Cincinnati or Columbus (Kent, Norwood, Washington: best neighborhoods, apartments, crime rate)

[eagle-vet22]

I'm a single 22 year old male who needs some opinions on which city is better between Cincy and Columbus. I'm leaning more towards living in Cincy. After visiting both cities, it seems like Cincy suits me better and plus I'm not an OSU fan. The two most important factors for me are cost of living (apartments 1br) and job market.

[cyberdasher]

You should know Columbus seems to have the reputation of the "hipper" city but in reality the extent of the Columbus buzz exists solely along the High Street corridor that connects OSU to downtown Columbus. That's it--it's a one strip town unless you like malls and subdivisions. If you don't care much for the Buckeyes then, unfortunately, you won't make many friends in Columbus

Although similar in size, Cincy is a different type of city, based on many different neighborhood centers--Hyde Park, Oakley, Norwood, Kenwood, Montgomery, and Downtown are the hippest joints in Ohio but large numbers of single professionals live in Covington & Newport.

Not sure of your profession but the two cities are fairly even in terms of comparing job markets. I would say typical housing for 1BRs are roughly even too--there is not a significant difference in cost of living between the two cities.

[MattDen]

I think the apartment rents in both are similar and Cincinnati has a slightly better job market but people are more insular in Cincinnati. Ive never lived in Cincinnati been there many times but it seems like a hard place to make any in-roads anywhere.

The problem though is with Cincinnati is they have so many very violent and neighborhoods with huge problems that one would probubly almost need the suburbs or be in one of the best neighborhoods just to have piece of mind. With Columbus it has a few rough areas, but a much larger area of Columbus is decent and many decent areas are of reasonable cost.

I personally like Columbus alot better. Its a city with far fewer social problems, a much lower violent crime rate and it has alot more interesting neighborhoods culturally. Cincinnati has great architecture but I prefer culture vibrancy to architecture personally.

As for someone in their 20s I think Columbus is one of the best cities in the nation for that demographic it has a huge concentration of people in their
20s living in the city. Cincinnati has an older demographic, it seems like since the city of Cincinnati proper has so many neighborhoods with so many social problems that the only options for people looking for something decent are the most expensive neighborhoods or the suburbs.

Its just my opinion but I would take Columbus anyday over Cincinnati. The city of Cincinnati does not have its act together at all, but they always have the suburbs I guess!

Cincinnati would be fantastic city, but it has some of the most severe social problems and violent crime issues in the nation. What good is a city if the safe neighborhoods can be counted on one hand.

[QueenCty]

It's probably more accurate to say it has seen more violence in the past few years, but in no way does it have the crime level of Detroit or St. Louis or even Birmingham. I think the last crime stats had it around 18th in the overall category - not great but cities like Richmond, Baltimore, Kansas City, and Atlanta are rated worse. I am not trying to change your mind, but I think it would be good to add some perspective to the discussion.

Additionally, Columbus was rated the 9th most dangerous city over 500,000. This is where it gets tricky - Morgan Quitno rates cities in an overall category, an over 500,000 population category, and a between 100,00-499,000 category. Of course cities that do not annex more suburban areas like Columbus (as a result Columbus has a larger city population but a smaller metro population) did are going to have higher concentrations of crime because they are likely to be older areas and they have less population. Cincinnati is not in the top 10 of the final category incidentally.

Within the city, off the top of my head I would say Clifton gaslight, Columbia-Tusculuum, East End, Pleasant Ridge, Oakley, Mt. Washington, Hyde Park, Mt. Lookout, and Mt. Adams are fine. The last 3 can be pricey though. I also think Columbus is fun as I lived there 7 years, but I have had a lot of fun here as well. I have noticed that half the people that I meet here now are not from Cincinnati which should help the insular concern. I want to stress that I think Columbus is great also, but I wanted to give a little more detail.

[Subway]

Originally Posted by QueenCty

Of course cities that do not annex more suburban areas like Columbus (as a result Columbus has a larger city population but a smaller metro population) did are going to have higher concentrations of crime because they are likely to be older areas and they have less population.

That's a very good point. Although the city of Cincy has a higher crime rate than the city of Columbus, the Cincy metro area has a lower crime rate than the Columbus metro area. Of the 344 metro areas that Morgan Quitno rated, Cincy was ranked as the 197th safest with an overall crime rate slightly below the national average for all metros, but Columbus was ranked as the 296th safest (IOW, the 49th most dangerous).

With that being said, I would recommend both Cincy and Columbus (I live Columbus, having recently moved from Cincy only because of a good job offer). Since eagle-vet has visited both cities and thinks that Cincy suits him better, that would be my recommendation - the feel you get from visiting a city is usually a good indicator in my experience. I personally prefer Cincy, but everybody is different.

[CincyJim]

Northern Kentucky has several nice towns and several nice neighborhoods in the older river cities.

You might want to check out Fort Thomas, Fort Mitchell, and other towns as far south as past abeam of CVG airport. They are as much of greater Cincy as the towns north inside the I-275 circle.

[jlrosen]

If you aren't a buckeyes fan, the choice is pretty easy.

[Ohiogirl81]

Originally Posted by MattDen

The problem though is with Cincinnati is they have so many very violent and neighborhoods with huge problems that one would probubly almost need the suburbs or be in one of the best neighborhoods just to have piece of mind.

A lot of people who live or who have lived in the city of Cincinnati would take exception to this. The bulk of Cincinnati's neighborhoods are as safe as anywhere in the 'burbs, and don't forget that criminals are mobile. Frankly, I always felt safer in my own Madisonville neighborhood than I did walking through the parking lot at the Kenwood Towne Centre. I certainly wouldn't have peace of mind living in the suburbs and driving into town every day for work, wasting all that gas and polluting the air.

Go with your gut feeling, eagle-vet22. Cincinnati's job market isn't ideal, but it's diverse enough to be healthy. Rents are pretty cheap. Good luck!

[Mircea]

The per capita murder rate in Cincinnati was higher than Chicago in 2006. Be careful with numbers, since they are meaningless unless placed in the proper context.

Any crime statistics based on the FBI's UCR (Unified Crime Report) are baseless.

The reason is that the UCR is raw data. For example, for a given quarter, it might report that there were 308 rapes, but that doesn't mean there were 308 rapes, it only means that 308 rapes were reported.

When the end is known several months later (or longer than that), we find that 15 rape reports were false reports, 3 were withdrawn, 22 weren't rapes they were gross sexual imposition, 8 weren't rapes, they were sexual assault, 11 were indecent exposure, 5 were pandering obscenity and so on.

Same with murder. 116 might be reported, but when the end is known some time later, we find that 2 where false reports, 3 were actually missing persons, 6 were suicides, 11 were accidental deaths, 12 were homicides, or voluntary/involuntary manslaughter, 17 were deaths by other causes etc etc.

When you look at that data, you really have to scrutinize it, and especially consider the source.
Another consideration is misreporting. For example, the FBI's UCR has "Aggravated Assault." That is as defined at Title 18 United States Code. Simply put, it is an assault that causes serious bodily injury necessitating hospitalization for more than 24 hours. Ohio also has a statute for "Aggravated Assault," but if you compare the elements of proof, it is nothing more than an assault consummated by a battery. The equivalent Ohio statute is called "Felonious Assault." Quite often what a state reports gets recorded incorrectly which can artificially inflate the statistics.

The best crime data is that compiled by the counties at the end of the year, but, gosh, that's a lot of work to compile that, so you can see why so many opt to use the FBI's UCR.

[hheil32587]

I have lived in both cities. Both are fun, but Cincinnati is better in my opinion, especially if you are not an OSU fan because everyone you meet will curse you for not being a die hard fan.