Info on Auburn WA Please! (Seattle, Tacoma: apartments, rentals, high crime)

[christus_rex]

Hey there. I am high school student in Montana looking to move to Auburn to attend Greenriver Community College and take court reporting there in a year. I would appreciate any information concerning Auburn. This includes public transit, shopping, apratment and job availability, even what Auburn looks like. Thanks so much!!!!

[Ryan]

Well, the good news is that public transit, shopping, apartments and job availability are all plentiful because you are in the Tacoma metro (it's a few miles from the largest mall in WA and a few more from good skiing at Mt. Baker). I'm not a big fan of the area myself. A lot of it is older run down, not "bad" per say, but definitely not great either. It's right next to the reservation and that tends to draw some bad element. If I was just going to school there, I'd probably live around Puyallup or Sumner. DO NOT live in Algona or Pacific. Those are the dumps in the area. A general rule of thumb is that the further East/N.East from Tacoma you travel, the better it gets (and the more rural) it gets. I'm not familiar with your particular college, so I don't have any info about that, but don't forget that when you enroll, you'll have to prove that you're a resident or pay the price; literally. That's about all I can tell you about the area. Good luck.

[Mark S.]

Algona and Pacific are definitely the "dump areas." Rather high crime there as well.

The area around Greenriver (east hill Auburn) is actually pretty nice. Apartments and other rentals are widely available, but they'll definitely be more expensive than you are used to in Montana.

West hill Auburn is also not too bad. I'd actually steer clear of the valley area (downtown Auburn).

Shopping? Eh. The Supermall is there, but it honestly isn't that great. There's a nice Used bookstore downtown. The nearest malls are probably the Commons in nearby Federal Way (a pretty pathetic mall honestly), Southcenter in Renton (always busy, terrible traffic, rather rundown, and not altogether safe), or the mall in Puyallup (probably your best bet).

Public transit throughout King and Pierce counties is pretty pathetic. But if you live near the college, you honestly won't need it to get to class. It's a very small campus. If you want to go into Seattle, you could probably catch a bus down to the train station. I've heard the Sounder train is very nice, but it has a very limited schedule. It's safe enough from what I've heard, though I've never taken it myself.

Traffic throughout the Seattle/Tacoma area is nightmare. Some of the worst in the nation. It's really, really awful, and the state and local governments are doing next to nothing about it, so it's only going to get worse.