What does Dallas need to become a world class tourists destination? (Houston: crime, cheap house)

[Cowboys fan in Houston]

Originally Posted by Bostonian08

Uhhhh - I don't know for sure - but something ...

But Dallas is not a country city. I have never found it to be.

Fort Worth is country, but they wear it right that I like it.

I pose this question: What do you feel Dallas is?

To me, Dallas is a jack-of-all trades city that really stands out nowhere. The good part of that is that Dallas is a very stable city economically, the bad part is Dallas doesnt ride the highs. Its a great place to live, the economy is good, its ethnically diverse, the food is good, and its cheap.

[Cowboys fan in Houston]

Originally Posted by lh_newbie

Dallas doesn't have low self confidence. Dallas has poor leadership that is short sighted. Big difference. I still don't think we should focus on being a tourist destination. We should focus on connectivity and big events - these things will improve the quality of life for it's citizens. If at some point in the future, tourism becomes a bigger piece of the pie, so be it. I'm merely saying we shouldn't focus on tourism. Focus on quality of life for citizens and keep the strength in the business section. Those are where we can make easy strides forward, and for a long long time. Tourism is so far away, we shouldn't even try to allocate money toward it.

Brian

+1

I think this is dead on. Dallas has very little tourism value. Fort Worth would be better suited for that.

I agree we should focus more on events and connectivity. We need to be in this for this for the long haul if they really want to put Dallas on the radar. Places dont become tourist hotspots overnight.

The leadership of Dallas is also questionable at best. Dallas is unusually corrupt for a city this size. With Carraway set to take the reigns, thats going to get worse. It will be like having TD Jakes as our mayor.

[JimBaker488]

Originally Posted by justme02

+1

I think this is dead on. Dallas has very little tourism value. Fort Worth would be better suited for that.

I can tic off a bunch of things to see in FTW but when I consider Dallas, outside of the Texas Book Depository, I draw a blank ?

[xS☺B☺s]

Originally Posted by justme02

But Dallas is not a country city. I have never found it to be.

Fort Worth is country, but they wear it right that I like it.

I pose this question: What do you feel Dallas is?

To me, Dallas is a jack-of-all trades city that really stands out nowhere. The good part of that is that Dallas is a very stable city economically, the bad part is Dallas doesn't ride the highs. Its a great place to live, the economy is good, its ethnically diverse, the food is good, and its cheap.

Dallas is an extremely young city. The cowboy identity is an icon of Dallas (and western) history much like the pilgrims are an icon of Boston history. Boston is 400 years old though. Dallas is barely 100. Dallas's identity presently is a business city, but cities evolve. NYC was a frontier town once. So was Moscow - settled by vikings. Dallas over time will make its own history. Who knows what will happen, but 200 years from now, that history is likely to become a tourist attraction unto itself.

[Lakewooder]

I like to compare Dallas to Milan and Frankfurt -- don't laugh, if you've been there you know what I mean.

[lh_newbie]

Originally Posted by Lakewooder

I like to compare Dallas to Milan and Frankfurt -- don't laugh, if you've been there you know what I mean.

(just teasing, but you set yourself up and I can't resist)
Are you old enough to remember Milan and Frankfurt before they had a long history?

[Cowboys fan in Houston]

Originally Posted by Lakewooder

I like to compare Dallas to Milan and Frankfurt -- don't laugh, if you've been there you know what I mean.

I have been there and I do agree to a point.

I can see Frankfurt for sure. Milan Im kind of iffy about.

[rantanamo]

Originally Posted by JimBaker488

I can tic off a bunch of things to see in FTW but when I consider Dallas, outside of the Texas Book Depository, I draw a blank ?

really?

First of all, its silly to come to DFW and be that municipal.

FW:
- Sundance Square(Including Bass)
- Stock Yards
- Cultural District(Botanical Gardens, Kimball, Science Museum, Modern, Will Rogers Center, Cowgirl Museum)
- FW Zoo
-AA museum

Dallas:
- West End(6th Floor Museum, Dallas World Aquarium)
- Reunion Tower
- AA Center(yes people take tours there, plus the AA display)
- Chase Tower Skylobby
- Arts District(DMA, Crow, Nasher, Meyerson, Winspear, Wyly)
- Uptown(Trolley, Kalita Humphreys, Freedman's Memorial)
- Fair Park(Science Place, African American Museum, Women's Museum, Current Science and Nature Museum, Texas Discovery Garden, Cotton Bowl tours, Railroad Museum for now)
- White Rock (Arboretum, Bath house museum)
- Shopping(some like to do it on vacations, Northpark and Nasher's collection, Galleria)
- Frontiers of Flight Museum
- Old City Park or whatever they call it now
- Farmers Market

but why would one visit the area and just stay in one municipality? The don't do that in LA or even Vegas much of the time.

[TrueDat]

I find it interesting that you don't mention Deep Ellum. With its phenomenal musical history, that should be one of the city's showcase areas -- like Beale Street in Memphis, Hollywood Blvd. in LA., etc. That it's not well-known, and its history isn't well preserved, says a lot about how the city views itself. (As it is, there are still some cool things to do there.)

And whatever happened to that Texas Music Hall of Fame that was supposed to be in either Fair Park or Deep Ellum?

[Lakewooder]

TrueDat - don't know but I'll bet 95% of the people on here don't know the name of the building it was going into -- clue - it's here in this timeline chart:

Lone Star Thrills - Fair Park & State Fair of Texas -- Historical Timeline (http://tsf.lonestarthrills.com/history/timeline.php - broken link)