How's Waltham? (Boston, Cambridge, Newton: low crime, houses, college)

[ben242000]

How expensive? Is the downtown area nice? What about the people?

I saw it had low crime rates, so that's obviously good, plus it's less than a half an hour from Boston.

[brightdoglover]

Very urban, diverse, former mill town, now home to a great deal of tech companies (and tech workers) so housing is more expensive than, well, than it seems worth paying.
There is a nice couple of streets downtown with very interesting restaurants and a great moviehouse. But a lot of downtown is subsidized housing, halfway houses, etc.
It's a big place, great access to Boston/Cambridgd, Rt. 128. The outskirts are quite suburban, near Brandeis College.
I don't think of Waltham as a town so much as a suburban/urban area just outside Boston, with all those pluses and minuses.

[goyguy]

Neighboring Watertown and Newton are both closer to Boston - Watertown also borders Cambridge - and would be nicer places to live in. The fantastic variety of restaurants on Main and Moody St's in Waltham (everything from Cambodian to Guatemalan) isn't far away, but BDL described that city's downtown area to a T. You can amble around there at all hours without worry, but it's pretty down-at-the-heels once you're off the main drags until you're closer to the city limits. Waltham Highlands, Cedarwood, North Waltham, and Warrendale are among its "better" sections; all have a suburban atmosphere and offer every kind of house from "dollhouse" Cape to perfectly restored Victorian. Prices are appreciably lower than those of Watertown and Newton as well.

"Less than half an hour from Boston" wouldn't apply unless you're including the westernmost Brighton section, or if you'd be commuting outside of rush hours and getting a run of good luck with traffic lights. Express bus service from each of the three municipalities is good, and Waltham has two stations on a commuter rail line into North Station.