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Originally Posted by citylove101
Interesting that almost all of these "boring" cities are in Sunbelt territory. Toledo and Lousville are not, but the two Jersey cities are close to New York. So that's like 98% of boring places are Sunbelt places. It must be the heat! I knew there was a reason I loved New York, Chicago and San Francisco!
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Out of the 50 most boring US cities:
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20 are in the Southwest (North Las Vegas, San Bernardino, Mesa, Colorado Springs, Henderson, Fresno, Stockton, Glendale, Riverside, Aurora, Phoenix, Santa Ana, Chandler, Chula Vista, Albuquerque, Bakersfield, Tucson, Anaheim, and Long Beach).
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24 are in the South (Lubbock, Chesapeake, Irving, Plano, Laredo, Arlington, Hialeah, Garland, Jacksonville, Corpus Christi, Tulsa, Memphis, San Antonio, El Paso, Lexington, Durham, Norfolk, Dallas, Louisville, Winston-Salem, Baton Rouge, Greensboro, Oklahoma City, and Fort Worth).
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4 are in the Midwest (Fort Wayne, Wichita, Toledo, and Lincoln).
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2 are in the Northeast (Newark and Jersey City).
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1 is in the Northwest (Anchorage). I put Anchorage here because I decided to split the West.
I would agree that climate plays a role.
It's not fun to walk around outside in 108 degree weather. Who would want to? We have a technology that allows us to bypass that (Arizonans worship the almighty A/C) and cars with the almighty A/C to help us travel to other places with the almighty A/C. We do then experience one month of the year where it's these temperatures with around 60% humidity (I actually really like this month, but most don't). Then the weather seems to hover in the 90s for a while, and then it is suddenly in the 70s-80s again. Most of our days experience no clouds and the lack of plants provide no shade (or tall buildings, refer to the car), making walking feel like a chore...
In the South I feel like it is much more tolerant to walk around than the Southwest, despite all the humidity and what not. Still, in the South it is not fun to walk around. I only enjoyed that in New Orleans and Miami, and there's very good reasons why they are not on here.
But still. Those in the Sunbelt are only using the technology given to us. Praise engineers and inventors!
I think more Northerners prefer urban lifestyles than those in the Sunbelt. I bet snow shoveling is quite a task (I wouldn't want to do it either) or deal with snow tires and driving in it and other stuff. In the Sunbelt where you don't have to deal with all this snow in most places, where your house can pretty much exist and won't prevent you from leaving or entering, why not? In most of the Sunbelt, houses require less maintenance, gas tends to be cheaper in the Sunbelt, cars have that A/C thing... why not?
As someone who actually would prefer to live more urban, it's quite more expensive to do than live a suburban lifestyle here in Arizona (lack of apartments and so forth, and you'd still need a car because our public transit sucks). I think in Northern cities where there is a higher selection of denser neighborhoods and apartments, it could end up being cheaper than living in the suburbs. Obviously, this would depend on the place.
Three of the criteria (population density, active life and fast food) directly depend on sprawl. I bet fast food restaurants make most of their profits on the drive-thru, and it's hard to have an active life when you feel like you're melting (and the indoors can only do so much, and when there's no where to walk to because it's probably at least a mile away and it's 108). Nightlife indirectly depends on it, because taxis are expensive and no one wants to be a DD, but when the bars are all sprawled out...
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