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My vote was for Atlanta, based upon combined close in and far out features.
-Austin has the best natural setting within city limits, along with tropical foliage.
-Nashville apparently has highest tree cover within 25 miles (WeatherSpark)& closest to lake.
-Atlanta has the best nearby hiking, and is closest to the mountains out of the group.
-Charlotte has the shortest time to a pastoral/rural setting, and best scenery within a daytrip.
1. Atlanta (Beltline and monadnocks like Stone Mtn carry it over, mountains are right there)
2. Charlotte (Close to ATL here, mediocre park system hurts it, great location though)
3. Nashville (Good downtown scenery with river, 1 hr Mammoth Cave, 2 hrs Chattanooga)
4 Austin (Not bad. Good, not great hill country topography nearby, relative dryness hurts it)
This is all subjective though of course, and so if you like palm trees Austin might win. Also good to know which of them you can get to a major body of water from. It'd be pushing it, but CLT and ATX residents could feasibly daytrip the Gulf or Ocean. That's somewhat harder from ATL, and essentially impossible from NSH. I kinda ranked based on quality of topography one could get to in a daytrip also, which, CLT might beat ATL on even, but ATL can get to good stuff pretty easily also, and again, intown hiking like no other city of this group.
Personally, I'm a fan of having scenic areas closer to the core neighborhoods, which of course, neither of them have exactly. Nashville has better scenery that can be seen at ground level throughout certain areas of the city, but Atlanta also has a more aesthetic appeal to it's neighborhoods.
My vote was for Atlanta, based upon combined close in and far out features.
-Austin has the best natural setting within city limits, along with tropical foliage.
-Nashville apparently has highest tree cover within 25 miles (WeatherSpark)& closest to lake.
-Atlanta has the best nearby hiking, and is closest to the mountains out of the group. -Charlotte has the shortest time to a pastoral/rural setting, and best scenery within a daytrip.
1. Atlanta (Beltline and monadnocks like Stone Mtn carry it over, mountains are right there)
Well, not exactly "right there". Like you said Stone Mountain is a monadnock, but impressive. Kennesaw Mountain is miles to the north. You have to travel even further to get to the Appalachians proper. That is, if you like green mountains. To me, they are "hills".
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