Charlotte Vs Sacramento (restaurant, south, rail, better)
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Sacramento has a great airport it doesn't need to have has many passengers as Charlotte because Sacramento is very well connected to the rest of the USA with multiple non-stops to all the hubs in the USA.
If one is a diehard snow skier, as I am, they want snow with high elevation mountains close to them within driving distance. The Sacramento Metro is as little as 30 minutes to 1 1/2 hr of World Class Skiing in the Lake Tahoe area by auto. Also, Lake Tahoe (the Sierras) is a fantastic recreation area all year round. Most prefer it in the summer over the winter.
The Napa Wine Country (45 minute drive from Sacramento) --is a fantastic beautiful area. You don't need to drink wine to enjoy it. There is plenty to do in the Napa area beyond visiting wineries.
There is so much to do in Sacramento, I tend not to visit San Francisco as much these days. But when we do, we always find something new to do. San Francisco is a fantastic, unique city, like no other in the world. It's always reinventing itself and in the last 10 years there are whole sections of San Francisco that are completely brand new. Visiting a friend recently, we discovered whole new parts of SF we rarely visit and revisiting areas of SF we know very well, never gets dull. San Francisco is a great gem to have so close to Sacramento by car, train, or bus. San Francisco is not overrated especially if you don't have to pay to live there.
I voted Charlotte but would easily change my vote just for proximity to San Francisco (I love SF) and I simply just love California.
Charlotte has the advantage of being the largest city in a hundreds of miles radius. You have to go 240 miles to reach Atlanta. You have to go 400 miles to reach DC. This means Charlotte easier attracts and maintains entertainment and events that tour large cities...
Sacramento is a large city but is only the largest city for about 80 miles...
For the record, I'm not at all a fan of San Francisco. Sacramento has more than enough on it's own merits and apparently I'm the only person who has lived and is familiar with both of these cities, Sac matches up pretty well to Charlotte...
Again, I'd give Charlotte the edge as a more mature and complete city, but it by no stretch of the imagination is ny more than a slight margin. Sacramento's downtown is a little smaller but you can definitely make the argument DT Sac is more impressive on a street level...
Sac is a mostly suburban city too but where it is genuinely urban, it is levels more urban and walkable than Charlotte. Public transit is more robust and mature, and I'd def say arts culture is greater in Sac...
The higher education infrastructure is a blowout in favor of Sac. Not only is it in California, debatable the best state in The Union for university education, not only is California mulling free tuition for native students, Sac's university, community college, and law school framework combined is playing at a different level than Charlotte can offer...
This site always shows who is misinformed rather easily lol...
Charlotte has better shopping, the arguably stronger core (Center City Clt districts), the much more diversified economy, lower cost of living with higher wages, and is (subjectively) a better looking city aesthetically, while also being a slightly safer place to live. And Charlotte'sfood culture is criminally underrated and I think is actually more of a fight versus Sac's than one would initially assume. But by no means is this more than a marginal advantage for Charlotte...
Weather is better in Sac fir sure, you asked about winters. Sac has cold winters for California. It has great winters for damn near everywhere else outside Cali and Florida lol...
Everything in my previous post holds true except I want to clarify, Uptown Charlotte is stronger than Downtown Sac, just more popping and busier, but outside Uptown, Sacramento runs away with neighborhood comps. A much more active and pedestrian friendly city than anywhere in Carolina...
Weather is better in Sac fir sure, you asked about winters. Sac has cold winters for California. It has great winters for damn near everywhere else outside Cali and Florida lol...
Everything in my previous post holds true except I want to clarify, Uptown Charlotte is stronger than Downtown Sac, just more popping and busier, but outside Uptown, Sacramento runs away with neighborhood comps. A much more active and pedestrian friendly city than anywhere in Carolina...
Murksiderock, Thank you!
I'm impressed with Charlotte's light rail and street car, I wondering if there are plans for the light rail to go to the CLT (airport)?
Murksiderock, Thank you!
I'm impressed with Charlotte's light rail and street car, I wondering if there are plans for the light rail to go to the CLT (airport)?
I've never heard any plans for it, when are you going to Charlotte? I asked my dad when I got here a few weeks ago, if they finally extended the light rail to Sac airport and he was like "it's never gonna happen" lol...
Lynx light rail is very comparable to SacRT! I used to live right near Tyvola Station in South Charlotte, could walk there in 5 minutes. Loved taking it Uptown!
I've never heard any plans for it, when are you going to Charlotte? I asked my dad when I got here a few weeks ago, if they finally extended the light rail to Sac airport and he was like "it's never gonna happen" lol...
Lynx light rail is very comparable to SacRT! I used to live right near Tyvola Station in South Charlotte, could walk there in 5 minutes. Loved taking it Uptown!
I'll be there real soon!
I'm wondering if your "love" for Sacramento is a "biased love" because you have family here and are homesick, lol. If I didn't still have family in Sacramento I would seriously consider moving which may just be a few years away.
Here's my mini-rant on Sacramento:
Sacramento's light rail still looks like a low density trashy train to nowhere. Huge disappointment. It was built in the mid 80's and it still looks like it.
I am always disappointed with Sacramento's lack of urban dense development and anti-business, anti- everything approach to just about everything. Sac's light rail to the airport, never gonna happen. Street car never gonna happen. "Hundreds" of restaurants and small business were shut down in the last 3 years and few have come back. Dozens and dozens of high rise dense residential NEVER got built.
Sacramento, by now should have accomplished Portland style riverfront development, and Austin style high rise residential. The Riverfront is a huge huge disappointment. There are dozens of American smaller cities with more interesting riverfronts. The current mayor promised a new riverfront, nothing happened. The best and only black mayor was maligned and pushed out.
Sac's Amtrak/Capitol corridor train station, huge disappointment after millions, billions spent, no new bridge(s) across the Sacramento River, no street car, a metro of 2.7 million with not a single interesting 21st century architecturally interesting building over 500-800 feet.
The only thing impressive built in the Sacramento area in the last 20 years has been low-density residential housing developments in Folsom and Roseville, which has by far more interesting and nice bars and restaurants than downtown Sacramento.
Murksiderock, Thank you!
I'm impressed with Charlotte's light rail and street car, I wondering if there are plans for the light rail to go to the CLT (airport)?
Yes. The proposed Lynx Silver line would go from Uptown to Gaston County with a stop at or near the Airport
Still enjoying Charlotte's uptown, I'm so jealous Sacramento couldn't get this amount of high-density high-rise housing built in the central core. Too many anti "gentrification" politico's and influencers in Sacramento. Charlotte is clean pleasant, "vibrant" no graffiti, our influencers would hate how clean it is here and "vibrate". They would hate the finance and banking industry here in Charlotte as well. They would rather have big gov't employ everyone.
Everyone in Charlotte is so polite too, I guess that is the old southern charm at work.
Lynx light rail is very comparable to SacRT! I used to live right near Tyvola Station in South Charlotte, could walk there in 5 minutes. Loved taking it Uptown!
I've been using the Lynx light rail a lot, within walking distance of the East/West station. Sorry, but the stations in the central core of Charlotte looks so much better than Sacramento's light rail. When Sac finally gets their new cars, perhaps it will be on the same level, but our stations really suck, the worst in the nation.
I choose Sacramento because at least it's a dry heat.
Plus the nearby mountains are better for skiing.
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