Moving to Madison - which neighborhood/area? (Milwaukee, Buffalo: transplants, for rent)

[atarinox]

Hi all,

There's a very good chance I'll be moving to Madison in the coming weeks, and I had some questions about which neighborhoods or areas might be the best fit.

A short commute downtown would be ideal - I'll have my car but ideally I'd be able to bike. I probably couldn't afford much more than 700/month for rent. I'm looking for an area which might be a bit younger (I'm just out of college), and would love it if I could find an area w/ young professionals/grad students for roommates.

I also have an indoor/outdoor cat, and definitely need an area with some woods/wildlife for her to explore around the house. Ideally this would include a backyard and garden area maybe. Older areas with big trees, cool buildings and a good bit of character would also be a preference.

So...is it even possible to meet all these conditions?

Also, as a side question - how easy is it for transplants to meet people and develop some kind of a social network in Madison?

thanks for the help!

[Drover]

Good luck finding a place under $700 that isn't a phone booth, a roach motel, or both. If you can tolerate living in a phone booth, you should be OK. If not, consider taking on a roommate.

Biking is easy, unless there's snow on the ground. Even then some people manage, sometimes with custom-built studded tires. Lotsa bike lanes around town. Good thing too, because you'll be hard-pressed to find a place to park downtown without paying an extra $100 a month.

Room for the cat -- that tends to suggest the west side, especially if you want to be close to downtown. much of the near east side sits on a narrow strip of land between two lakes. This presents two concerns: a) housing is denser so yards are smaller if they exist at all, and b) more major thoroughfares packed into a smaller area, which means too many opportunities for kitty to become a meat pancake. The area that seems best suited to your needs is that immediately south of Regent Street and immediately west of Park Street. If you can get right up against Vilas Park and/or over by Edgewood College, all the better for your mouse-muncher.

Meeting people: it can be done if your interests are well-served by the community, but you'll need to be willing to seek out the opportunities as they won't necessarily present themselves to you on a silver platter. You're in a better position than most since there are 42,000 college students huddled in the middle of town so you have a lot of people right around your age that you should (mostly) be able to relate with.

Best of luck to you.

[katreese]

Originally Posted by atarinox

Also, as a side question - how easy is it for transplants to meet people and develop some kind of a social network in Madison?

For answers to that question, read the following thread:

http://www.city-data.com/forum/wisco...ange-land.html

[Drover]

Originally Posted by katreese

For answers to that question, read the following thread:

http://www.city-data.com/forum/wisco...ange-land.html

Uh, do you not think maybe the situation in that thread where an apparently single person moving to the family-oriented suburbs of Milwaukee is maybe a little bit different than someone in their early 20s moving to Madison which is packed full of single people right around his/her age?

[i_am_hydrogen]

Try the area near James Madison Park. (Mansion Hill, in particular, is a nice area.) It's close to the capitol square/downtown and tends to have a more mature crowd while still feeling like part of the university community. I used to live near the intersection of Pinckney and Gilman and paid $450 for a decent studio. But that was six years ago, and I'm not sure what places go for in Madison these days.

[katreese]

Originally Posted by Drover

Uh, do you not think maybe the situation in that thread where an apparently single person moving to the family-oriented suburbs of Milwaukee is maybe a little bit different than someone in their early 20s moving to Madison which is packed full of single people right around his/her age?

No. I moved to Madison in my early 20s as a single person, and my experience was exactly what the person in the thread I posted described. Also, the person's problems in the thread I referenced were not described as being because he was single. Mine weren't either. Getting married is probably not going to affect whether or not a person is beer-focused and insular.

[Drover]

Funny. I moved to Madison in my early 20s too, and I had no trouble finding social opportunities. Moderator cut: personal attack Madison is not the Milwaukee suburbs any more than Buffalo is Ithaca or Fresno is Berkeley. Different places for different purposes and, to a fair extent, for different people.

And yes, for many people being married does have a substantial impact on one's social habits; and having a family changes the focus of one's interests. That's why suburbs are often sleepy little places while urban centers teeming with young singles are not.