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1. "East Coast presence."
2. "Thriving engineering/surrounding university infrastructure and student pipeline."
3. "Transportation hub with major growth potential."
4. "Strong technology and pharma industry presence."
5. "Business friendly, political incentives, and attractive tax/economic long term benefits."
My vote goes to Raleigh
Who exactly are you quoting? City data posters? Lol
Massive, in-town Ohio State in Columbus sure, but Indiana and Purdue an hour each from Indy are not so different than NC State and UNC. For Raleigh/RTP, its' selection to AMZN's 20-member short list makes sense with Duke added versus the relatively pedestrian Butler and not so impressive IUPUI (Indiana U and Purdue U in Indianapolis). As for Charlotte, UNCC, Queens, Johnson C Smith, CPCC, and Johnson & Wales may not have baked AMZN's cake.
IUPUI has become very impressive over the last decade or so. While it is still somewhat commuter oriented, it is slowly becoming a university similar to Ohio State (both heavy with commuter and those who live away from home on or near campus). There are three schools that deal with tech: The School of Science and the School of Engineering, both Purdue branded schools. There is also an infomatics school (IU brand) that has been popular. The business school (IU) used to have an IT focused degree but it went away, likely due to so much overlap from other schools. I could see the business school bringing that back if Amazon came to Indy (my siblings both got this degree, finishing at IUPUI and both have very successful careers in the field). Combining IUPUI with Butler, Marian, Ivy Tech (two year degree with credits that transfer to both IU and Purdue), and Univ. of Indianapolis, there are plenty of tech kids in the field.
With the flagship campuses of Purdue and IU roughly an hour away, oh and Rose Hulman, there are plenty of young people with the knowledge to provide staff. The biggest question and issue we face here in Indiana is how to keep these people here. The freshman class of IU-Bloomington is 45% non-Indiana resident.
Gallup’s poll of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. found that 6.2% of San Franciscans identify as LGBT, which is 2.6 percentage points higher than the national average.
The other high-ranking cities in the Gallup survey included Portland, Ore., Austin, New Orleans, Seattle, Boston, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles, Denver and Hartford, Conn.
IUPUI has become very impressive over the last decade or so.
While IUPUI is still not overly impressive, out of reasonable diplomacy much of the other statements in your post won't be discounted. Inconveniently, lackluster admissions standards and corporate recruitment of grads are simply inconsistent with describing IUPUI as "very impressive". For AMZN, more than just some of IU's and PU's respective best would be required, they'd certainly depend on a LOT of well-educated newbies to Indy and Indiana, and not so much on the OK Butler nor Marian or the Univ of Indianapolis. For all but a few candidate cities and for most similarly populated cities, related incoming resource requirements will likely exist. For example, RTP even with relatively more respected universities.
While IUPUI is still not overly impressive, out of reasonable diplomacy much of the other statements in your post won't be discounted. Inconveniently, lackluster admissions standards and corporate recruitment of grads are simply inconsistent with describing IUPUI as "very impressive". For AMZN, more than just some of IU's and PU's respective best would be required, they'd certainly depend on a LOT of well-educated newbies to Indy and Indiana, and not so much on the OK Butler nor Marian or the Univ of Indianapolis. For all but a few candidate cities and for most similarly populated cities, related incoming resource requirements will likely exist. For example, RTP even with relatively more respected universities.
The only thing that really separates Indy from Charlotte in this "race" IMO is the better university system. I can't find think of a single school as close to Charlotte that rivals Purdue in engineering as close as Purdue is to Indianapolis. That's not even counting IUPUI, IU, Butler, and other Big Ten schools Yes, you have the schools in metro Raleigh, but Raleigh itself is a finalist. Having lived in Indy for three years, it does have an underrated and fairly robust tech environment, but I can't imagine it really competing with Raleigh in that regard. It may eclipse Charlotte.
Otherwise, I don't see how Indy is preferable to Charlotte. It has more crime. It's not as desirable a location.
Gallup’s poll of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. found that 6.2% of San Franciscans identify as LGBT, which is 2.6 percentage points higher than the national average.
The other high-ranking cities in the Gallup survey included Portland, Ore., Austin, New Orleans, Seattle, Boston, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles, Denver and Hartford, Conn.
Don't see Atlanta on that list.
People, what is the purpose dissecting every statement?
People reporting to the census of being gay is always going to be less than actual.
Didn't the Kinsey 1960's report estimate 10% of the population was gay?
Don't you realize that until recent increased acceptance, that Atlanta was basically the only place truly accepting for us gay folks in the entire South East, which is the most or 2nd most populous region in the country with 50-60 million people (Louisiana to Kentucky to North Florida)?
There are gay folks here that first arrived in the 60s, 70s.
Then there is the gray area of what metro Atlanta's boundaries are constituting quoted population numbers.
And finally, are those top 10 rankings for just the City of Atlanta? Are they just the central core counties? Or are they the 35 counties sometimes included as part of metro Atlanta?
Taking all of this into consideration, and that I've lived off and on here since 1990 (28 years)...
my statement isn't all that far-fetched.
This is my last response to those on here that are just trying to elicit a response.
It's a sad testament to what I have going on in my life, lol.
Don't you realize that until recent increased acceptance, that Atlanta was basically the only place truly accepting for us gay folks in the entire South East, which is the most or 2nd most populous region in the country with 50-60 million people (Louisiana to Kentucky to North Florida)?
All of Florida is the Southeast.
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