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I'm looking to take up residence in a mid-sized city that is convenient for trips back home to the Detroit area. I'd also consider a small destination city piggybacking off a larger metro area (think Ann Arbor).
Within a couple hours of driving I see: Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids, Fort Wayne
Within a reasonable (~6 hours) train/bus ride I see: Toledo, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis
As far as I can tell, these seem to be the only options?
I'm also happy to consider cities that would entail a cheap round-trip flight, but determining average flight costs between cities seems unusually difficult. Anywhere that would allow a $500 round trip flight home every other month or so would be totally fine. I'm hoping this opens up a lot more options?
Ideally, I'm looking for somewhere that has many offerings but where things are far more centralized than somewhere like Detroit or Chicago, and where basic quality of life factors are also met (e.g., entertainment and career opportunities, other young people, general feeling of safety). It seems like this would rule out Toledo from other things I've read, and maybe Fort Wayne? Honestly, Ann Arbor hits a lot of high points for me, but I'm not having a lot of luck with my job search there.
I'm highly open to suggestion on this. Thanks in advance.
I'm looking to take up residence in a mid-sized city that is convenient for trips back home to the Detroit area. I'd also consider a small destination city piggybacking off a larger metro area (think Ann Arbor).
Within a couple hours of driving I see: Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids, Fort Wayne
Within a reasonable (~6 hours) train/bus ride I see: Toledo, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis
As far as I can tell, these seem to be the only options?
I'm also happy to consider cities that would entail a cheap round-trip flight, but determining average flight costs between cities seems unusually difficult. Anywhere that would allow a $500 round trip flight home every other month or so would be totally fine. I'm hoping this opens up a lot more options?
Ideally, I'm looking for somewhere that has many offerings but where things are far more centralized than somewhere like Detroit or Chicago, and where basic quality of life factors are also met (e.g., entertainment and career opportunities, other young people, general feeling of safety). It seems like this would rule out Toledo from other things I've read, and maybe Fort Wayne? Honestly, Ann Arbor hits a lot of high points for me, but I'm not having a lot of luck with my job search there.
I'm highly open to suggestion on this. Thanks in advance.
I think Lansing is very underrated in terms of the things you are looking for and it has multiple Downtowns/districts that may work(Downtown East Lansing, REO Town and Old Town, along with Downtown Lansing). Plenty of young people in East Lansing due to MSU(9th biggest university in the US according to 15-16 enrollment info) and Lansing Community College in Downtown Lansing has about 19,000 students. It is only an hour/hour and 15 minutes away by car.
Buffalo is about 4 hours by car going through Canada and about 5/5 and half hours going south of Lake Erie. If you want the city, I'd say to look west of Main Street over to about Richmond Ave due to having its share of younger folks, multiple districts(Elmwood Village, Allentown, Hertel Ave, etc). You could possibly look into Kenmore and the surrounding area(town of Tonawanda) just north of the city, if you don't mind a suburban area. Kenmore is walkable and quite dense.
All of this will depend on the job situation and what you are looking for in other aspects.
Last edited by ckhthankgod; 03-26-2017 at 03:35 PM..
Toledo is only an hour from Detroit and closer than all but Ann Arbor. I'd consider it over, say, Fort Wayne, but if four hours' drive is a consideration Columbus probably has more for what you're seeking if you strike out in AA.
I book A LOT of flights for a lot of people, and while maybe .01% of those flights involved Detroit, I am pretty certain you can get to basically any mid-sized city in the continental US for $500 roundtrip outside of busy holidays. Southwest, Jetblue, Frontier and Spirit provide many low cost connections to DTW. Try the explore the map function on google.com/flights to see what's available out of DTW (which should be reasonably close in price to what you can expect flying to/from DTW from another city). For a Fri-Sun in April it looks like you can get to every corner of the US for under $500, except Key West and Yakima, WA which are a tad bit over. Seriously though, with any bit of flexibility, staying under $500 should never be a concern.
Now, considering you are willing to bus/train for 6 hours, then I would suggest limiting yourself to direct flights that are 4 hours or less. That's fairly comparable when you consider the extra time it takes to fly. That doesn't narrow you down too much, but it does eliminate the west coast and southwest and limits you to larger cities as you get farther from the midwest. So pretty much Salt Lake City and east would be in play.
Alright, good luck! I don't know how to narrow down too much based on what you've stated. There are plenty of major cities to choose from and tons of secondary cities and college towns that could work as well.
What about one of the nicer, outer lying suburbs of Chicago? That way you would still be in a smaller city but you would be close enough to O'Hare to fly to Metro Detroit whenever you need to, and Chicago to Detroit flights are dirt cheap and take about an hour or less each way.
I don't know of specific cities to recommend, but there are some beautiful areas on the outer perimeter of the Chicago Metro and then you would be close to the fun parts of downtown Chicago too, for shopping, sightseeing, or whatever.
Detroit is a major hub for Delta so another city that functions as a Delta hub would be my recommendation. Cincinnati is the closest one that has six nonstop flights a day (fares showing $368 RT currently with short notice) and is also a fairly reasonable four hour drive from Detroit. Cincinnati certainly offers those quality of life factors mentioned with a lot of downtown revitalization and an influx of young professionals, along with a diverse economic base that could bode well for a job.
I'm surprised you haven't looked closer at Grand Rapids with all of these other cities mentioned. There are reasons it's been the fastest growing area in Michigan since the 60's. Great economy, job market, vibe. Tons of investment happening in the core and surrounding suburbs. If you're looking to be closer, this city hits all of your points. It's less than a 2 hour drive until you're in Metro D. It would seem like it should be first on your list.
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