Please give advice to an Arizonan moving to Ohio! (Columbus: house, restaurants)

[jajosh07]

I totally disagree... Folks in the small towns and townships, especially in the Marysville, Plain City area are now used to a large amount of transplants with new developments coming in all the time. Trust me being more rural and conservative is not necessarily a bad thing. Granted there are cons to any area, urban, suburban or rural area. The perks though with the rural area you get are a strong unified sense of community and family, little or no crime, traffic or noise. You will find those who are in the "old boys network" but the majority of people are not. Speaking from experience the Plain City area is much more prosperous than other rural areas and has the benefit of being within 10 minutes of Dublin, 25 of downtown Columbus, but also having the great aspects of living in a smaller area. The school systems are also a great advantage. In a smaller more rural area, you get a personalized education with a school district (Jonathan Alder) that ranks with the "more progressive" systems of the suburbs. Overall i believe if you make an effort you would have a great family, make great friends, and live a great life in a small town.

[Steelers06]

Tornados as something to consider? We get one warning a summer, and a funnel cloud usually never touches down. I have NEVER heard of anyone's house being damaged, even a bit, by a tornado. So don't be afraid of them.
I would disagree with the earlier poster about "there is LOTS to do" - unless you want to go to the movies, mall, resturant or bar, you're out of luck. Yes, there is OSU madness in the fall, which can be fun. But a lot of people get really obnoixous about it, especially on campus.

[streetcreed]

totally disagree... Folks in the small towns and townships, especially in the Marysville, Plain City area are now used to a large amount of transplants with new developments coming in all the time. Trust me being more rural and conservative is not necessarily a bad thing. Granted there are cons to any area, urban, suburban or rural area. The perks though with the rural area you get are a strong unified sense of community and family, little or no crime, traffic or noise. You will find those who are in the "old boys network" but the majority of people are not. Speaking from experience the Plain City area is much more prosperous than other rural areas and has the benefit of being within 10 minutes of Dublin, 25 of downtown Columbus, but also having the great aspects of living in a smaller area. The school systems are also a great advantage. In a smaller more rural area, you get a personalized education with a school district (Jonathan Alder) that ranks with the "more progressive" systems of the suburbs. Overall i believe if you make an effort you would have a great family, make great friends, and live a great life in a small town.

I agree that there are drastic differences in lifestyle in rural vs suburban areas. There are way more people moving into the rural areas surrounding the city. However, these are the fastest growing areas of the metro; with the exception of the downtown neighborhood's increase in development this decade.

Many people have the same idea, live in a township or small town outside of the main metro, but often over development follows this large amount of new housing. This has happened time and time again in metros across the country.

What starts out as a field with one housing development becomes an area with traffic congestion, strip malls, and hundreds of housing developments. Marysville is one of those areas facing the issue of exurban development. This has occured in the Canal Winchester area and exurban areas in southern Delaware County, like Lewis Center/Polaris.

That does not mean every exurban area will become this way, and some people prefer to live a rural lifestyle vs a suburban or urban one. However, one should closely look an area and decide, if they truely want to maintain a rural lifestyle, if their township or town is about to be engulfed in mass development.

I do feel that at this point the largest amount of transplants and diversity, in Ohio, is located in the core of the metro, however, that has been gradually changing as exurban areas see more development.

would disagree with the earlier poster about "there is LOTS to do" - unless you want to go to the movies, mall, resturant or bar, you're out of luck. Yes, there is OSU madness in the fall, which can be fun. But a lot of people get really obnoixous about it, especially on campus.

Columbus is a very lively city. However, this is easy for me to see because I choose to live in the cities core in the Short North. The areas around downtown are the center of culture for Columbus and metro. The suburbs have shopping and restaurants (mostly chains) but the theaters, stadiums, festivals, art galleries, most well known dinning gems, are all located in the center of Columbus. Too often, people living further out in the metro, loose sight of how "happening and hip" the central city is.

If you find yourself bored in our gem of a city I suggest you visit columbusalive to check out how much is always happening. Columbus has a great art scence and music scene, even though the closure of the Columbus Symphony is a (hopefully temporary) blow to the cities cultural happenings.

Columbus Alive

also
Wexner Center for the Arts This the site for Wexner Center which many locals know little about.

[Kennedy327]

stay away of canton, and youngstown or anywhere se ohio. Look at cleveland area, akron suburbs like fairlawn, twinsburg, hudson, stow are really nice. Columbus has nice surroundings also.

[CortlandGirl79]

I hate to tell you, but Canton and Youngstown are located in Northeast Ohio!!! If you don't know what region they are in, i doubt you have a fair and balanced view of what those cities are actually like!

[GearHeadDave]

I can pretty much guess that you are coming to work for one of the big two employers in the Marysville area. Realize that many of the professionals working for thiose companies (probably half) don't live in Marysville, they live in Dublin or other suburbs because Marysville is too "redneck" for them.

Personally, I would trade my house for yours in AZ in a heartbeat if I had a job out there. There is almost no outdoor recreation here and I really miss that. AZ has always been my dream location. After a bit I think you will miss it.

[OLHS_CHEER]

If your looking for good schools, check out Olentangy, Dublin, Upper Arlington

[skyemonkey]

i moved to OH from AZ (mesa) 13 years ago. although i love dublin and its irish influence (great schools too), i hate OH. i miss AZ soooooooooooo much. i agree with the poster that said it depends on your attitude. i also agree that there is NOTHING to do here. AZ has so much to do and to see. it is green here, but i would trade it in a heart beat to get back to AZ. if i find a job there within the next year we are considering moving back to AZ

[Ohiosinmyblood]

I live in Las Vegas and have to nearly tie myself down to keep myself from picking up my husband and kids and moving back to Ohio. The weather in Vegas is much like the weather in Arizona...dry....hotter than #$%^ and to be honest the 325 days of sunshine gets ...well...boring. I love it when it rains or when we have cloud cover.
I grew up in Bath, up in the northeastern part of ohio and i have to agree with the posters who have said that bugs aren't really an issue in Ohio. I have had three scorpions in the house so far this summer. I've had wolf spiders, mice, those disgusting water bug roach things and a neighbor had a tarantula on their porch. I would take spit bugs, japanese beetles, mosquitos, ticks, fleas, bees and any other bug from ohio over the bugs here.
Surroundings? I would kill to see a big green tree. It costs me 75.00 a month to keep my grass green. I have nearly driven right off the road countless number of times trying to avoid hitting an enormous tumbleweed that can't seem to decide which direction it wants to go. The mountains are beautiful but for goodness sakes they are all brown as is the valley...one big wide open bunch of brownness.
Ohio is beautiful. It has history and at least people have something that brings them together like the buckeyes. In Vegas there is NOTHING unless you like to go to the local casino and gamble your life away while you drink yourself into oblivion.
I have been considering moving back to Ohio for about 5 years now. I read all the posts and like anywhere there are people who love it and people who hate it. It just goes to show you that we're never totally happy and its up to each one of us to find the place that meets most of what we are looking for. For me, the more time i spend in this dry overheated growing by leaps and bounds playground the more convinced i am that Ohio is the best place on earth.

[EthelBeth]

Hi,

I am from Oregon and my husband is from Arizona but we have lived in Columbus for 5 years now. Yes the humidity is very hard to get used to.....actually you don't get used to it, you just learn to tolerate it! The area here is so amazingly beautiful....trees everywhere, and so green in the spring and summer. The Fall is also beautiful. Take a good look at the mountains before you leave the west because there aren't many out here, but then say hello to the beautiful green.

The people here are so very nice as an overall statement. You are midwest and so far I think they live up to their hospitable reputation! My favorite part about Columbus is that you have everything a big city has to offer, but then you can be out of the city in about 20 to 30 minutes in any given direction.....not kidding, there is as much city as you want and as much country right at your fingertips.

My other most favorite part is how easy it is to travel in the east. You know how it is in the west when you have been driving for 5 hours and you are still in the same state! From Columbus you are only 5 hours to Chicago, 8 hours to New York, 6 hours to DC, and only 2 hours to Cedar Point....one of the best roller coaster amusement parks I have ever been to.....oh my goodness it is so much fun up there. You have the great lakes at your fingertips as well....which makes you feel like you are at the ocean they are so big.

You will love it here.....as long as you make sure to love it here! Ohioans love their state and I love the state pride here. Not quite like Texas, I guess, but really who can compare to that kind of state pride!

Here is a list of all the things I will miss when we leave Ohio.....
You pick strawberries, apples, and pumpkin farms
The Ohio State Fair (especially the butter cow!)
Cedar Point
How close you are to so many cool cities
Hocking Hills State Park (just an hour south.....amazingly beautiful)
The fireflies in the summer...they are so fun to watch
The country side and the friendly people (obviously there are other places with friendly people)


Also, Marysville is a nice area with a good school district. If you want to live a little closer to the city Dublin is a great city with a really good school district (I taught in that district for awhile). The commute from Dublin to Marysville isn't too far and Dublin is a very nice place to live. Also Powell.....I think that is fairly close to Marysville as well.

Good Luck!