Why would people choose Chicago over other major cities? (Manhattan: wages, to live)

[fightforlove]

Chicago is a great city for it's skyscrappers, millenium park, the excellent rail transportation, affordable rent/housing and friendly, welcoming people. New York does not even compare, unless you're really exclusively into the downtown/urban lifestyle, but Chicago's downtown can hold it's own. The downside to Chicago is that most of the suburbs are homogenous, the natural terrain is dull and the city social culture is a little too heavy on the sports bar/drinking scene for my taste. Sometimes I think Chicago would be perfect if I could mix in a little California with it--replace lake michigan with the pacific and surround it with exotic mountains and desert terrain. Then, import all of the fashionable, laid-back, health-conscious women from the Cali 'burbs, a baseball team capable of winning at least 1 world series per generation, a slightly stronger creative vibe and then it would be the most perfect place on earth.

[ChiNaan]

Originally Posted by emathias

It's crowd sourced, remember. If you want fresh numbers, add them. I do that with topics I care about.

The 2000 U.S. census data numbers were added to wikipedia en masse in a uniform way. They weren't typed in by individual users for each individual state, city, county, town, township, etc. They were way too consistently formatted for that to have been the case, and showed up all at the same time. I don't know who did it or how, but that has yet to be done for the 2010 numbers. I believe that's what Plzen was referring to.

[A2DAC1985]

Originally Posted by Tex?Il?

You make reference to Millenium Park many times in your posts. Now, I agree that Millenium is beautiful and has been very successful as a major dazzling Chicago focal point.

However, I'm not sure if it really stands out as a one of a kind project. From what I can tell, it seems like many cities have equivalent artistic pieces in major urban parks.

When I looked up on wikipedia I found a whole list of Frank Gehry projects across the world and country.

List of Frank Gehry buildings - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Again, I'm not arguing your points, I'm just trying to get a sense of why Millenium Park is seen as something that does not have its counterparts in other cities.

http://www.americansforthearts.org/N...Millennium.pdf

It seems to me that Millennium Park is just another example of Chicago doing something simply because it wanted to do it. I think that attitude is one, if not the most, important factor in why Chicago is where it is today. I don't know if New York or Los Angeles would be able to turn just under 27 acres of their city into a $475 million dollar project that had already made over a billion dollars (for businesses) two years after completion.

While others may have something similar, I don't think other places could have pulled off that similar project (to the same results) in 2004.



Plus being #6 on the list is not a bad place to be... especially considering it's the only place that was built within the last decade that made it in the top ten. Some of those places had hundreds or thousands of years head start on Millennium Park.

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[emathias]

Originally Posted by fightforlove

...
a baseball team capable of winning at least 1 world series per generation, a slightly stronger creative vibe and then it would be the most perfect place on earth.

a) You've just insulted half the city by ignoring the White Sox (2005 World Series champs)

b) If LA is so creative, why does Hollywood keep sending out remakes?

[A2DAC1985]

Originally Posted by Tex?Il?

You missed out then.

It no different from Bostonians going to Cape Cod/Nantucket, Philadelphians going to the Jersey Shore, or New Yorkers going to the Hamptons/Montauk, etc...

But I think that Chicago has actual enjoyable (and free!) beaches the length of the city. No need to venture to another city, let alone another state. How many miles of beach does New York have? Boston? Philadelphia?

[Plzeň]

Originally Posted by A2DAC1985

But I think that Chicago has actual enjoyable (and free!) beaches the length of the city. No need to venture to another city, let alone another state. How many miles of beach does New York have? Boston? Philadelphia?

Chicago beaches are nice, but they get quite crowded on nice summer days, which is one reason so many Chicagoans go to Indiana and Michigan beaches. Also, many of the Illinoisans who flood those places are from the suburbs. If they live to the South or West of the city, it's not even that much longer of a drive for them (time-wise) to go to some of the places in NWI or even far SW Michigan than it would be to the city beaches.

[grapico]

Originally Posted by hindukid

Chicago is more laid back than NYC.

Chicago has better use of waterfront and park space than NYC.

Chicago has 80% of the cultural activity of NYC at 50% of the cost.

Chicago is far easier to own a car in.

Personally I just think life here is so much easier. Paying 1/3 the amount on rent/mortgage just makes life so much easier and less stressful. I go to NYC all the time but just don't really feel like I am missing out on much at all.

This is BS. Chicago is great, but you obviously don't know NYC that well if you think Chicago offers 80% of it... particularly high culture/arts/media...
Unless you mean something like "nyc has tall skyscrapers, so does Chicago... "NYC has pizza, so does Chicago"... "NYC has opera, so does Chicago"... or other scraping the surface items that don't really look at all the other dimensions.
I don't particularly want to live in NYC, but I recognize Chicago isn't NYC (or close to it) in terms of culture.

Originally Posted by nidex

Because Chicago offers 97% of what NYC does, and it's half the price. Simple.

lol...no, again.
I'd say it's actually more like 1/3 of NYC, at 1/3 of the price.
NYC is a monster and way above Chicago in almost every aspect.
That doesn't mean you shouldn't live in Chicago, ...or Seattle, LA, Dallas, wherever though. There are several places people that make sense to live in before NYC depending on your needs. All fine cities with their own perks, I find the Chicago to NYC comparisons kind of tired and outright wrong though, and make a really BAD reason to move to Chicago, b/c if you are wanting NYC, Chicago could be rather disappointing, it isn't really like NYC... Big great city in it's own right, but not NYC.

[knitgirl]

Originally Posted by fightforlove

Chicago is a great city for it's skyscrappers, millenium park, the excellent rail transportation, affordable rent/housing and friendly, welcoming people. New York does not even compare, unless you're really exclusively into the downtown/urban lifestyle, but Chicago's downtown can hold it's own. The downside to Chicago is that most of the suburbs are homogenous, the natural terrain is dull and the city social culture is a little too heavy on the sports bar/drinking scene for my taste. Sometimes I think Chicago would be perfect if I could mix in a little California with it--replace lake michigan with the pacific and surround it with exotic mountains and desert terrain. Then, import all of the fashionable, laid-back, health-conscious women from the Cali 'burbs, a baseball team capable of winning at least 1 world series per generation, a slightly stronger creative vibe and then it would be the most perfect place on earth.

It were all those things, it would be the most expensive city in the world! The good thing about our climate is it keeps wimps away.

[iDrea]

Chicago not only has a diverse population which brings a lot of different types of places to go to for entertainment andfood. You can also find great deals for both. (just google daily deals, i typically use brownhub for anything ethnic).

Attractions are also amazing. Anything from the museums to the bean to the numerous festivals and concerts that are held every year.

It also offers great neighborhoods with different lifestyle choices that can accommodate practically anyone. Downtown architecture is amazing and the city itself is clean.

[SCCP]

Originally Posted by grapico

This is BS. Chicago is great, but you obviously don't know NYC that well if you think Chicago offers 80% of it... particularly high culture/arts/media...
Unless you mean something like "nyc has tall skyscrapers, so does Chicago... "NYC has pizza, so does Chicago"... "NYC has opera, so does Chicago"... or other scraping the surface items that don't really look at all the other dimensions.
I don't particularly want to live in NYC, but I recognize Chicago isn't NYC (or close to it) in terms of culture.

Actually, your "NYC has tall skyscrapes, so does Chicago" line is not so far off the mark.

NYC has almost triple the population of Chicago, and so it obviously has triple the cultural/recreational/social venues/opportunities (I'll call them "CRSs"). But there are really two additional questions: (1) to what extent do these extra CRSs merely duplicate each other, thereby accounting for larger crowds but not adding any real lifestyle "value," and (2) as an individual, to what extent are small distinctions or super-narrow niches in CRS valuable to me?

Without a doubt, some of NYC's CRS superiority can be written off as mere duplication. I don't think that anyone is so discerning in taste that he or she would experience the presence of two nearly identical coffee shops as providing TWICE as many lifestyle points as a single coffee shop. By the law of diminishing returns (sorry for dorky econ language), that second coffee shop might add, say, 20% more lifestyle points than the first at best. Don't forget, of course, that the New Yorkers likely have less time in a day (or a lifetime) to experience all the extra CRSs!

So rather than ask about sheer quantity of CRSs, you should ask about the extent to which the added opportunities benefit each specific individual. I think that even a fairly zealous NYCer who has also experienced Chicago would, on honest reflection, say that the NYC lifestyle is no more than (perhaps) 50%greater than Chicago on the CRS front - AS EXPERIENCED by the person in any given month or year.

For many of us, the figure might be closer to some of those mentioned above, such as Chicago at 80% of NYC.

Even if we move beyond the CRS duplication issue, there is the irrelevantly narrow niche issue. I, for one, don't really care whether or not New York offers certain super-unique-yet-silly (IMHO) options that Chicago lacks. For example, if NYC and only NYC has a gastropub that features sushi served in goblets of microbrew beer, such a venue (though maybe intriguing as a novelty) means very little to me. I would rather have my sushi first (which Chicago provides) and microbrews later (which Chicago also provides in high quality). Obviously this is a sarcastic example, but you get the point.

I realize that my argument can cut either way. Some people find that Chicago adds only 10% lifestyle value beyond that of Indianapolis despite the fact that Chicago is much larger in terms of CRSs. Given the differences in costs and environment (intense vs. laid-back), Indy would be a better option for those people. Obviously I'm not in that boat, and so I think that Chicago provides the best balance.

None of this is meant to put down NYC. I have a friend who is extremely picky/discerning (however you choose to see it), and she loves to have the broadest array of options available. Then, she picks her favorite options (a few of which might not be available in Chicago) and enjoys them over and over again. She is in BigLaw and makes plenty of money, so she can afford many of the nice options even at NY prices. She moved to NY last year and loves it... and I agree that my friend and NYC are the perfect fit. So the NYC-to-Chicago cultural/recreational/social ratio really depends on each person's tastes.

I happen to believe that for a majority of Americans who are inclined to live in an urban setting, the ratio works favorably for Chicago. But that is just my guess. Hence, I have encouraged friends to move/stay here using many of the arguments that appear in this thread. But I always concede to them that the competitors (be they Indianapolis or NYC) have their own charms and advantages.