Despite Fresno and Merced being cesspools will the HSR make them the new refuges for Bay Area refugees?

[BeauCharles]

Originally Posted by Perma Bear

There are a few but not enough to employ more than a select few. The poverty rate in the Central Valley is HUGE, like third world country huge

You have obviously never been to a third world country. I have a friend who worked in South Africa for a year and a half on a temporary assignment. I visited he and his wife in 2003 while they were there. Again, you can't even imagine what its like and South Africa is even close to being the worst example. The poverty rate is high in the the Central Valley, but the US defines its own standard of what a poverty rate is. That US poverty rate income and living conditions in Mexico, Central America or Africa would be middle class to upper middle class.

As far as your claim about decent jobs in the valley - most people have them and most people aren't poor or unemployed. Its not a "select few".

[SOON2BNSURPRISE]

We visited Fresno a few weeks back and found the area around Cal State inviting. My wife has family in the area and cousins that have bought in the Clovis area. With 500,000 people the area seems to be self sustaining. We visited the street my wife's grandparents used to live on the South border of Fresno and would not want to live there. It was interesting to see and from my wife's view point it, she claims that it looks similar to how she remembers it from when she was a teenager. Interesting tid bit, she never realized how big Fresno is. She had visited many summers and they never ventured further than maybe a few miles from where her grandparents lived. She thought that Fresno was a rustic type of place. North side was much nicer and even in the area where we were staying near the Convention Center, we found it nice, although her Aunt said that was not such a nice area of Fresno. What do we know, were from Oxnard. Also impressed with the new home prices in the area. A new home in Oxnard is going to cost $600,000 easy and it would be on a small 4,800 square foot lot if you are lucky. They don't build many single family homes in Oxnard anymore, mostly condensed housing now.