San Antonio vs. Austin? (El Paso, Arlington: live, suburban, to relocate)

[Quattro72]

Originally Posted by txlnghrn

I've lived both places for 4 years each. I much prefer Austin to San Antonio in terms of a quality of life. Austin is prettier (I find SA to be quite junky), and has more of the cultural things that interest me (art and music), as well as a far superior food scene. That said, traffic is worse in Austin, jobs are hard to come by, wages are overall lower and real estate costs higher (though still within your budget). I think its faults are largely attributable to the fact that its such a great place to live that there just aren't enough jobs and resources to support the number of people who want to be there.

So, based on that, if you can secure a job there BEFORE making the move, I'd pick Austin in a heartbeat.

Totally agreed. Austin, hand down.

[perticusrex]

I quite enjoy SA's junkiness.....

[imaterry78259]

Originally Posted by Quattro72

Totally agreed. Austin, hand down.

San Antonio hands down but Austin is a climber

[mikey1984]

Originally Posted by lemonfresh

what?

No.

Wtf?

Seriously, you folks living in that over-hyped college town need a reality check. Quit coming in here and bashing sa or talking it down for whatever low self esteem driven reasons.

bingo!

[LuminousFive]

I was born in San Antonio, lived there for 18 years, moved to Austin for college at UT, and lived there for 5 years. (now in the military and stationed in Germany... I MISS TEXAS!)

To be honest each city has its advantages.
San Antonio:
-Lower cost of living
-More value for your money in terms of real estate
-Has some cultural offerings (specifically hispanic i.e. fiesta) additionally there is good symphony and some theatrical offerings via the Majestic Theatre and a few others.
-Politically leans toward conservatism
-A great place to raise a family
-Less "high-tech jobs"
-**** poor public transit system (every time the city proposes improvements san antonians vote it down)
-A more "spread-out" feel to the city
-Every chain or big box store/restaurant you can imagine (except for white castle... oh I wish those tiny burgers would migrate south)
-North and NW toward the hill country the city is beautiful, moving more towards downtown it gets a bit flatter and more sparse. (But these parts of the city aren't to bad either)

Austin:
-Extremely culturally vibrant (called "the live music capital of the world") Plenty of theatre, opera, art, and symphony offerings.
-Good night life (even for those of us who are now "too old" for the sixth street scene)
-West of I-35 has beautiful scenery (to the east is pretty flat and much more economically depressed)
-Politically leans toward liberalism (some in san antonio half-jokingly refer to Austin as the Socialist Republic of Austin)
-Terrible traffic
-Terribly designed road system
-Great public transit (I lived there for 5 years without owning a car and got everywhere I needed)
-Fantastic restaurant scene... there are so many family owned/small business sized restaurants that offer such good food.
-Many, many jobs in the "high-tech" sector considering Dell, AMD, Motorola etc. all have offices there.
-Doesn't feel as spread out as San Antonio
-A pretty good place to raise a family too. :-)
-UT FOOTBALL! (Had to throw that one in... HOOK 'EM!)

Hope this helps. I tried to touch on a lot of the different aspects of each of these cities. If you have any questions, please feel free to PM me.

--John

[txlnghrn]

Originally Posted by lemonfresh

What?

No.

WTF?

Seriously, you folks living in that over-hyped college town need a reality check. Quit coming in here and bashing SA or talking it down for whatever low self esteem driven reasons.

I don't know if this was aimed at me or not, but I DO currently reside in San Antonio. And I think Austin is, overall, a better place to live based on factors that are important to me when picking a place to live. And that has nothing to do with "low self esteem driven reasons"(???)

[joelaldo]

-Politically leans toward liberalism (some in san antonio half-jokingly refer to Austin as the Socialist Republic of Austin)


HORRIBLY INCORRECT, we refer to y'all as People's Republic of Austin.

or... Travist County Socialistic Republic.

HAHAHA. jk


It is generally true that cities with more cultural opportunities (theatre, arts, music, etc) tend to be more liberal. The best cities in America, (New York, SF, LA, Portand) are all liberal cities. However, would you want to raise a family there? Jobs in S.A. for IT workers aren't non-existent. Some pay really good... especially if your husband lands a job with a defense contractor at Lackland or Fort Sam. That being said, Austin is a better place for that. Wages in Austin arent high enough to compensate for the dramatic difference in cost of living.

Only thing that drives me nuts about Austin is the traffic. There's always a traffic jam for every single errand I had to do the week I was down there. A buddy of mine told me one time that he plans his vacations and flights to avoid rush hour traffic. He'll arrive at 1am, just so that he doesnt have to face that 45 minute drive in dead traffic to his apartment only 15 miles from the airport. A drive from San Antonio to Dallas should be normally just shy under 4 hours. However, the drive through Austin can sometimes turn this trip into a 5.5-6 hour drive.

I love everything about Austin, but I wouldn't be willing to live my life inside my car.

[lemonfresh]

Originally Posted by LuminousFive

-Politically leans toward conservatism

Our last three Mayors have been democratic and left leaning. We elected an openly gay council woman four years ago. Bexar county was blue during this past election when city of SA residents voted in a left leaning democratic candidate. Please tell me how SA leans toward conservatism?

Heck, whenever big bonds go up on the ballet, whether they be for schools or the city, they pass. When the visitor tax had to be voted on to continue, all four proposals passed.

Does SA have its "say no" bunch, yes, but every city and metro has them. I dislike them but what I dislike more is when someone labels SA something but has no proof to substantiate that claim other than years old stereotypes and incorrect stigmas.

-**** poor public transit system (every time the city proposes improvements san antonians vote it down)

That is actually very very incorrect but I assume you are talking about light rail being voted down some 10 years ago or so. Well yeah but guess who also voted down light rail around the same time, yeah the "liberal" over hyped college town.

You may want to do some research.

What SA and VIA are doing now with SmartWaySA will blow every Texas city out of the water in terms of comparable mass transit.

[JuneOf48]

San Antonio is not "conservative." Maybe compared to Austin, but compared to the rest of the U.S., definitely not the case. Bexar County voted for Obama, and San Antonio has a Democratic mayor. Most of southwest Texas went for Obama. We are about 60% Hispanic in San Antonio, and that gives the political tone a unique flavor. Not "East Coast" liberal, but liberal/progressive in a different way.

This isn't Austin--but it also isn't Dallas. Maybe the more "Anglo enclave" sections of the city are fairly conservative in terms of political perspective, but that isn't true of the great majority of the city.

[LuminousFive]

Originally Posted by JuneOf48

San Antonio is not "conservative." Maybe compared to Austin, but compared to the rest of the U.S., definitely not the case. Bexar County voted for Obama, and San Antonio has a Democratic mayor. Most of southwest Texas went for Obama. We are about 60% Hispanic in San Antonio, and that gives the political tone a unique flavor. Not "East Coast" liberal, but liberal/progressive in a different way.

This isn't Austin--but it also isn't Dallas. Maybe the more "Anglo enclave" sections of the city are fairly conservative in terms of political perspective, but that isn't true of the great majority of the city.

1. I wasn't comparing San Antonio to "the rest of the U.S." I was comparing it to Austin.
2. Yes Bexar county went to Obama, but it also went to Bush... twice. Travis County (Austin) went democratic in all of the last three elections.

My point was not that San Antonio is a "Conservative" city. It was that if you are comparing San Antonio and Austin, San Antonio is certainly the more conservative of the two.

BTW, with all of the hullabaloo regarding district lines a few years back, the districts that make up san antonio, all freakin three of them, have completely different political make-ups. 1 went overwhelmingly for Obama, 1 went pretty strongly for Obama and 1 was a landslide for McCain.

All things said, both cities are diverse in terms of political makeup. San Antonio is the more conservative of the two.