Which neighbor do you like better? Maryland or North Carolina? (Norfolk: home, school)

[vanyali]

No one south of Fredricksburg would pick MD. No one north of there would pick NC (if they have any actual experience with the place). Northern Virginia is Northern, the rest of VA is Southern, and that's how opinions are mainly going to divide.

And yes, Charlotte is still Southern in all ways that matter.

My husband just remarked yesterday, on a trip back to Charlotte, how amazed he was that a McDonalds he drove through on Rt 1 was so quick and efficient, and even put the cream in his coffee for him -- something they'd just never think to do in Charlotte. Doing things quickly or efficiently or at all better than before is just not a top priority here.

[tarp]

The Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area (the Triangle) is actually just as liberal leaning in its politics, if not more so, than Northern Virginia and the area feels a lot more like NOVA or Suburban MD than it feels like Richmond, especially in the urban cores. Once you get into the smaller towns surrounding it, then it's virtually indistinguishable from Southern VA.

In 10 years, NC will be a "blue state". Their politics are already a lot more liberal/progressive than VA, in good and bad ways - higher taxes, stricter gun laws, stricter consumer protection laws, more focus on urban issues and needs in the state legislature. Plus the huge amount of growth from northerners moving down to NC...

[Lynch Vegas]

Obviously NOVA is more like MD, but I think there's more to it than just this observation. Much of southside VA is just like eastern NC: poor, rural, with a few very wealthy families. Where I think Virginia really acts like a mixture of historical Southern disparity and the Baltimore-DC sprawl of middle class is within the cities of Tidewater, Richmond, Lynchburg, Charlottesville, and Roanoke. What differs from NC is that the big NC cities still seem to have that huge gap between the very wealthy and the poor and a smaller middle class. If you travel around Maryland on the eastern shore and the northern Chesapeake Bay area, the small towns appear to me to be almost New Englandish with a tinge of the south mixed in. They did get the Redskins so they have that going for them!

[vanyali]

Originally Posted by tarp

The Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area (the Triangle) is actually just as liberal leaning in its politics, if not more so, than Northern Virginia and the area feels a lot more like NOVA or Suburban MD than it feels like Richmond, especially in the urban cores. Once you get into the smaller towns surrounding it, then it's virtually indistinguishable from Southern VA.

In 10 years, NC will be a "blue state". Their politics are already a lot more liberal/progressive than VA, in good and bad ways - higher taxes, stricter gun laws, stricter consumer protection laws, more focus on urban issues and needs in the state legislature. Plus the huge amount of growth from northerners moving down to NC...

I've only been observing Charlotte for 3 or 4 years, but it looks to me like most of the Northern transplants to the area assimilate within a year or so of moving down, so that the raw numbers of transplants to the area overstates their influence on the place. Of course, there are more houses and roads and the Charlotte metro area physically gets bigger, but culturally, I don't see the Northerners swamping the Southerners. More the other way around.

[williboy]

How about Tennessee, Kentucky, or West Virginia?

[NightHawk112005]

West Virginia would have to be last. I'd have no problem with Kentucky or Tennessee. As for Maryland vs. North Carolina, it's a tough call. I love ACC basketball, so NC would be a great place for me to be with four teams in the state. But although I'm conservative, I've never considered myself a southerner. I could probably enjoy either.

[Bobilee]

West Virginia would have to be last.

Curious post, considering that West Virginia is Virgina's most natural neighbor, having been part of Virginia, and many people connected with relations and ancestry, and sharing a large border.

[NightHawk112005]

Originally Posted by Bobilee

Curious post, considering that West Virginia is Virgina's most natural neighbor, having been part of Virginia, and many people connected with relations and ancestry, and sharing a large border.

I don't care. I feel no connection to West Virginia, especially considering all the jokes that I and several friends have made about West Virginia over the year. Unless it was the only state in the continental U.S. I could get a job in, I'll never live in West Virginia.

[NENC]

Virginia probably has more in common with NC than it does with either WV or MD. Both are about the same size with similar geographic profiles...a fairly wide coastal plain area along the Atlantic coast with a significant piedmont region (both states have shared a long history of tobacco, furniture manufacturing and textiles in their piedmont regions), and a significant mountainous area in the west.

Virginia and North Carolina were settled by the same people as well...English protestants in the coastal plain and Scotch-Irish in the piedmont and mountains. Both states have large African American populations, both share a history of plantation culture in the coastal plain. Both states also share some similarities agriculturally...peanuts and cotton in particular (Suffolk, VA has been home to Planters Peanuts for years) that Maryland does not share. Virginia and North Carolina also share a very long common border that is heavily traversed. WV shares a long border with Virginia but most of the length of that border is mountainous wilderness. The mountains are a significant barrier to commerce between WV and VA. Those two states do not share the same sisterhood as say the Carolinas (North and South). WV actually has more interaction with Ohio and Pennsylvania than it does with VA. Same thing with MD...MD shares a shorter border with Virginia than does WV or NC with very few crossings.

Can't quite put my finger on it but Maryland just feels different than Virginia and North Carolina. Everything about it feels different. Its climate is different, its people are different, its cities are different. Maryland to me is more like PA, Delaware, and New Jersey than it is like Virginia.

[KeyserSoze]

Maryland has all of what you described, just at a smaller scale. I always thought of Virginia as a larger-scaled Maryland(I've seen it being called East Virginia sometimes), despite the few differences the two states have. No offense to the Commonwealth though, with all its glorious history. Maryland also had a long history of tobacco, as well -- and not exclusively in the Eastern Shore or Southern Maryland, either. As for north as Carroll County, which is South of the PA border, and as far west as Frederick. That of course has all changed, though. And plantations were all throughout the state of Maryland as well. Piedmont, Coastal Plain, Eastern Shore, whatever. It was there. Just nowhere near as many as Virginia because the Commonwealth had more Piedmont & Coastal Plain land available, which made many plantation owners wealthy.

Cotton only grows in Southeast Virginia, and even there, only in a very small area(near the NC border), as opposed to North Carolina, where a considerable percentage of cotton is grown in a considerable part of the state. More people travel the MD/VA border(DC) than they do the NC/VA border. Not to say that the NC/VA border isn't heavily traveled, just nowhere near as heavily traveled as MD/DC/VA is. And I could be wrong, but I think MD/DC/VA(I'd even throw WV in there as well) share & provide more together as a region as opposed to NC&VA. Could be wrong, though.

Maryland has a large black African-American population as well(generally & historically Baltimore, PG, & Eastern Shore, but is spreading), located in the same region as in Virginia(generally & historically the Tidewater to the East & South, but is spreading). Maryland & Virginia share the Tidewater region, too, as well as the lovely Tidewater accent(found on the Eastern Shore of MD, though is dying out). I think it exists in Coastal Carolina as well. The rural areas in Virginia look, feel, & remind me of the rural areas we still have in Maryland.

Climate between Maryland & Virginia different? Not really so. It may seem similar to NC towards the South/Southeast of the state, and that I would agree with, but that's only because of the Carolina influence. Just as how Southwest VA feels like Northeast TN. Just how Northern Virginia may seem different from the Appalachians, because of the DC influence. The climate between the two states is pretty much the same. No discernible difference, at least in my experience. Only a 1-4 degrees warmer on average, and in some places in Virginia(further South too), they are a bit cooler than you would find in Maryland. So it's not like Virginia is always warmer than Maryland.

With a few exceptions between the two, I don't really see or feel much of a difference, and I've been through the Commonwealth literally hundreds of times, from 95 to 81 -- from 64 to 66. Virginia just has it's own feel. Not blatantly obvious, but you can sort of feel it. I guess cuz of all the history around gives you a different feel. But in my conclusion, it's not really North(though some areas feel more Northern), but not really South either(though some areas feel more Southern), there's no overwhelming majority between which side it leans. I believe that's what's referred to as the Mid-Atlantic. The other state that comes to mind when I think that is Maryland, which is why I say they're similar. Same goes for Delaware, West Virginia, & DC. Can't really say the same for North Carolina, which besides the few exceptions of certain areas, is still Southern. Can't be disputed. That doesn't mean I expect everyone to see my way, though.