneapolis, which isn’t a huge city, but it’s bigger than most in the Midwest. For me, the single best thing is live music. My boyfriend and I spend a significant amount of money on music shows (we actually met at one). I live downtown, so when the weather cooperates, we can easily walk to 3 good music venues and a 4th is just a short cab ride away.
I like living downtown because I can walk to most of the things I like to do. If we feel like going out to bars or clubs, those are also within easy walking distance (no need to worry about drinking and driving). Most weekends, I don’t touch my car after 6PM on Friday and before 8 AM on Monday. I live really close to a park and an art museum, and a cineplex and shopping area are also just short walks away. People always ask me how I do my grocery shopping (I drive to a grocery store), but most people in the burbs drive to grocery stores, too.
There just seem to be a greater variety of things to do (especially in the summer). The park I live by has free outdoor movies every week. There are numerous restaurants to go to. And, as I mentioned, the live music. Before this I lived in Madison. While it’s a college town, so many times acts I wanted to see skipped Madison and went to Chicago, Milwaukee, or Minneapolis (or all 3) instead.
I also like the people you meet. At one of the movie showings 2 summers ago, a troop of what I’ve dubbed “the weird bicycle people” rode through the park. Their bikes were weird–things like 2 frames welded together so the rider was twice as far off the ground–not the people themselves. I had no idea people tricked bikes out like that, let alone a group of 30 who would ride together. Last Tuesday I attended our precincts caucus. I live in a pretty eclectic neighborhood, but it was so great seeing college students, old hippies, retirees, and young professionals all in the same place and passionate about the same things.
I would take public transit more, but the system doesn’t seem to be very friendly to my commute (out to the suburbs in the morning, into the city in the evenings). The bus system is set up so that express runs to and from work would either get me there REALLY early (5 AM to work) or REALLY late (10 AM to work). I guess that’s what I get for not having to fight traffic much. Even in a city the size of Madison, I was able to get along without a car okay (I didn’t have one until the last year). Yeah, it would take longer and sometimes there were disruptive passengers, but I did a whole lot more reading.
You never, ever have to drive.
Boston Symphony Rush tickets
Museum of Fine Arts
Isabella Stuart Gardner museum
all less than $10. No planning ahead required; they’re all within walking distance and you don’t need to do anything but show up (except, with the BSO, show up 2 hours early.) Or buy the student card for $25 for the entire season.
I can get anywhere I need to go, including suburbs, without needing a car.
The level of training you can get here is infinitely higher. There are counterexamples, like Cornell, but usually schools in big cities have the top faculty. UPenn, Julliard, Columbia, Harvard, MIT, University of Chicago, Northwestern, etc., are all in or very near big cities. The world famous whoever doesn’t have time to drive three hours to teach; big industry jobs are also often in cities.
Somewhere within walking distance of the subway, you can find anything you’re looking for. In my case, that’s usually something at Virgin Records.
I’m surprised people hadn’t pulled up lawn chairs for my advent. In many large cities in North America, and for most large cities in Europe, you’re completely wrong about this. In Montreal, 33% of households do not own a car. I and the large majority of my acquaintances do not have cars. We don’t need them. I can get anywhere I need to be for $31 a month.
I live in Atlanta–and out in the 'burbs, too–and did just fine without a car. The only reason we even got a car was we wound up working at like 4am, when the buses hadn’t started running. We’ve since changed shifts and stuff. Now we don’t really need a car, but it makes life a little easier, and I’m not giving it back now that it’s mostly paid off. But when one of us needs it to go out of town or something, the other does just fine taking the bus/train.
Re: The Level of training, I’d also include the diversity of training. Within a reasonable distance of my apartment, we have everything from your basic community college to expensive liberal arts schools to Georgia State, Georgia Tech, and Emory.
I’ve never had the slightest urge to move to NYC, but you’ve just sold me with something I’d never considered before. :rolleyes: [sup]I want to be the crazy guy![/sup]
Ah, Atlanta. It has good art stores. I got some great colored pencils there once.
(Apparently, that’s my main criteria for a great city!) 
We had a great art store open up for like a week not too long ago. They spent months building this store, had a Grand Opening, and shut down a week later. Weirdest thing I ever saw.
Shame of it is, it was a nice art store. I wanted to learn to draw just so I could hang out and buy stuff there.
Thirty posts later (and thirty very compelling, thoughtful, convincing posts, I might add) and the OP has not yet replied. I wonder if he’s been convinced to take a big-city holiday at the very least? Check out an opera maybe?
To everything already said, let me add (or rather, let me agree) that big cities are the crossing points for ideas and the crucibles in which the clash and merge of cultures move humanity inexorably forward. Rural environments can be hostile to change because their systems (of industry, society, belief) cannot survive change. The price of the simple life can be surrendering the examined life.
A generalization, yes. Thoreau and Emerson would have something to say, I’m sure. But Mr Clark likes his malls and cinemas, so I doubt he’s a transcendentalist…
BROADWAY! Where else can you see ten different live shows in a week within 10 city blocks?
Well, I’ll tell you right now I had more fun in a town of 30,000 than in a “metro” area- but that’s because it was a college town and I spend 5 years of fraternity-rampaging etc…I think the benefits of a small town should not be overlooked, especially if you have quick access to a large city…and your definition of “large” could be different too.
Omaha, NE has about 1,000,000 in the area (combined with Council Bluffs, IA (on the other side of the MO river)) and other suburbs etc, but it is NOT a large city…or, as I see it, it is a large city with absolutely no big-city benefits. Public transport is practically non-existent. No theme parks, no major concerts or sporting events, etc (and the bars close at 1:00am :(…) so if you go “big-city”…go Chicago, etc or somewhere you don’t need a car and have access to those things you don’t get in a small town. So there is a gap, imo, between probably 100,000 and maybe 2 million that would be better than anywhere in between.
Sooo…all these advantages everyone’s touting, the art museums, the plays, the music, the fantabulous food at 4am…how often do most of you actually take advantage of this stuff? Do you go to the museum, or the zoo, or the aquarium, or the theme park once a month? Do you go see a play and a concert every week? Or do you usually go to work, come home, have dinner, and then read or watch tv or hang out with friends till it’s time to go to bed?
Near as I can tell, most folks who live in very large cities take advantage of that sort of thing about as often as people who live within easy driving distance of those cities–if there’s something they’re truly interested in, they’ll make the effort to go; otherwise, forget it.
To be perfectly honest, living in a city the size of New York sounds like my idea of hell. I cannot imagine having people everyfuckingwhere all the fucking time, and none of them caring about what I say or do. If I must be surrounded by people, and I’d much prefer not to be, I’d like them to at least be friendly people willing to pass the time of day with me. Smelling exhaust and diesel fumes all the time and the constant sound of traffic would be pure torture. Worst of all, though, would be the contempt and insularity of people who had never lived anywhere else and thought their way of life was far superior to any other. I just don’t think I could communicate with people who talked about how bright and colorful the city was without having any idea how much the colors were muted by the inevitable smoke and dirt that comes with city life, who had never run into a store clerk who could tell them hilarious stories about their parents as children, who had never stood in their front yard surrounded by silence and stared at the unspeakable beauty of the night sky as seen away from streetlights. The whole thing just sounds terribly cold and lonely to me.
I don’t take advantage of those sorts of things very often- except the food late at night. What I very often do take advantage of is the fact that my children rarely need to be driven anywhere. They’re 13 and 14. I have a niece and nephew who both live in suburbs. Neither is old enough to drive, although they are both older than my children. They have to be driven almost everywhere.
I’ve never stood in my front yard and seen the sky away from streetlights. But I have to say, when people think about living in New York, they often seem to only consider Manhattan. They never think of neighborhoods like the one I live in or the one I grew up in, both of which consist of mostly 1-3 family houses, with backyards even. Where most streets don’t have much traffic. Where my children not only went to the same elementary school I did, but were taught by some of the same teachers. Where they often run into store owners who can tell stories about me as a child. Where there are over the backyard fence or sitting on the front stoop friendships. All with good enough public transportation that my daughter can travel to Manhattan for school every day. Best of both worlds.
I live in a small college town, and I think they are better than the towns of the same size without the college. Most of the things everyone lists about living in a large city could matter less to me. I think some cities such as Charlotte are worse than my town about things closing early. I went to Charlotte recently and I felt like I was in a ghost town after six o’clock.
Well, I usually went to Disneyland about once a year, (sometimes twice when I was growing up). Didn’t go the art museum constantly, but did go now and then. When I was in school, our field trips were really awesome, needless to say.
I grew up in Glendale, which is a rather conservative suburb of Los Angeles. It’s a pretty nice place, not grimy or depressing. It has the Brand Library and the Galleria, which are pretty nice places—I haven’t seen anything compare to them here in Hooterville. (Granted, I don’t know every nook and cranny of Hooterville, but I’m familiar with most of the malls, and as far as I know, nothing compares.) I went to Brand Library semi-frequently and the Galleria constantly (Valley Girl that I am).
Glendale has Swain’s Art Store, which is far more awesome than anything I’ve found in Hooterville. And Swain’s does not compare with some of the BIG art stores elsewhere in the Los Angeles area. Oh yeah—I can’t forget to mention Laguna Clay and Aardvark, two wonderful clay suppliers that had so many goodies for potters. I am forever spoiled by the incredible selection of Laguna clays (stoneware, earthenware, porcelain etc.). I think they must have—what? 50 different clays? More? I can’t keep track. Out here in Hooterville, the “big” clay suppliers have something like 10 different clays. Fortunately, they’ve started to carry Laguna clays (you have to special order) but of course the cost is more because of shipping.
I also went down to Melrose Ave. pretty regularly. Very fun, lots of peculiar shops and cool stuff. I also visited Hollywood Blvd. and Sunset Blvd. frequently as well. I often went to see films down in Hollywood, because I liked the atmosphere there. The Chinese or the Egyptian or the Cinerama Dome are pretty cool theatres.
Now and then I’d see something performed at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion. Not often, but when I wanted to see something, it was there. Also, as a movie buff, I had some friends who worked for Universal Studios (and other studios). For some years there, I often went down to Universal and hung around behind the scenes, watching things being filmed, hanging out, and being geeky. There also some special movie or TV viewings with actor’s commentaries (I’ll never forget the one I saw with Rutger Hauer at a special screening of Blade Runner) and so forth. I have had some really good memories and once-in-a-lifetime experiences that many movie geeks envy. Good times, good times.
I am a night owl so I do like that there are things open all hours. I won’t say that I’m the biggest social butterfly, (I’m certainly not). But I sometimes got around and when I did, I was able to avail myself of things (and had opportunities) that I could not have had here in Hooterville or anywhere else other than a big city like L.A.
With all due respect CrazyCatLady, how can you make such an ignorant statement? If I may infer, you’ve never actually lived in NY, have you? We’re all well aware of the rep of New Yorkers as being rude people, and it is oh so easy to buy into the stereotype, but it’s not altogether true.
I would love to label rural folk as inbred uneducated yokels, but as I’ve never lived in those environs, it would be foolish of me to make that assumption.
Have a nice day.
Rick Jay,
You did an excellent job of selling Toronto. I live there. It needs a good pitch man after the SARS scare. That’s over now and we’re open for business.
I’d like to add that Toronto has excellent public transit, which is clean and safe. It’s a great way to go to work or get around the city. The city itself is clean. It’s also a ‘walking city’ like New York or Paris. There are miles of sidewalks lined with businesses, shops, museums, galleries and restaurants. Their are lovely hidden walks and parks especially around the university and miles of boardwalk by the lake.
There are problems. We have homeless people, gang violence in the outlying areas and smog. But all and all it is a city of neighbourhoods. People can and do get involved in their community.
Thanks again Rick.
To each his own.
People in my city, Toronto, can be very friendly. Stories about one’s children, parents or pets are often shared at bus stops, in shops and the like. I find the people of New York very warm and helpful for the most part when I visit. I do take advantage of what my city has to offer. Secluded places may be hard to find but you can go home for that. People watching is always interesting. And when I want to see a starry night sky I visit the north.
Last summer during the blackout city folk like me got a chance to enjoy the stars without getting in the car or on a bus. Neighbours pitched in and helped one another. You couldn’t go anywhere without someone asking if you had enough supplies. The lights happened to go out on my birthday. Originally I had planned to spend a quiet evening with my kids. Instead I ended up pooling resources with neighbours at a noisy, fun street BBQ. It was the best birthday party I’d had in a long time.
The country is a nice place to visit, but with the exception of the smog, I love city life.