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In no order:
Top 3: Ruidoso, Tijeras area, Albuquerque (due to sheer number of terrific amenities)
Bottom 3: Gallup, Grants, Albuquerque (due to sheer number of ABQ problems)
Would love to hear some more additions to this. Was a fun thread
I don't see any omissions on the "top" list. And as much as I love New Mexico it isn't really lacking in dumpy towns. Just about anything in eastern New Mexico. Some that haven't bee mentioned. Tucumcari, Clayton, Clovis, Raton, Springer. In central NM a lot of people aren't too high on TorC although it does have some unique things about it. In western NM, Grants and some of the other Navajo towns have bad reps.
All in all the oil patch area in SE NM is the least appealing on total points. But you still aren't that far away from some really nice stuff in New Mexico. I might pick those towns over say anything in west Texas (panhandle, permian basin) simply because the NM towns are closer to the nice mountains.
Bottom 3 - Alamogordo (some good barbeque, but geez, it is always breezy and dusty), Socorro (would you think of flash floods there?), Raton (ate there once and got food poisoning; was sick for a week)
Many of the locals are surly and cruel, the traffic like a self-inflicted knife wound, and the housing prices way inflated. It's like Juarez zoning combined with California prices. I feel less free in Santa Fe than any other place in the state. Meow Wolf and Violet Crown can't make up for the rest of the steaming pile, I'm afraid.
My list:
1, 2, & 3: Santa Fe, Taos/Ranchos de Taos, Los Alamos (which has the Valles Caldera in its backyard). But I haven't been to Ruidoso, though I've heard nice things about it, so maybe we could squeeze that in there, too, IDK.
Worst: I avoid the worst. Grants? Is it even a town? Tucumcari?
Bottom 3 - Alamogordo (some good barbeque, but geez, it is always breezy and dusty), Socorro (would you think of flash floods there?), Raton (ate there once and got food poisoning; was sick for a week)
Where isn't it windy in New Mexico? You missed the boat on Alamo, bud. I love it here! Windy? Re-hee-haa-ree-haa-llleeeeee!
Many of the locals are surly and cruel, the traffic like a self-inflicted knife wound, and the housing prices way inflated. It's like Juarez zoning combined with California prices. I feel less free in Santa Fe than any other place in the state. Meow Wolf and Violet Crown can't make up for the rest of the steaming pile, I'm afraid.
I know this is an old post, and I am not going to convince anyone whether they should love or hate Santa Fe or anywhere in between, but I found your reasoning interesting to comment on, so I'll break it down.
1. Many of the locals are surly and cruel,
Surly and crude is not uncommon in most of the state. But it is an undercurrent belied with what is my experience that a lot of New Mexicans, even one's you'd never guess (face tattoos?), can be helpful to the point of selflessness and conviviality. That is not to say New Mexico does not have its social problems, but the 'locals-only' attitude that is prevalent in Santa Fe is the rule in New Mexico as a whole, not the exception. Only in Albuquerque can you escape it.
What Santa Fe does have that is absent in most of the state is a class of real snobs. The vast, vast majority of whom are second home owners from out of state with more money than manners. You don't exactly have to rub shoulders with these people, but sometimes you run into them on the dining scene even if you otherwise try to avoid the venues they frequent.
2. the traffic like a self-inflicted knife wound,
This is a characteristic of any city that retained their historic district instead of bulldozing their history and putting up a grid of strip malls. If you love wide boulevards lined with Wendy's and Starbucks, you won't like driving in Santa Fe. I commuted from Albuquerque to Santa Fe for years, even worked at the ski area for a couple of years, and I am not going to say I liked hitting SF during rush hour, but it is what it is not out of laziness or stupidity, but history.
3. the housing prices way inflated.
Yup. You often hear people in Idaho, Montana, Utah, and elsewhere complain about the effect of newcomers from California on real estate values, but Santa Fe has been dealing with it for the better part of 40 years. I think this has a lot to do with the general surliness of locals as mentioned in point 1.
4. It's like Juarez zoning combined with California prices.
Not sure how you can compare a city of 1.5 million people and over ten times the density to a city of 85,000. Santa Fe seems to be zoned much like any other American city of its size with a compact "downtown" area surrounded by small-lot residential neighboorhoods with the occasional commercial road, eventually yielding to sprawled out, actually very spread out suburban developments. If anything Santa Fe is the opposite of a dense, mixed residential/commercial city.
5. I feel less free in Santa Fe than any other place in the state.
I think having our feelings acknowleged is important. Noted.
Santa Fe has much the same laws and regulations as any other city in the state. I guess they led the charge for reusable shopping bags, though. But a dystopia it is not.
Bottom 3 - Alamogordo (some good barbeque, but geez, it is always breezy and dusty), Socorro (would you think of flash floods there?), Raton (ate there once and got food poisoning; was sick for a week)
All right, Redmond75, I Googled average windspeed for both Santa Fe, NM, and Alamogordo, NM. Here ya go:
Santa Fe: 7.7 mph
Alamogordo: 7.9 mph
We really are full of...wind over here, aren't we?
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