California's top second tier city?

[Atsuke]

LOL Fresno is a joke when compared to the rest of the cities of this poll.

[cardinal2007]

If we are talking metro areas, the top second tier city would have to be San Jose, in Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley, and the inventions from there have world wide importance, and have significantly changed the way people live and work.

If you're just talking about the city itself, it probably barely edges out Sacramento, because it is the largest city mentioned, and it still has enough important companies to be a major influence on the world, but not like the entirety of Silicon Valley. The biggest tech companies in San Jose are Cisco and Ebay. Companies like Google, Facebook and Apple are in Mt. View, Palo Alto and Cupertino respectively, which while in the metro area, are not in San Jose.

[krudmonk]

Sacramento is really gunning for us these days...

[majoun]

Originally Posted by cardinal2007

If we are talking metro areas, the top second tier city would have to be San Jose, in Silicon Valley, Silicon Valley, and the inventions from there have world wide importance, and have significantly changed the way people live and work.
.

And this is one of the reasons why I'd consider San Jose a first tier city not a second tier city.

[Radical347]

San Jose, Oakland, Sacramento, Long Beach, Fresno.

San Jose has the tech influence, and the worst that someone can say about San Jose is "it's boring." That's much better than the worst that can be said about Oakland (although I'm not going to deny that Oakland has plenty of good points, too.)

Sacramento is next. It's a nice city but I can't consider the government influence worth bumping Sac up for especially when they're constantly doing things like this: http://www.city-data.com/forum/calif...f-banning.html.

[Radical347]

Originally Posted by S.D. Calif

San Diego is already ranked above San Jose. San Diego has way more to do. It is renowned for its climate. It has the Seaworld and the Zoo/Wild Animal Park, Legoland, Soak City, Belmont Park; Old Town, Seaport Village, the Gaslamp Quarter, La Jolla. 70 miles of some of the best beaches in the world. It has the Cabrillo National Monument, wealthy Coronado within its sights. San Diego has the largest second largest single runway airport in the world. A major port. It has some of the best schools, i.e. UCSD and is one of the safest cities in the country. It's a center for biomedical research.

I think that trumps San Jose.

At this point I'd say SD is barely above SJ but not for any of the reasons you mentioned, except for the beaches & tourist attractions. "Trump" is not a word I would use when comparing SD's climate vs. SJ (it would probably trump most other states, though, & SJ's would do this too) -- if you're in the right part of SD, it's slightly better, otherwise, there's very little difference. San Diego does not have "some" of the best schools -- the only top tier one really is UCSD, and if you're going to include Legoland and Soak City for San Diego (which are not in San Diego itself, but the metro area), then you have to include Santa Clara University and Stanford for metro San Jose. In which case Stanford beats UCSD, no comparison, and the others are tied (USD vs. Santa Clara & SDSU vs. SJSU.) Having the "largest second largest single runway airport in the world" isn't something I'd personally write home about & as Gentoo said San Jose is safer than San Diego.

[Gentoo]

Originally Posted by Radical347

At this point I'd say SD is barely above SJ but not for any of the reasons you mentioned, except for the beaches & tourist attractions. "Trump" is not a word I would use when comparing SD's climate vs. SJ (it would probably trump most other states, though, & SJ's would do this too) -- if you're in the right part of SD, it's slightly better, otherwise, there's very little difference. San Diego does not have "some" of the best schools -- the only top tier one really is UCSD, and if you're going to include Legoland and Soak City for San Diego (which are not in San Diego itself, but the metro area), then you have to include Santa Clara University and Stanford for metro San Jose. In which case Stanford beats UCSD, no comparison, and the others are tied (USD vs. Santa Clara & SDSU vs. SJSU.) Having the "largest second largest single runway airport in the world" isn't something I'd personally write home about & as Gentoo said San Jose is safer than San Diego.

Totally agree. San Jose's climate is very similar to San Diego's, right down to the rather mild winter temperatures and low rainfall (it's often dry although cloudy in SJ while the rest of the bay is getting rain). As far as tourist attractions go, I'd only put the Safari (wild animal park) up there. Every major city has a zoo and the other two Sea World's are larger and the attractions generally done better. This isn't subjective opinion, I used to work there.

[Nineties Flava]

Originally Posted by Radical347

San Jose, Oakland, Sacramento, Long Beach, Fresno.

San Jose has the tech influence, and the worst that someone can say about San Jose is "it's boring." That's much better than the worst that can be said about Oakland (although I'm not going to deny that Oakland has plenty of good points, too.)

Sacramento is next. It's a nice city but I can't consider the government influence worth bumping Sac up for especially when they're constantly doing things like this: http://www.city-data.com/forum/calif...f-banning.html.

San Jose does have some of the same issues that plague Oakland, albeit in smaller quantities... there are some flat out TERRIBLE schools and SJ has a couple neighborhoods you'd have to think twice about visiting. It's more than just King & Story... Alum Rock, Cadillac Drive, 7 Trees, Auzerais Ave, etc. all have some serious gang issues. However, for a city its size it's still very tame.