What do you hate most about ABQ? (Albuquerque: house, neighborhoods)

[Tim Rankin]

Originally Posted by casden

LOL!!! It's like some machine somewhere is cranking out Borg-like writing style clones that spew out messages with very similar sentences and identical concepts - even some of the words they use are identical.

Oh God, I should have known the Borg was behind this. In another few years, we'll all be shuffling around our new Generica-style city, with 10,000 mi. stares & looking for the nearest Starbucks.

[Trkstp Tina]

This discussion is all over the board! (And I admit, I'm the queen of tangents. And I'll agree with the posters who say grammar and spelling are truly atrocious everywhere--I used to be an editor, and I saw PhDs who couldn't spell or use proper punctuation. And also, for such a laidback place, I'm surprised how fast people drive here.)

My top #5:

1. Lack of sense of community. I can't put my finger on it--perhaps the "car culture," the Western mindset, the walls around the house.

2. Lots of ugly sprawl.

3. Weak downtown; not many walkable areas.

4. My hands are dry all the time. Believe it or not, sometimes I miss humidity.

5. Feels isolated. For us personally, it's far from family, friends. But being so far from the coastline and far from major cities sometimes gets to me.

Gee, that all sounds so negative! But there area a lot of good things I could say too.

[mortimer]

ABQConvict calculates:

> Enchiladas are made of 5 cents worth of corn tortilla,
> 10 cents worth of cheese, 1 cent worth of red chile ...

That's it? No pollo? Carne?

ew

BTW, to be fair, even for cheese enchiladas, you have to cook them, so you didn't count the cost of energy above. You have to cook them on/in something, so you also need to amortize the equipment. Labor is not free. Time is money and all that. Convenience also costs money.

I bet you can get that cost up to at least a buck with what I've given you.

[EnjoyEP]

Originally Posted by Trkstp Tina

1. Lack of sense of community. I can't put my finger on it--perhaps the "car culture," the Western mindset, the walls around the house.

Yeah Tina, you know that I am one of the most pro-Albuquerque ambassadors alive that you'd find walking the feet of the earth, and still, I think the biggest negative that I had too, in ABQ, was sort of this same thing.

Albuquerque, I found, is filled with very pleasant, very nice, very cordial people. I was actually surprised how many people I found quite cordial and agreeable in ABQ compared to the big Midwestern cities I was so much more familiar with.

However, I equally found kind of a lack of that old-school "community neighborliness"...

I think ultimately that was the reason my wife and I ended up relo'ing back to the Midwest, even though now we really regret our decision. But I will cede that this area I am in now (and my hometown originally) - the Milwaukee, WI area - has more of that "community flavor".

My basic $.02 on the issue is that in areas of the Midwest, east coast, etc., you have families, ties, and roots that go back literally for generations on end. People have invested life-ties to a particular city/region/area and their roots go back accordingly...not just in terms of family and friends, but in terms of community - interests, sports, hobbies, food, etc.

In ABQ, ABQ is obviously a very aged city and there certainly are pockets of natives with deep-rooted histories in the area. Yet, it is a very "young" city in many regards...it really does appeal strongly to transplants, and there are just huge numbers of the populace that come from areas other than Albuquerque originally.

With that, while people are certainly very nice and laid back in general in ABQ, there isn't the joint sense of "hey, on Sundays, when the weather is cold, gloomy, and crummy (neighborhor-X), why don't you grab a 6-pack at the store and comeon over for the Packers game?" Or, "hey, we've just gone through a 7-month winter, now that it is nice outside and euphoria has struck, (neighbor-Y), why don't you grab a pack of brats, come on over, and we'll have a cookout together, as we've been doing every May since the beginning of man?"

I just think in areas where you get so many people who were born, raised, lived, and died all in the same general vicinity, you get much more of the bond of community, togetherness, etc.

So in my ramblings, bottom-line is, I agree with you. I guess the good news is, that:

a) ABQ has extraordinarily quality, good-natured, laid back folks and thus, there is certainly a strong social potential for folks if they can just "connect" through places like school, work, etc.

b) The more we northern transplants live - and the longer we do so - in ABQ, stuff will start to happen.

I am absolutely convinced that ABQ will never be a Phoenix or a Vegas in terms of long-term massive size and a lack of community together-ness...the growth in ABQ is just at a better pace to allow stuff like that to happen.

It is a challenge for ABQ residents, however, I am hopeful over time it can happen. Yet, that doesn't make it necessarily easy I realize in the meantime. If it did, I wouldn't have made the personal bad choice of leaving the area to begin with.

Originally Posted by Trkstp Tina

4. My hands are dry all the time. Believe it or not, sometimes I miss humidity.

I always did in ABQ too. It was weird - I loved (and still do) ABQ largely in some aspects due to the dry, desert air, and yet, I found myself (especially after doing a run on a 98 degree, cloudless day where the sun burned like a hot iron and the humidity was at some crazy low level like 7%) missing humidity just so awfully much.

In this regard, I equally "share your pain."

Having moved to a humid climate again though, I do feel strongly it is better to:

A) Live in a dry climate, occasionally missing humidity and getting back to it in trips, than
B) Live in a humid climate, always missing the dry, and getting back to dry in trips.

That is just me I will admit. But:

a) I will forever be able to attest to folks here who hate humidity that yes, humidity isn't all bad, but also
b) I will forever now know that dry is better than humidity.

Milwaukee's May through September weather is absolutely tremendous. Seriously. While I bemoan (and rightfully so) the long, crummy winters here, Mays through Septembers are great. 60s, 70s, and 80s, decently warm nights, a nice mix of sun, clouds, dry and rain.

However, it is humid. What does that help bring? Well, after nightfall, lots and lots and lots of mosquitoes and flying-insect-biting creatures. THAT S*CKS!!

So, I just waited for 8 months for warm weather, here it is, but often, once sunset hits, it is hard to be outside due to the swarms of biting insects. Argh, that stinks.

Also, on the days where it should be hot (but not un-enjoyably hot) - say 85, 88 degrees, etc., it is unenjoyable. The nights too. And again, that is unfortunate.

I believe ABQ's summers are hotter-than-ideal, however, due to the low humidities, you can almost always enjoy the evenings. You can't even do that nearly as consistently in a region where the summer temps are a good 10 to 20 degrees cooler...much due to humidities.

So why do I ramble on with this post?

a) To let you know that there are others out there that agree with you - at times missing humidity - because I was (and hopefully will be again) one of them.

b) To reassure you that if you hit humidity again, you'd miss that dry even sooner!

Originally Posted by Trkstp Tina

5. Feels isolated. For us personally, it's far from family, friends. But being so far from the coastline and far from major cities sometimes gets to me.

I think that is perhaps "east coast" syndrome, where you folks have like 10 major cities all within a few hours of a drive.

My experience, the Upper Midwest, I had Chicago - one of the major cities of the world - within an hour's drive, but otherwise, wasn't that close to other major cities in Milwaukee.

In ABQ, I always enjoyed being within 6 hours of Phoenix and Denver, a little more within Tucson, and only 4 hours within El Paso.

But I can see if you are used to being from Boston to NYC in a couple of hours, ABQ does seem remotely located.

[EnjoyEP]

Originally Posted by abqsunport

And why does El Pinto try to charge $16 for them? At least it comes with an overrated atmosphere.

I am totally with you there, sunport.

I always found El Pinto to be so overrated, at least in comparison to the unbelievably many cool, great NM Restaurants that ABQ offers.

El Pinto is so expensive...and for what? Their food is OK, at best. You can get so much better so many places.

I do really like the atmosphere there, but I find atmosphere is good at so many other ABQ restaurants too.

Yet, my wife would ALWAYS insist on out-of-towners to go to El Pinto. It sometimes drove me nuts! Yet, I do admit, many of them ended up just LOVING El Pinto...and would often ask for a return, repeat trip to EP when they re-returned to the city.

To me, El Pinto was overpriced and the food just didn't stack up - yes, in its own merits well enough, but not compared to the great authentic NM food found elsewhere in the city.

Yet, I will admit that not only did friends end up just LOVING El Pinto, but one night we were there, I had done a 12 mile run and was starving, and they had a free chips n' queso line which just hit the spot in a way with a margarita folks would never know!

[abqsunport]

Yep, EnjoyEP, everytime we have out-of-towners we have to go to the overpriced sub-par cuisine of El Pinto. We also have to make a trip to Santa Fe. Believe me, I know the feeling of the "Impress Tourists with El Pinto" syndrome.

[penelopelp]

I agree that ABQ has sprawl, but it's not as bad as some places that I've lived (DC, & LA).

The wind is pretty brutal today. That being said, the weather is still far, far better than it would be if I was still in Ohio.

[EnjoyEP]

Originally Posted by penelopelp

The wind is pretty brutal today. That being said, the weather is still far, far better than it would be if I was still in Ohio.

Hey penelope -

Let this make you feel better about today's winds in ABQ:

1. I am in Milwaukee, WI. I realize that Ohio is warmer than Milwaukee, WI, however, this is a "Midwestern" climate still.

It was quite sunny today - with a late-spring type of sun - thus it felt semi-"warm" today. In fact, I was telling my wife "hey, it feels pretty nice out here today!"

Well, I check the temperature? 33 degrees. Yes, 33 friggin' degrees!

Well, even if in OH you'd have been 10 degrees warmer, that would've been 43 degrees today.

I see ABQ is currently at 65. Sure, it may be a crazy-strong windy 65, but it is still 65. I would take crazy-strong windy 65 over 33 or 43 (with no wind and a sun).

2. I see that the predicted high by the Weather Channel for Thursday, MARCH 20 of this week, is 76 degrees in ABQ. That means much of ABQ may hit near-80 degrees. In March. On March 20. My high that day? 41. And guess what? My high isn't all too shabby for that day!!! So I would cut off a hand, finger, or toe for your chance at near-80 on Thursday!

VIVA ABQ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[mortimer]

Trkstp Tina mentioned:

> 2. Lots of ugly sprawl. ...

I'll say it again; one more family = one more house. If you occupy space on this planet, you contribute to sprawl and live somewhere that used to be pristine wilderness. If you live in an apartment less so, but you still are part of it.

The *ONLY* reason its less bad in Albuquerque (thank Phoenix/Denver/etc) is that there are less people. I don't imagine the population density is all that much different in any two towns/cities in the American West.

[Tim Rankin]

Originally Posted by EnjoyEP

I always found El Pinto to be so overrated, at least in comparison to the unbelievably many cool, great NM Restaurants that ABQ offers.

I am throwing my [useless] weight behind EnjoyEP & ABQSunport. Here is a summary of our one experience there:

My in-laws & sister-in-law's family were in town in July, and we decided to go with El Pinto, to sample some "New Mexican." We were seated outside, mouths watering in anticipation of a first class meal. I had visions of red and green chiles dancing in my head, and of a waitstaff resembling the person on the Chalupa hot sauce bottles.

We had only been seated on the patio for one minute when the flies attacked. The scene was reminiscent of one of the gorier scenes in The Birds, except that we were spared our eyeballs. At one point, I lost sight of my mother-in-laws head as a flight of [I estimate] 1000 black flies swooped across the table. I understand it was July, and the monsoon, but this was too much to bear.

I summoned every ounce of charm I possessed, and requested the finest indoor table they had, on such short notice. At which point we were seated in the only available room, that interestingly was also absent of any other diners. It was a rather large and squarish room, with very little decor, and rather dimly lit.

The waiter recommended several dishes. We ordered an appetizer of El Pinto's Famous Nachos, which was supposedly the Best of the Best. What a disappointment! Honestly, the Ruprict Nachos at Moe's Southwest Grill in Okla City completely puts this appetizer to shame! The other dishes were really just average - I would say about midway between Taco Bell and Gardunos.

The one good outcome was that our drive to El Pinto was very scenic - from the Heights, we followed Tramway north and then down the mountain. I was glad that my in-laws got this beautiful dose of scenery not long after their arrival in NM.

Having said all that, I would visit El Pinto again, especially if it's not during the monsoon season, with the greater humidity and higher fly count. But there are so many other good restaurants to visit in town, that it may be a while before we get a chance to go again.

p.s. I may have exxagurated a bit about the flies.