Atlanta vs New Orleans (living, better, population, people)
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Which city would you rather live in? Which fits the amount of amenities you need? These things include:
Culture = New Orleans.
Shopping = ATL.
Restaurants = New Orleans.
Economy = ATL.
Quality of Life = New Orleans.
Housing costs = ATL.
Public Transportation = ATL.
Nightlife = ATL.
Art galleries = New Orleans.
Weather = New Orleans.
Parks = New Orleans.
Music scene = ATL.
Education = ATL.
Lifestyle = New Orleans.
Culture - New Orleans easily, Atlanta doesn't have a *really* identifiable culture
Shopping - Atlanta easily, from all of the marts downtown to Lenox/Phipps, big city shopping in Atl
Restaurants - New Orleans gets talked about A LOT, but I'm going with Atlanta as a major restaurant secret...there are a ton of really fabulous restaurants in Atlanta with famous chefs, and more fine dining
Economy - Atlanta for sure, even though it's bad right now, NOLA corruption scared their good economy away in the 80s and they have never recovered and NOLA is too reliant on tourists (which if
Atlanta had that kind of tourism, the Atl restaurant scene would be more highly ranked)
Quality of Life - Atlanta, why do you think over a million people relocate a decade?
Housing costs - New Orleans, intown Atlanta in a nice neighborhood is not actually cheap, but NOLA is
Public Transportation - Atlanta for its extensiveness, heavy rail, and ridership, but NOLA does deserve an honorable mention even though its system serves tourists at least as much as residents
Nightlife - NOLA hands down, but it's certainly not my type of nightlife; I think the French Quarter is gross, Atlanta has a few large clubs that put anything in NOLA to shame, but Atlanta can't compete on the bar scene
Art galleries - NOLA; Atl is lacking heavily on the art scene for sure for a city its size
Weather - NOLA; Atl gets every bit as cold as northern cities and doesn't get snow
Parks - Atlanta for sure (Piedmont, Chastain, Centennial Olympic, Candler, Stone Mountain, Kennesaw Mountain)
Music scene - NOLA here, but it's closer to a toss up
Education -Atlanta for sure! I go to Georgia Tech so you know I think Atl is a much moer highly educated city, and it is (Tech, Emory, GSU, Oglethorpe, Kennesaw, Morehouse, etc etc)
Lifestyle - NOLA, I prefer an urban lifestyle and Atlanta's comes in bouts and pieces but NOLA's is more consistently urban
NOLA - 7, Atlanta - 7
For the categories Atlanta "wins" in, I would choose Atlanta. I also think Atlanta is pretty close in the categories it "loses" in, but NOLA isn't always close in those it "loses" in.
A couple of categories you forgot to mention:
Crime: This alone would keep me out of New Orleans
Cleanliness: This alone would keep me out of New Orleans
Character: Toss up here, Atlanta has some really charming areas, but NOLA is definitely full of it
Skyline: This category could start a war, but Atlanta would win hands down
Tourism: NOLA can't even be compared to Atlanta in this category it's so far ahead
Sports: The Saints have quite a following, but prior to Drew Brees they were even more fair weather than Atlanta fans, and Atlanta at least has 4 professional teams, so I guess Atl wins
Scenery: Atlanta hands down, even without a waterfront; the muddy Mississippi is ugly to me (I grew up on blue water so that has an influence)
Location: Atlanta because it's centrally located and because it won't get hit by a hurricane
Culturally, Atlanta is definitely underrated as well as under re-construction. New Orleans I love their culture and the fact that you cant really take it away from the city.
Everything on the list is trivial and to me
EDIT: Now that I think about it Atlanta and New Orleans was never meant to be compared culturally for Georgia (if you want to compare it to N.O.) Savannah would be the best and obvious candidate, they have so much in common and yet their own, completely different way of doing things just my $0.02
Atlanta all day for me. The King of the South and great higher ed, plus the big city.
New Orleans feels more big city in a small town and street to me. People there tend to have more character. Atlanta has a bigger, but relatively dead downtown, ultra sterile, ultra corporate feel, and then a massive metro area with lots of metro amenities. Metro New Orleans is dense and compact right behind NYC and SF.
LOL..... thats why the 350.2 sq. miles is broken down to include land and water.
Like I said before of that 350.2 sq. miles, 180.6 is land and the other 169.6 is water. Either figure is larger than the 136 or something like that sq. miles that Atlanta has. So unless you have something that can dispute the US Census then it appears that this story is indeed over
New Orleans Urban Area
Pop: 1,009,283
Land: 197 sq miles
Density: 5,101.6
Atlanta Urban Area
Pop: 3,499,840
Land: 1,962 sq miles
Density: 1,783
Fulton County
Pop: 920,581
Land: 528 sq miles
Density: 1,741
Metro Atlanta is setup very differently than Metro New Orleans.
Culture = NO
Shopping = ATL
Restaurants = NO
Economy = NO
Quality of Life = NO
Housing costs = Tie
Public Transportation = ATL by numbers
Nightlife = NO
Art galleries = NO
Weather = ATL
Parks = Tie
Music scene = NO for me
Education = ATL
Lifestyle = NO
Atlanta and New Orleans are like polar opposites. Atlanta is where you go if you want to make a name for yourself or to make alot of money. New Orleans is where you go to party and take it easy. You can take it easy in Atlanta, but there is a faster pace to Atlanta, more of an energy there. The nicknames are different. In New Orleans, it is called "The City Care Forgot". Atlanta is called "Empire City of The South". I know this because I live in the Atlanta area and I have relatives in the New Orleans area.
To me, New Orleans is a city that is slow to change while Atlanta has been changing rapidly. It's a place that is in flux alot.
Atlanta and New Orleans have struggled with violent crime. However, with Atlanta, the violent crime rate has been dropping and when I go into the city of Atlanta, I feel safe. I walk around by myself during the day and no problems for me. New Orleans has gotten worse since Katrina.
Last edited by green_mariner; 10-28-2011 at 12:21 PM..
Atlanta has a bigger, but relatively dead downtown, ultra sterile, ultra corporate feel, and then a massive metro area with lots of metro amenities.
"Ultra sterile" and "ultra corporate"? I don't get that at all. The urban core of Atlanta is pretty varied architecturally, particularly downtown, plus you've got a lot of different types of people there (office workers, college students, tourists, and even the bums/vagrants) which work against any sort of feeling of sterility or a feeling of corporate domination IMO.
New Orleans for me. Its such a unique city. I would find it a fun and interesting city to live in. Its history, architecture, people, food and culture would be be something I'd like to learn more about and be part of.
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