Columbia, MO questions!!! (Fairview, Rea: home, job transfer, neighborhood)

[gimme it]

Thanks to you and to the others who gave good info. I was wondering which city (Columbia or Iowa City) would be considered more charming. Is one more tree-lined and green? Does one city have less concrete than the other? Tia

[edgeofhell]

Originally Posted by ptice69

Columbia. Yuck. I moved away. Schools (public) lack everything. Town is OK. Even though they are trying to make it like KC and STL. Check out gocolumbiamo.com. Crime rate and such, it's growing. Good points about Columbia, nature trails and some parks. Good luck.

wow, I'll be filing this one under "Least informative post ever"

"yuck"?? gee thanks for the details

"schools lacked everything"?? how specific

"They are trying to make it like kc and stl"????
Who are they??? and how does one try to make it like kc or stl???

negativity without specifics makes me sick

[aragx6]

I don't know much about Iowa City, but I was pleasantly surprised by Columbia's trees. And I am totally biased, but i think Mizzou has one of the prettiest public school campuses I've seen.

[GraniteStater]

Originally Posted by aragx6

I don't know much about Iowa City, but I was pleasantly surprised by Columbia's trees. And I am totally biased, but i think Mizzou has one of the prettiest public school campuses I've seen.

Iowa City is an oasis when it comes to trees They probably have more trees in Iowa City compared with several Iowa counties combined.

[Chris19]

I have been through Columbia several times and thought about going to grad school and moving there. I find Columbia to be a nice city and is a nice-sized community, a little smaller than Sioux Falls, SD (which is around 150,000 in the city). From the parts I have seen, the city is clean and the trees and hills give it character. If I move outside of the Sioux Falls, SD area, I would definitely consider Columbia, MO due to its size, proximity to higher learning, and having a diverse enough economic base for a smaller city.

[cyrano]

I've lived in Columbia since 1999 and have spent significant time in Iowa City. Iowa City is marginally prettier, mostly due to the Iowa River flowing through town. Columbia is, however, more attractive than most places. IC also has Prairie Lights bookstore close to campus, one of the last great independent bookstores in the country, and a slightly more vibrant intellectual culture in my opinion, although Columbia's is quite fine, thank you. It's definitely a liberal oasis in a conservative state, much like Iowa, although the political dynamic in Iowa is different.

In Missouri, Columbia suffers somewhat in its perception as a liberal town out of step with the majority of the state. Of course, a lot of us think that is a good thing. I like to compare Columbia to Brigadoon-- a wonderful place that seems to vanish behind you as you cross the city limits into the rest of the state, and the theme from "Deliverance" starts playing in the background. That's not entirely fair, but we are a Democratic, liberal, kind of tree-hugging, Volvo and Subaru kind of place in a Republican state.

Both are well-forested. Columbia and the area has a nice network of hike-bike trails that are well-used. Columbia schools are, notwithstanding what a prior poster said, regarded as some of the best in the state, in large part due to demanding parents who are often faculty members at MU. People really care about education here, just like it's also civically important to have a good library, and the public library here is one of the best I've seen. It's turned me into a library patron, something I never was before. To me, the best indicator of public school quality is that most rich parents (including the Wal-Mart heirs who live here) send their kids to the public schools, although there are private school options available. That's simply not the case in other Missouri cities.

Both towns have cultural activities that you'd usually find in much larger cities, due to their major state universities. I have loved classical music all my life and have heard a number of the world's greatest performers (Murray Perahia, Christopher Parkening for example) here. Many of us think nothing of making a short jaunt to KC or StL for a concert or an exhibition as well. The dining in both places is too much biased towards national chains, a function of being on major East-West interstates.

The weather in both places is true 4-season weather, including hot summers and cold winters. It's colder, more often, in Iowa City, and hotter, more often, in Columbia.

People gripe about housing prices being high in Columbia but that's because they compare them with other Missouri small(ish) towns. They ARE higher in Columbia than Jefferson City, for example, but for most, the quality of life is dramatically higher in Columbia.

"Charming" is hard to pin down. Both places have neighborhoods near campus that are the epitome of charming, but quite frankly, most of the affordable housing in both places is in tract subdivisions that look like any place. Columbia's primary "charming," close-in, desirable subdivisions are Grasslands (expensive) and Old Southwest, where we live. Our house is very close to the library, our children could walk to their elementary school and it's an easy walk to downtown, MU, and the aforementioned hike-bike trail, the neighborhood is heavily forested, and there's a lot of wildlife (a little too much in fact).

Columbia is the only place I'd live in Missouri, and Iowa City is the only place I'd live in Iowa.

[Chris19]

Very good point. Columbia is similar to Sioux Falls, SD in that respect. Sioux Falls is not as conservative as most parts of South Dakota and is more expensive, but has more amenities and good quality of living like Columbia. When I visited Columbia, it reminds me of a smaller version of Sioux Falls with a huge state university (something Sioux Falls lacks but has a public universities center that is growing at a good clip).

[thinkartgraphics]

i have had mixed feelings about columbia in the past, but it's changing for the better. i am posting with a spin on some of the advantages of columbia. it's growing fast and there are plenty of people trying to make sure it grows in the right direction. check out some of the arts organizations and art related events/groups popping up everywhere around CoMo. The Warehouse Studios is a non-profit that will be housing many local artists. the north village is a section of columbia that pursues their goals to become "the hot spot" for artists. fay street lofts are live/work lofts like they have in bigger cities like chicago and ny. Fay Street Lofts
orr street studios is another artist studio space for established artists in columbia. there are several more underway; like the columbia art league project in the historic missouri theatre. hope some of this info helps you make a decision.

[cyrano]

Forgive me for posting twice, but I just realized what the tipping point for me is in preferring Columbia over Iowa City-- the large cities each town is close to. Columbia is almost exactly equidistant between St. Louis and Kansas City-- and for a lot of us, it's nice knowing that those big city amenities aren't that far away. Iowa City is about the same distance from Des Moines as Columbia is from StL, and is somewhat closer to the Quad Cities and of course to Cedar Rapids-- but I think Columbia wins on this count, since even Des Moines doesn't have the attractions or amenities that either KC or StL have.

Iowa City is, per Google Maps, 222 miles from Chicago, which is really a superior attraction...but at 200+ miles, it gets out of the realm of "jump in the car and go" territory, at least for me. There's a strong connection between IC and Chicago, but I still think it's closer to a Major Trip than the 2 hours (and that's when the traffic cops are all out, as they were today) from Columbia to StL.

And with pretty easy train access, a weekend trip for Columbians to Chicago is something a lot of us do. Mrs. Cyrano and I prefer to drive up to La Plata, MO, a small town between here and the Iowa border where the Southwest Chief from Los Angeles stops on its way to Chicago. No parking hassles, no terror-filled drives on the Dan Ryan, just a lovely weekend in a great town.

But it's still a very close call. I have spent many happy hours in Prairie Lights and on the UI campus in IC, and think it's amazing that so many of America's best writers have lived, worked, and studied there.

[aragx6]

I never knew you could head up 63 and catch a train to Chicago! That's so much more convenient than going from Jeff City to St. Louis and on from there! Only wish I'd known that when I lived there!!