Orlando is a great city but....

[compelled to reply]

Originally Posted by NuName

Too many ppl in Central and South FL dont speak english, even if they can!!!

If your talking about behind the counter, than this is a whole different story, but out constitution grants Americans free speech and if you want to speak to your family in public in Spanish, gibberish, or anything else, than we as Americans have a right to do so. Although I think business should be unilingual and we shouldn't have government websites/etc in Spanish, realize our country was indeed founded on liberty, not English, although our promise of liberty was indeed written in English (thus ties to the business/government thing).

[vincero]

You have to build the city for the people not just for the tourist

Bingo.

[osomd1]

Originally Posted by Bull City Rising

I dunno, man. I'm a third-generation Floridian who grew up in Winter Park, moved to Boston for college (and stayed more or less another six years), and has now settled in Durham, N.C.

No way would I ever move back. I've moved to a metro area just smaller than Orlando (1.2m people in Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill), but with much better traffic, far better jobs (#1 for creative-class workers in the US; #1 for jobs overall in recent Forbes rating), and, dare I say it, more culture and better dining. (The Enzian and Park Ave CDs, plus Stardust Coffee, would have been on my top-culture list of Orlando ten years ago, and I don't think anything has yet matched them!)

In my town of just 200,000 people (one part of the so-called NC Triangle), we have a world-class university, the fifth-best hospital/medical center in the country, a better arthouse cinema than the Enzian, the 11th-best restaurant in the US per Gourmet Magazine, about half the per-capita crime rate, gorgeous old renovated brick warehouses serving as condos and workspace... plus the largest ad agency in the southeast, the world headquarters of IBM's old PC division (Lenovo), major engineering and operational centers for Cisco, Nortel, Sony Ericsson, GlaxoSmithKline, Fidelity Investments, Credit Suisse... the list goes on and on.

I loved growing up in W.P. in the 80's and 90's. Park Avenue and Rollins didn't yet have the unapproachable "Palm Beach" look to them (witness the change with the kids' artwork at Christmas now being posted on Morse Ave instead of Park Ave because it wasn't 'classy' enough), but were comfortable, attractive places to be around. I was blessed to live in a great neighborhood and to attend some of the best schools in the area (Park Maitland and Trinity), but looking back and hearing from friends as to what's happened to the public school system -- which was struggling when I was there in Orange Co., and apparently is in even worse shape now -- it would be another reason to never return.

My mother -- a second-generation Floridian herself -- has already bought her retirement property in Tennessee and will be selling her home of the past 30 years later on this year, which is heartbreaking for her. Fortunately, the benefits of selling an acre of Winter Park lakefront should ease the pain a little once she sells. :-) My father still has family and business ties to the area but wants to move out at least as far as Lake County if he can.

I'd like to hope that there will be better roads and schools in the future; perhaps with Doug Guetzloe finally getting strung up (he's successfully opposed taxes for roads going all the way back to the mid-80s, and I-4 hasn't been widened much since!) it will be possible. Still, though, too many folks in Fla. are of the mindset that taxes aren't needed because the growing tax base will just pay for itself. Hasn't yet been the case, but I hope things change.

Sorry to sound so negative about my old stomping grounds. I do have some fond memories of the area, and there have been some great changes (can't believe what happened to the old Orlando NTC -- Baldwin Park??!), but honestly, I think from the total picture of culture, jobs, education, and affordability... it's possible to do a lot better than Orlando. I hope things turn around!

Whoever bases a decission about moving to a certain place on this or other forums must be insane, I beleive that most people that frequent them are
social zeros, always unhappy and you bet not very successful!!!, just think
about the nicest place you can imagine, visit the forum for that city and voila!
there they are, whining, complaining, always fantazaising about great, dirt
cheap places, full of white people that only speak and understand english, ha,ha,ha they are just pathetic.
Reality check:
1- Is it a coincidence that all the states with the fastest growing economies have very high percentage of hispanics and other minorities.
2- Have any of these whiners been to a college town in the past 25 years? they are full of asians, hispanics, middle easterners, europeans. They are the driving force of this country, now if you go to a beauty school or a vocational
school, or either police or fireman academy, then you'll find your "average" american, and of course whining their way through trade school.

[High Springs Gator]

Is it a coincidence that all the states with the fastest growing economies have very high percentage of hispanics and other minorities.

And the majority of those minorities are illegal immigrants. Don't you dare put them in the same category as American citizens.

[osomd1]

Originally Posted by High Springs Gator

And the majority of those minorities are illegal immigrants. Don't you dare put them in the same category as American citizens.

Ha,Ha who cares about who is moving the economy forward, "illegal" vs "legal"
resident what's the difference, a document? give me a break, Everyone except for native americans came here as illegal or cuasi illegal residents, who has the moral right to draw the line?