Am I On the Right Track? (Columbia, Lexington: insurance, crime rate, job market)

[madetomom]

Columbia has peeked my interest. Our family is looking at moving out of a cold climate in the Northwest somewhere warmer that gets little to no snow and ice. Am I on the right track in looking at Columbia? I can handle a little snow, but icy roads in the winter - not so much.

Also - traffic is a big issue. We just visited a few places this summer that had AWFUL traffic. Dallas and Austin were probably the worst. What is traffic like in Columbia? Do people drive super fast on the freeways zipping in and out? And how are the streets in town? We found the streets in Austin were older and very narrow so it made our Tahoe kind of scrunched in and close with other cars.

One last question. What (if any) kind of high tech jobs are there in the city? Engineering - computer programming, IT etc.

We'd love to move somewhere that is not a huge big metro city - but one that still has things to do, is easy to get around, warm weather, fairly safe, and pretty. Not asking a lot right??

Thanks for the insights and opinions!

[waccamatt]

Originally Posted by madetomom

Columbia has peeked my interest. Our family is looking at moving out of a cold climate in the Northwest somewhere warmer that gets little to no snow and ice. Am I on the right track in looking at Columbia? I can handle a little snow, but icy roads in the winter - not so much.

Also - traffic is a big issue. We just visited a few places this summer that had AWFUL traffic. Dallas and Austin were probably the worst. What is traffic like in Columbia? Do people drive super fast on the freeways zipping in and out? And how are the streets in town? We found the streets in Austin were older and very narrow so it made our Tahoe kind of scrunched in and close with other cars.

One last question. What (if any) kind of high tech jobs are there in the city? Engineering - computer programming, IT etc.

We'd love to move somewhere that is not a huge big metro city - but one that still has things to do, is easy to get around, warm weather, fairly safe, and pretty. Not asking a lot right??

Thanks for the insights and opinions!

Snow and ice occur, but are rare, traffic isn't bad in most areas and the greatest number of IT oriented jobs would be in the insurance software industry or with one of the colleges or universities here. I think Columbia has most everything you're looking for.

[Columbiadata]

I call Columbia the six of one/half-dozen of the other city in terms of how to get around town. Its layout lets you choose from several routes, one just as convenient as the others, whether you're going across town or somewhere within the large downtown street grid. In general the street and highway system here has always stayed ahead of traffic volume. Most of the streets in town are wide, and one-way streets are all but nonexistent. I think there are three of them.

This morning's newspaper, The State, has an article that I don't see online, about Midlands Technical College and bridging the gap between employers' needs and the workforce's education and skills level. The article says healthcare and IT are the biggies, with 20,000 jobs expected to be filled in the Columbia area over the next few years in such fields.

The University of South Carolina this fall will begin a new master's degree program in health information technology. Columbia has become an insurance technology magnet. And then of course there are new retail and service industry jobs opening up all the time.

It's a healthy city and metro with a steady growth rate. While Columbia isn't an everyday big name in the national media for being THE place to move to, it has always confounded its competitors and continues to do so on its own unique terms. Despite the recession and the continued arrival of new people with the nation's migration to the warmer climate states, the unemployment rate has been relatively okay compared to some cities with their own influx of people. According to the state agency that tracks the job market, Columbia has added a healthy number of jobs in 2012.

When it snows it's here today, gone by noon. That said, every seven years or something we might get a blast of it. It's the same for ice. There seems to be a geographic cut-off line that usually saves the area from winter messes. Summer is hot and humid, but where isn't hot in the summer these days? The air-conditioner just had its 50th birthday.

[mjpayne44]

In general the street and highway system here has always stayed ahead of traffic volume.

In general? HA! This city (and most of SC in general) is mostly reactive when it comes to staying ahead of traffic volume. We have three interstates (20, 26, and 77) that form a beltway around the city. It seems nice at first, but you have to realize that truck & other traffic just passing through has to use it as well. There is no beltway that is primarily used for local traffic (other than I-126, which just funnels a large volume of vehicles downtown & overloading that grid in the mornings/afternoon). Hell, it's tough to not use the interstate to get from one side of town to the other. Also, the road conditions here are some of the worst I have seen (other than Oklahoma).

Also, there are a lot of blighted areas that aren't all that safe, and they are all spread out across the city. Some are easy to spot, like the Broad River/Bush River area, but some are hidden next to nicer neighborhoods. So you really need to be careful where you decide to live.

Sorry about bringing the negativity, but I figured all truths need to be covered.

[Columbiadata]

Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest Columbia is without blighted areas. And I guess I'm a little out of touch with what it feels like to try to get into the city during peak hours since I live in it.

['Lina Girl]

The weather is great around here! (We live about an hour west of Columbia.) It almost never snows, and when it does it melts the next day. The last really awful ice storm we had was maybe 8 or 9 years ago. We don't seem to get the tornadoes and baseball sized hail they're always getting in other places. The summers are hot and humid, but the beautiful weather the rest of the year pretty much makes up for that. We do outdoor things early in the morning and in the evening during the summer months and then stay indoors during the heat of the day. If we must go out we wear loose, light colored clothing that breathes, and move around very S L O W L Y and in the shade if at all possible!

I've lived in Houston and spent time in Dallas and I have lived in Chicago. The Columbia traffic is not as bad, nor is Columbia as big, so I guess it is all relative. Good luck with your decision. For what it's worth, my husband and I have lived in many states all over the United States and we like South Carolina the best! The people are friendly, the pace of life just a bit slower, the winters are mild, we have beautiful beaches and even some mountains up in the northwest corner. We had been considering moving up to Tennessee to be closer to our relatives up North, but we just can't do it. We are going to stay here in S. Carolina, but we may move closer to Columbia. There is more to do in the way of recreation in Columbia (museums, zoo, etc.) and better shopping than where we live now. We just spent the day in Columbia earlier this week and had such a good time. We did not find the traffic to be a problem, nor did we see any "blighted" areas, but we were mostly near the Capitol and the USC campus. Unfortunately, it was too HOT to get out of the car and walk around the lovely campus. It is frequently in the upper 90's on summer afternoons in Columbia and only a few degrees cooler once you get out of the city. Some friends of ours live a little west of Columbia in Lexington and love it out there. The schools are excellent and the crime rate is low.

Come on down for a visit!

[nin_man]

Compared to Dallas/Ft. Worth, the traffic here is laughable. There are a couple of bottlenecks, but unless you just have to live near the lake, you'll miss the worst of them.