Wilkes-Barre relocation (Philadelphia, Scranton, York: middle-class, sales, apartments)

[Dgallagher]

Hello, everyone! I'm extremely new to the forums. I have recently received a summer internship offer from a company, and they gave me a few choices of where I could go:

1. Wilkes-Barre
2. Columbus, OH
3. some far-off place
4. some fare off-place, etc.

I am a college student (from State College) and would like to stay relatively close to my friends and family for the summer.

Convince me that Wilkes-Barre is the place I should go based on
1. cost of living
2. attractions
3. atmosphere
4. crime/pollution/generic bad things
5. ease of finding housing.

Thanks!

[ScranBarre]

Hello there Mr. or Ms. Gallagher! I'm also a college student, and I attend King's College here in Wilkes-Barre, PA. If the choice were solely between Wilkes-Barre and Columbus, it would be like comparing apples to oranges! Columbus, OH, I belive is around the 14th-largest city in the country, with a population of around 700,000 people. In contrast, Wilkes-Barre proper is only home to 40,000 and, together with its sister city of Scranton (pop. 75,000), they both serve as the hub for an area of around 600,000 residents. You really can't compare the two. In my opinion, Wilkes-Barre has some charming, historic, walkable neighborhoods and Columbus seems to be more "sprawly" (housing developments, big-box stores everywhere, wide, busy streets, no sidewalks, etc.)

I'll base my analysis on just your five issues for now, but you can feel free to ask as much as you'd like!

1.) Cost-of-living: Well, you don't find too many places within two horus of Midtown Manhattan and Philadelphia that are as affordable as Wilkes-Barre is. It's still possible to find a nice, three-bedroom, two-story, "in-town" home for around $90,000, and the typical "McMansion"-looking homes you find in most suburbs (vinyl siding, shutters, two stories, front-facing two-car garages, etc.) are more affordable here than in most other areas. We have homes like that around here for around $250,000---homes with similar appointments would easily cost $500,000+ in NJ, NY, or Southeastern PA. Overall, housing prices should be a bit cheaper here than in Columbus, which has been becoming a "boom town" as of late. We have average American car insurance rates; I'm still under my parents' family plan, and I pay $100/month to insure my 1999 sedan. Gas prices around here are also average. The state sales tax is 6.0%, which I believe is lower than the sales tax in OH. In general, you'll find Wilkes-Barre to be cheaper than Columbus. One thing that may be more expensive around here though is the property tax burden, which draws the ire of many local residents. While we tend to pay roughly half the property taxes that those in NJ and NY do, I still hear that we pay more than OH does.

2.) Attractions: Assuming you have a car, there's a wide variety of attractions within a half-hour's drive of the city. In the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre area, we have skiing, hiking, shopping, fine dining, whitewater rafting, theaters, local festivals, a great local Philharmonic, casinos, off-Broadway shows, etc. I'm not quite sure what your hobbies might include, be we tend to have everything you could name around here. Give me some of your interests, and I'll give you some better feedback.

3.) Atmosphere: I'd say I have mixed feelings about the local "atmosphere." While I find most locals to be very friendly, I also hear that they can be rather cold when it comes to embracing "outsiders." We're also not very diverse; I believe our area is about 94% white, non-Hispanic, so don't expect to walk around Downtown Wilkes-Barre and see a wonderful blend of blacks, Arabs, Hispanics, Jews, gays, etc., because you'll likely be seeing straight middle-class white person after straight middle-class white person for blocks. In that sense, I don't like the lack of cultural diversity we have around here. Nevertheless, the friendliness of the locals tends to make up for that. As far as the weather goes, we're a notably cloudy city. The lack of sunshine can get on people's nerves quite a bit, but I still enjoy having four very varied seasons of weather, where we can have Nor'Easters in winter and heat waves in the summer with pleasant weather in between.

[ScranBarre]

4.) As far as crime goes, Wilkes-Barre has more crime than its sister city of Scranton, but it's still not all that bad. Our crime rate is lower than it is in Columbus, but I'm not saying that break-ins, vandalism, etc. don't occur. As with any city, just use some common sense and take precautions, and you should be just fine. I personally don't have any problems with the local air quality, but I DO see that our air is dirtier than the national average from my research. I can recall during one of my daily runs last summer than the vehicle exhaust fumes near my home were so bad that I threw up all over the pavement from a coughing fit, but, then again, I live in a congested suburb right along I-81, I-476, and Highway 315, all of which combine to bring more than 100,000 vehicles per day past my home. There isn't much truck traffic through the city of Wilkes-Barre itself, so fumes should be minimal. One thing that draws my ire are the presence of "culm banks", or large hills of coal waste products that are just sitting and blighting our landscape. You'll find many uneducated older people saying that we need to KEEP THEM around to "preserve our history," but the newer generations all seem to agree that returning the banks to greenspace or for brownfield redevelopment projects is a much better alternative. The coal banks themselves don't cause any harm, but they're just unsightly. Many have been cleaned up, but a few of them do still remain here and there throughout the valley. The city's downtown has been undergoing a lot of revitalization lately, and some new projects include new condos, loft apartments, retail shops, restaurants, and an improved riverfront.

5.) You'll find a wide range of housing options in the city. Most local young professionals like to settle down in either Kingston or Forty Fort, on the "West Side", which is just across the Susquehanna River from Downtown Wilkes-Barre. Both of these communities are relatively-flat, have tree-lined streets, and have historic neighborhoods. The Back Mountain and Mountain Top areas are the city's two primary "bedroom communities", which are home to mostly tract housing and newer developments. The city itself offers some very liveable neighborhoods, the most attractive being the area around Wilkes University with its tree-lined streets, stately homes, and proximity to downtown. Parsons and Miners Mills on the city's North End are also very safe, friendly, and affordable, but they're more visually-unappealing with a scarcity of vegetation.

Here's a link to some photos I have taken of the area around Wilkes University and parts of downtown. Expect more photos of the "Diamond City" to come soon, as I still have to shoot scenes from Public Square, the Diamond City Entertainment District, Parsons/Miners Mills, and the West Side.

http://www.city-data.com/forum/penns...-part-one.html

Hope this helped a bit!

[Dgallagher]

Your posts exceeded my expectations! Thanks. I will indeed have a car, and I plan on scouting out the area in a month or so. I'm glad to hear that housing isn't ludicrous; some of my other options were in much larger, more expensive cities.

Some of the houses from your photos were lovely. I am definitely going to have to visit the historic locations.

How about the public transportation systems? I loves me some buses.

Also, have you visited State College? And how would you compare the two locations?

p.s.: Ms.

[ScranBarre]

Originally Posted by Dgallagher

Your posts exceeded my expectations! Thanks. I will indeed have a car, and I plan on scouting out the area in a month or so. I'm glad to hear that housing isn't ludicrous; some of my other options were in much larger, more expensive cities.

Some of the houses from your photos were lovely. I am definitely going to have to visit the historic locations.

How about the public transportation systems? I loves me some buses.

Also, have you visited State College? And how would you compare the two locations?

p.s.: Ms.

Hello there again MS. Gallagher! LOL! Well, Wilkes-Barre does have a public bus system, but it's very underutilized. There are also a few active cab companies, but they're not like the New York City cabs that you can just hail as they drive by; you need to call a dispatcher and have them send a driver to pick you up. Most locals, even those who live in or around downtown, rely solely on their vehicles to get them from point A to point B. The issue of public transportation has never really arisen in our area because, for the most part, traffic congestion in the region is non-existent. The North Cross-Valley Expressway and I-81 can each get a bit hairy during rush-hour with near bumper-to-bumper traffic, but otherwise our local roadways are smooth sailing.

As far as comparing Wilkes-Barre to State College is concerned, as a graduate student, you'd probably enjoy the environment much more in State College than Wilkes-Barre. While Wilkes-Barre has two colleges in its downtown, it never really succeeded in cementing itself as a true "college town" while State College is DOMINATED by Penn State. I think State College offers many advantages over Wilkes-Barre, but it also has some shortcomings. For example, State College may offer more college-aged entertainment options, but you also have to contend with a lot of undergraduates who like to "party-hardy." State College's cost-of-living is a bit higher than that of Wilkes-Barre due to the high presence of higher-earning college-educated adults in the area. Also, State College is a much smaller community than Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and doesn't offer quite as much in the way of professional sports teams, ethnic dining options, shopping outlets, etc.

It all depends on how long you envision yourself staying in your new city. State College may be nice if you want to immerse yourself in more of a youthful, energetic, "fun" environment, but once you outgrow college partying and all that stuff, you'll probably find State College much less appealing. As for Wilkes-Barre, it's not quite as "exciting" as State College for younger people, but it's more stable in the long-term as the area tends to cater to middle-aged people and senior citizens. I have been to State College before on several occasions, and while I liked the campus of Penn State itself, I saw very little, overall, that a non-college-oriented family or individual would deem to be desirable. Basically, State College is very "isolated"; it's quite a long haul to any other relatively-large city for any other sort of recreational, cultural, or athletic event. Scranton/Wilkes-Barre is about two hours from Philadelphia and New York City for fun day-trips, and both of those cities have begun to leave their mark on our area as well (The bad in the form of drug usage and the good in the way of new residents).

If it were up to me, I'd find State College to be VERY desirable if I wanted to "live it up" for the college life, but if I were looking to settle down and raise a family, I just didn't see any real "advantages" to living in State College as compared to other cities in the state with more attractions and entertainment options to offer. Deciding between Columbus and Wilkes-Barre would really be a no-brainer, in my opinion, but deciding between Wilkes-Barre and State College could be a tough one. While I don't much care for State College's isolation and lack of urban amenities, you still can't overlook the fact that it often ranks much higher than Scranton/Wilkes-Barre in overall livability rankings in various publications. I think the best way for you to pick between these two is to take a weekend off sometime and spend a day in each city. Wander around the campus of PSU in State College, and take in the historic neighborhoods of South Wilkes-Barre. Deciding between these two cities won't be easy.

[WasPA]

Might I add that Wilkes-Barre & environs are swell in the summer, take a swim in the nearby lakes---or those in the Poconos, take a spin on the top rated wooden coasters at Knoebel's Amusement park. take a hike at any of the various state parks, from Promised Land to mountainous Rickett's Glen's deep forests with waterfalls; Fourth of July brings several all-American celebrations with carnivals & fireworks...and the philharmonic's one summer performance.....

Within Wilkes-Barre, the Philharmonic won't be scheduled beyond the above and theater might be limited ...off season as it is in most cities, but the area has summer playhouses since you have a car; you'll also have the home ballgames of the new Yankees AAA team (former Columbus Clippers----you see, even they said "Goodbye (to) Columbus"!). There are two or three (three?) old fashioned drive-in theaters not far from W-B;

If you get bored, there would be summer studies probably, much history to discover; New York City or Philadelphia are both easy drives, the Jersey shore is not far; you could also take in summer symphony, ballet etc. at Saratoga Springs by heading north or at Tanglewood but taking I-84 east from Scranton.....plenty of bars, heh and live music too in and around Wilkes-Barre

All in all summer might be too short!

[nlptdms]

I would never recommend Wilkes Barre as a nice place to live. My in-laws live in the area and I am therefore forced to spend time there. Drugs everywhere...and a bar on practically every street corner. Several of the Turkey Hill convenience stores are robbed weekly. Not a great place to be. i would not feel safe living in this area.

Just my opinion.

[mm_mary73]

Originally Posted by Dgallagher

Hello, everyone! I'm extremely new to the forums. I have recently received a summer internship offer from a company, and they gave me a few choices of where I could go:

1. Wilkes-Barre
2. Columbus, OH
3. some far-off place
4. some fare off-place, etc.

I am a college student (from State College) and would like to stay relatively close to my friends and family for the summer.

Convince me that Wilkes-Barre is the place I should go based on
1. cost of living
2. attractions
3. atmosphere
4. crime/pollution/generic bad things
5. ease of finding housing.

Thanks!

Just curious - what type of company? Will they give you a stipend or simply the joy of working for them???? Any chance of the internship turning into a position? My daughter did this in undergrad school and felt it was worthwhile. Nowadays, you are crazy to pass up the chance. Nittnay Lions rock!

[ScranBarre]

Originally Posted by nlptdms

I would never recommend Wilkes Barre as a nice place to live. My in-laws live in the area and I am therefore forced to spend time there. Drugs everywhere...and a bar on practically every street corner. Several of the Turkey Hill convenience stores are robbed weekly. Not a great place to be. i would not feel safe living in this area.

Just my opinion.

Wilkes-Barre proper has certainly had its crime issues in recent years, but as the foot traffic continues to boon in and around the city with the rebounding downtown corridor, criminals will find it tougher and tougher to commit their illegal acts without risking "getting caught" by a passer-by. Drugs and bars are everywhere, and your Turkey Hill comment is actually "underestimated" (They're more like semi-weekly robberies now). Nevertheless, if you're a law-abiding citizen and you're terrified to walk around town, then you're just being a bit unrealistic. The only ones who get involved in violence are those who "were asking for it", if you catch my drift. If the city truly turns you off, Ms. Gallagher, its streetcar suburb of Kingston, just across the river, is another option.

[burdell]

Originally Posted by Dgallagher

Hello, everyone! I'm extremely new to the forums. I have recently received a summer internship offer from a company, and they gave me a few choices of where I could go:

1. Wilkes-Barre
2. Columbus, OH
3. some far-off place
4. some fare off-place, etc.

!

Nothing against PA at all but do 3&4 include somewhere like Europe or??????

Might be worth a look, could be a rare opportunity, I firmly believe travel is some of the best education you can receive.