Why do people from Dallas dump on Dallas? (Austin, Tyler: new home, buy)

[ts_123]

Originally Posted by sirlarkspur

i have been living here for 3 months and the things i hate with a passion are the dallas cowboys (im from the philly area) road construction makes dust which means cars looks like **** also the ***** that is the texas sun i have seen more cars with ****ed up paint here that in the rest of my life. sure we have ****ed undercarriages in the northeast. the fact the people here drive giant cars for a living sure a truck makes sense but a ****ing Chevy Tahoe or suburban WHY??? also there seem to be millions of ****ty altimas on the road again WHYY? the altimas are what the pirus is to SOcal. you might as well be living in a island now granted this problem is true for 99% of the midwest and southwest but this makes it so if you cant find it in your city your have to fly to the next big city or drive for days in the northeast you can drive to the next big city at noon and still be home for dinner

I have absolutely no clue what I just read....

[hbdwihdh378y9]

Originally Posted by WriterDude

This place is terrific!

Okay, we've been in Texas for almost 3 weeks now, and while I'll acknowledge that doesn't make me a Texan to the core, I'm pleased to say that almost every dire warning has proven to be completely overstated.

Yes, it's a continental humid climate.

No, it's not. It's not dry like Phoenix, but it's not humid like everywhere to the south or east.

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by WriterDude

But I'm curious. I have seen so many people here on the City-Data forums presenting a sour disposition about Dallas. Why? Are you just deeply negative and cynical in general? It has to be an act, right? You're just trying to keep people from coming here because you got yours and don't need a bunch of half-witted "foreigners" adding to the line at your favorite BBQ place, crowding the malls, or clogging up traffic with last-second turns?

I've spent most of my life in Dallas. I was born and raised here. I wouldn't say my memories of Dallas prior to the mid-1980s are vivid (since I was just a kid) but the "Dallatude" referred to by more than one poster here has always been present.


I didn't "get mine." I was born "with mine." I grew up here because I didn't have a choice where I got to live. I fled Dallas for college and spent 12 of my 40+ years living elsewhere. (FWIW, Austin is worse.)


I don't have a favorite BBQ place and I don't shop at the mall. I'm just sick of people moving here clogging up the roads and driving up my property taxes and utility rates.

Originally Posted by jgn2013

Are the Dallas dumpers actually FROM (born and raised) Dallas proper or 'The Metroplex?'

My best guess is that this sort of person wants to seem either extra cosmopolitan and boast of their love for Chicago, D.C., NYC etc., once they traveled a bit for work after college.............or...........they have a strong preference for the small-town life and can't stand urban living and "urban" people.

I'm a "Dallas dumper" and I'm a native, so I've earned my stripes. I've spent 3/4 of my life here (having lived elsewhere in my 20s and early 30s) and I have every right to dump on a city that is:

• crowded
• not good value for money
• ugly
• superficial
• "glitzy"
• shallow
• rude

I don't have any great love for big cities, nor do I crave a life in the country. Honestly, I'd rather live somewhere that has natural beauty, four seasons, decent public transportation (I like options), better walkability, friendly people, and a good balance between COL/QOL. Dallas isn't it. I don't see why people think Dallasites (or their northern suburban counterparts) are friendly. They're some of the rudest people I've encountered. The only city in the US where I've encountered consistently ruder people is Boston. I'll make an exception for Fort Worth, though. I've found Fort Worth people to be pretty friendly (once you get off the highway).


You love Dallas so much? Keep it.


We have elderly disabled family members in the area, so we're staying here as long as those family members are alive and need our help. We put their needs above our desire to leave the area, just as they put our needs above theirs while they were raising us. Once we're no longer needed here, we are moving. We already have a shortlist of cities we're considering. (Chicago, NYC, and DC aren't on it.)


P.S. when I say "native," I mean I was born in Dallas proper and raised in Dallas proper. I'm not from the suburbs. I'm from Dallas. Back in those days we rarely went north of 635.

[Johnhw2]

Originally Posted by sirlarkspur

i have been living here for 3 months and the things i hate with a passion are the dallas cowboys (im from the philly area) road construction makes dust which means cars looks like **** also the ***** that is the texas sun i have seen more cars with ****ed up paint here that in the rest of my life. sure we have ****ed undercarriages in the northeast. the fact the people here drive giant cars for a living sure a truck makes sense but a ****ing Chevy Tahoe or suburban WHY??? also there seem to be millions of ****ty altimas on the road again WHYY? the altimas are what the pirus is to SOcal. you might as well be living in a island now granted this problem is true for 99% of the midwest and southwest but this makes it so if you cant find it in your city your have to fly to the next big city or drive for days in the northeast you can drive to the next big city at noon and still be home for dinner

Wow those are serious problems, Id move if this upsets me as much as this. lol

A few points, many who have lived here for ever dont have a good reference point on what it is like to live else where. Add to this some people are not happy unless they complain and you have compaints. Is this more than other places? I cant say for sure.

Other places Ive lived I didnt see the City vs the suburb hate I see here. I think this comes from an inferiority complex but have no idea why this seems more prevalent here than in say NYC area suburbs vs city or inHhouston.

[Alewife]

Originally Posted by Johnhw2

...or inHhouston.

Doesn't Houston just annex them?

Originally Posted by BigDGeek

...four seasons, decent public transportation....

?

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by Alewife

?

What about that do you find confusing...specifically?

[Tigerbait73]

Dallas is a great place to live...has everything you could need. If you don't like Dallas, you probably don't like big-city living to begin with. Every city has it's downfalls, and people will always find something to complain about no matter how great it is. Best just to appreciate what we have here.

[NP78]

Originally Posted by hbdwihdh378y9

No, it's not. It's not dry like Phoenix, but it's not humid like everywhere to the south or east.

It is actually literally a continental humid subtropical climate (Koppen Classification Cfa). Dryer than points South and East, for sure, but still within that classification.

[Alewife]

Originally Posted by BigDGeek

What about that do you find confusing...specifically?

Locales with the temperature variations of North Texas are not seasonless.

An MSA with bus transit augmented with over 100 miles of rail, including to the doorstep of its largest airport, isn't exactly lacking in transportation options.

Are you sure Austin is the best reference point from which to observe Dallas objectively?

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by Johnhw2

Wow those are serious problems, Id move if this upsets me as much as this. lol

A few points, many who have lived here for ever dont have a good reference point on what it is like to live else where. Add to this some people are not happy unless they complain and you have compaints. Is this more than other places? I cant say for sure.

Other places Ive lived I didnt see the City vs the suburb hate I see here. I think this comes from an inferiority complex but have no idea why this seems more prevalent here than in say NYC area suburbs vs city or inHhouston.

To me it's really pretty simple.

1). We have a small number of regulars here. Due to likely nothing other than small number/small sample size error a disproportionate number of these regulars dislike the area and a couple of them border being obnoxious about it. Add to that the person from Colorado who lived here for a bit, hated it, and seems to have made a career of popping on overstating his/her case with Rolex like reliability.

2). The growth here is akin to an area gentrifying in some ways. When an area gentrifies some long term inhabitants are priced out. Around here some have seen their costs go up faster to much faster than their incomes have risen. So in that narrow context they feel, and are, worse off than in the past never mind Dallas and its burbs still offer a top the class ratio of pay versus costs and opportunity.
The emotion is I'm worse of than I was with little to no understanding that I'm better off than I would be most anywhere else.

3). Bogus or dishonest or ignorant anecdotes add up. Paraphrasing some of the beauties I recall, "lake water around here is objectively disgusting".....when people boat, sail and swim in that same water by the thousands. "I know several people in my neighborhood who've been bitten by poisonous snakes".......that's statistically not possible. "I got off the plane at DFW at 5:30AM and it was 98F with 80% humidity".....never mind that in 125 years of record keeping that combo has never happened. "There are no trees in Dallas"......when Dallas has the largest hardwood urban forest in the county and high percentage of overall tree coverage.

I could go on for hours.

ETA - There is also something of a political angle to this. Many, by no means all, however, of the complainers say many of the same things area democratic party bosses say at events. I know Ken Molberg a little and have listened to him talk for many years about the area.