Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I looked through some of the other forums here, and found that San Antonio had the most posts of all cities listed in Texas. Texas had the 3rd most posts of all the states. San Antonio had the 3rd most posts of individual cities listed in US states. North Carolina has the two-most active cities, as well as the most active forum. I just found it interesting.
Also, Texas is actually the second busiest state. And if you add in Dallas and Fort Worth (same metro) that area has the most posts.
But I will say this: if you visit New York, Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, Seattle, Minneapolis, Boston, Atlanta, or Philadephia and come back to San Antonio and still think it is on the same cultural level as these cities, then you clearly have a prosaic standard of what constitutes true culture
Why are you compairing San Antonio with these large metro areas?
But I will say this: if you visit New York, Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, Seattle, Minneapolis, Boston, Atlanta, or Philadephia and come back to San Antonio and still think it is on the same cultural level as these cities, then you clearly have a prosaic standard of what constitutes true culture
I guess this will go on record as my rant. I will probably get in trouble for this one.
I think it all depends on what your definition of culture is. I have spent major amounts of time in many of the cities on your list. I have also shared a meal with Mayan Indians in the Yucatan, watched sea manatees play in the inland rivers of Belize, got drunk with suspicious italian men in Rome (one of them drove a PT Cruiser, I have no idea what that was about), was awed by the real statue of David in Florence, eaten raw octopus in Barcelona (not as bad as you think), visited Napoleon's birthplace in Corsica, and learned there is a thing call "Putain" in Canada which sounds good on paper, but never ever eat it. (I actually can't stress this enough, it's really, really bad and might kill you but the Canadians love it)
For me, I define culture as a city's character. Am I saying SA is better than Chicago? No, actually Chicago is one of my favorite cities in the country. If I don't get to go there each year on business I always make a personal trip out there with my wife just to eat a great steak, get a Chicago Hot Dog from Portillo's (Not SuperDawg, that's where the tourist eat) and visit many of the wonderful museums they have there. New York, the most incredible city in the world. Period. LA-it's more a life style than a culture, but God is that a fun town! I would never want to raise kids there, but it is truly an amazing place.
Haven't been to Boston or Seattle yet.
Now, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Minneapolis??? I don't think these cities have character. They seem to me to be little more than just big suburbs. Just ugly tracks of suburban sprawl. Don't get me wrong, I see San Antonio going down the same path and it pains me. But you take in the rich history and hispanic culture of the city (or is the history and culture the wrong color for some of you SA bashers?); if you study San Antonio's place in history before the oil boom; ever been to a (I know I am going to spell this wrong) a Quinceanera(?) or a full-on Mexican Wedding, you will find this place is so much more rich and vibrant than Dallas or Houston. The very first email in the world was sent from San Antonio; Alex Hailey wrote much of "Roots" here; Teddy Roosevelt recruited his Rough Riders from the Menger bar (those guys must have been lit!); the guy who started Valero was the actor Jimmy Stewart's best friend and together they stole the hand of a yeti from a monastery in Tibet (bet you didn't know that one. My wife is right, I read too much). Granted, our museums are lame (except for the McNay), our symphony and opera shamefully underfunded, we do have the dumbest drivers in the US, and the holiday river parade is just pathetic. But these things don't add up to character to me. (Except for the museum thing. I love museums. I go to other cities just to visit their museums. Best thing I can say about Dallas: their Museum of Art, one of the better collections in the country. I don't know who runs the Whitte, but they need to be removed. We don't need a permanent display of Fiesta Queen dresses. Trot them out before Fiesta, then clear the floor space for some Minoan or Indus River Valley art. How much traffic does that even generate? I don't know any one who gets up in the morning and says "let me see a bunch of gaudy dresses from the last 50 years". It just can't be a draw!)
If I had to rank Texas cities by their culture/character, I would put Austin as number 1. Like a major metropolitan area, it is constantly changing and evolving, but it always maintains its own unique sense of place and character. San Antonio would be number 2, while it evolves less rapidly, it's unique sense of character is stronger, probably because it is more firmly rooted in history. Third would be the Corpus area. I just love the sea and the closest runner up is Galveston which reminds me a lot of New Jersey. Sue me.
Of course nobody but SA has the current reigning sports Dynasty, the San Antonio Spurs!!! (I am sorry Boston, if your last great season was before the invention of the Speak-n-Spell, you are, by definition, irrelevant.)
There goes Trae and his inferiority complex. Yes, I know you mentioned Dallas, but geesh guy, you just can't let San Antonio "seem" important can you. lol
I'm not getting into this...it's obvious a number of you are overly sensitive in regards to any criticisms about San Antonio and cannot handle those with differing opinions. But I will say this: if you visit New York, Chicago, LA, Houston, Dallas, Seattle, Minneapolis, Boston, Atlanta, or Philadephia and come back to San Antonio and still think it is on the same cultural level as these cities, then you clearly have a prosaic standard of what constitutes true culture
I've lived in two of the cities you listed and visited the rest before. I don't think anyone here has ever put SA on the level of those places in terms of culture, in terms of the arts or anything. Not once, but you sure love to imply that, don't you. And if someone did or does, so what, it's there right to do so, they are free to share their own opinion, the only problem lies in your insulting them for stating their opinion. However, something that definitely does not constituent "true culture" is going on internet forums and talking down places you dislike. It's not.
Quote:
And while San Antonio proper has surpassed Dallas proper in population, it is foolish to suggest that the cities are in any way comparable to eachother in prominence.
Why do I get the feeling that if someone said San Antonio has better pre-wee football teams than Dallas you'd manage to come to that same overly dramatic "you think San Antonio is on the same level overall as Dallas?!?" conclusion?
Quote:
DFW metropolitan area trumps San Antonio, with over 6 million. It will never surpass the DFW metropolitan area population.
Cool. And here's another beyond obvious observation, DFW will never surpass New York, LA or Chicago. I guess Dallas and SA have more in common than you think.
There goes Trae and his inferiority complex. Yes, I know you mentioned Dallas, but geesh guy, you just can't let San Antonio "seem" important can you. lol
This person probably has more than one screen name and not just in this forum.They post the same S.A. bash B.S. Just let them be, anyone that knows about cities knows that San Antonio is an important place.I think if the F500, Valero,Tesoro,Nustar,shut down, Valero being the largest oil refining company in America, it would have some kind of effect on the economy.At least with prices probably.The same with the military presence here.
Actually, if you do a search on this forum for all of Ballistics' posts, an interesting portrait emerges.
After the first time Ballistic bashed one of my pro-San Antonio posts, I assumed (based on some other posts regarding Ballistic owning a Lexus) that Ballistic was some kind of angry young twenty-something year-old man with a decent job forced to move to SA from Dallas because of some kind of work re-assignment. The aggressively negative posts from Ballistic, I thought, were fueled by a frustration of the single's and night-life scene here in SA, which does pale in comparison with Dallas. I can tell you I was offended by Ballistics' bashing and couldn't understand the viciousness underlying it. As a former Telecom analyst, I am used to hunting down the bits and bytes to put a complete story together. Now, as an engineer, I am compelled to understand why things are. So I did a simple search on this forum and found a history of posts for Ballistic.
What I found out, by simply reading through some of Ballistics' posts is that I was wrong in most every assumption. Ballistic is a kid. Not a man, but a girl. Not making a living here in SA, but simply going to school here. The only thing I might have got right is she grew up in Dallas. She's not here due to a work-transfer, just here to go to school. She posts as much on the Dallas thread as on the San Antonio thread. And she generates as much, if not more, bad karma on that thread as she does here. This is due to her defense of a short-sighted, highly materialistic (and can I say, spoiled?) lifestyle that people even on the Dallas forum recognize as wrong.
Many of us have reacted and replied heatedly to Ballistic's posts. I know I have. I just wanted to share this information with everybody, and you can easily do a search on this forum to confirm everything I have written here. My own personal belief is that unless you have to earn your keep in a city, support yourself in that city, and raise a family in that city......you cannot judge that city.
What Ballistic says is absolutely ridiculous. Who said SA isn't a significant national and international hub. We have a strong military presence and we are a major hub of NAFTA with our central location. SA has a strong cultural presence dating back to before even Texas became a state in the union whether you like it or not. We also have two major theme parks and are considered one of the most visit places in Texas, if not the most visited with so many attractions that are found here. There is a lot of history to be found here. I don't like how people like you and Guerilla keep bashing SA. If you don't like SA, just don't ever visit here, end of story.
This really affirms Ballistic's post about the regions naiveity on the lack diversification. Non of the above qualities determines a cities cultural hub or an economic power.
Simply having military bases is quite an argument but if this was true i'm sure wake island will soon be the global financial power following san antonio of course.
A theme park? Is this for real?
Now yes it is true I will say San Antonio does have culture. But the only culture there is present from the massive influx of hispanic immigrants settled there and the values reflect the same old people are born live and die there to be near their families and have never traveled outside of the country (South and central America's excluded).
I think Austin has more to offer than San Antonio I think most people agree as housing is more, jobs pay more and its a more expensive place to live. These are generally the signs of an economic power in the play.
San Antonio's a fast-growing community and it has 3 of the top 5 tourist attractions in Texas. (Alamo, Riverwalk, Sea World) It should not be surprising that a lot of people would want to talk about the city in these forums!
Hey !! San Antonio, I'm thinking about spending next winter in your fair
city. I'm from PA and tired of Florida. Tell me what you think !! I'm a young
retiree but, usually pick up a job to meet people and something to do. Is
temporary housing very expensive ??
I can tell, the drivers are great in San Antonio compared to the ones in
Detroit. The people here are not just slow they are nuts.
They simply do not care about you , your safety or simply cutting you off,
merging right in front of you in stopped bumper to bumper traffic,
or running motorcyclists off the road.
Four million people in one area is to much.
I'VE BEEN EVERYWHERE TOO. Houston was much worse than S.A.
but not any more.
Detroiters are constatnly driving in bad snowy or icy conditions here
and don't slow down particularly on I-696 eighty is the average speed and the state troopers here will broadcast over the radio stations when they will be monotoring speed and handing out tickets.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GWhopper
That's a very interesting fact. I think there are a lot of contributing factors as to this forum's popularity.
First, as much as people who live here complain about all the construction, it is clear that the city is putting together a massive and modern infrastructure that will support an immense amount of urban growth.
Second, San Antonio is growing very strongly now, and while Dallas, Austin, and Houston are growing as well, they are not seeing the same percentage of growth that we are, we are clearly the next jewel in the Texas crown.
Third, once upon a time, SA was the BIG city in Texas, but the oil boom shifted economic power to Houston and Dallas. As oil, while more far more profitable than ever before, sees less and less growth in terms of jobs, the focus is now shifting to what San Antonio has to offer, economically.
Also, the single fact that has kept San Antonio down economically for most of my lifetime, that being that this city had such a huge percentage of non-college educated people, is no longer true. This is becoming an educated city, the pool of quality resources is growing greatly, it is far more fertile than ever before, and with housing costs still well below national averages, these people (like me) want to stay here and companies are coming to us. We can be paid less, but live better than most in other more economically mature areas of the country.
And lastly, those of us who grew up here are tired of this city getting such a bad rap. LA, New York, DC, I have spent a significant amount of time in each. And while there are more "cosmopolitan" or "Urbane" things to do in those places, I wouldn't want to raise my kids anywhere else. If you can't find "culture" here, you simply aren't trying. This is a great city with a wonderful history, it deserves people like us to promote it and defend it.
All that being said: I can only say one bad thing about SA: in all my extensive travels on this earth, SA does have the most stupid, bovine-like drivers in the country. I mean, the average San Antonio driver:
1. Needs to bring their car to a complete stop on a major thoroughfare to make a right turn.
2. Waits several seconds to move on a green light, then slowly moves their vehicle across an intersection, taking the time it would take for 10 vehicles to cross the same intersection at normal speeds.
3. Thinks the first 5 seconds of a red light are still "okay" to drive through. This is called a "San Antonio Red", and the timed traffic lights in SA actually do take this into account. (probably why the people in item 2 sit on the green lights!)
4. Drives slow in the left lane (and this is not only old people) and does not know that what a faster car behind them means when they are flashing their high-beams at them.
5. Has no concept, or cannot comprehend, what a Yield sign means.
and lastly;
6. In the last 5 years I have probably spent more time driving in other American cities than in San Antonio, but this has only, AND I MEAN ONLY, has ever happened to me here and, sadly, it occurs quite frequently: during modest to heavy traffic the car in front of me misses a turn and stops, not AT THE NEXT INTERSECTION, but in the middle of a major road, like Blanco, San Pedro, Hildebrand, Wurzbach, Huebner, DeZavala, and MAKES A U-TURN!!!
This is why I can never run for mayor in SA. I think these people should have horrible things happen to them, and that would be my entire platform. We should have the ability to follow these people home and beat them with inflatable baseball bats while cursing them until such time as: A) they grow dizzy and see the error of their ways, or B) we simply feel better.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Never been to Detroit,
