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.
What did you not care for in Denver and what stood out to you about Colorado Springs?
From what you listed, here's how I think COS would stack up.
Mountain biking: Great
Ethnic restaurants: Fairly decent
Housing stock: Bad. Prices have gone up a lot in the last several years, the new development is crap, they're just throwing up houses with no road or infrastructure improvements.
Walkable neighborhoods: No
Friendly / Vibrant: There's a good mix of people from all over and they're generally interesting. Bit male dominated from all the soldiers if your a younger guy.
Healthy: Yes
Rust Belt: Hell no. There's hardly any industrial zoning in the entire metro.
Skiing is 2-3 hours away, not <2. COS isn't the best spot in the state for skiing as Pikes Peaks too dry and there's South Park in between the city and the rest of the ski areas.
Airport: DIA is 1 1/2 hours away. It's decent. There's a lot of direct flights, but if there's any sort of delays, the entire airport just backs up for hours. It'll be under construction for years.
Tech Jobs: If you have military experience
Live music: Average.
IDK, I guess I was thinking COS would be cheaper than Denver and it seems like getting outdoors (especially skiing) is a little easier with less traffic. Also, I have family in Denver. When I go out there I am not super enamored with the city. Don't get me wrong, it would be a great place to be, but for the price, I'd rather be in Seattle.
I've never been to COS, but was thinking about heading out for a quick visit in the spring. From what I've read, it looks good, though the job market seems a little so-so. Noted on the housing stock. This seems to be a problem all over CO.
What do you think about Fort Collins? It feels a bit more provincial. I still can't figure out what people do there for work and what justifies the housing prices beyond the university.
Albuquerque checks off all of those boxes. It may not be the best at all of them, but it is decent enough in most of them and excels in quite a few of them.
Must haves:
- Mountainous outdoors scene (avid mtn biker) Yes - Albuquerque is just wonderful in this regard, with the Sandia mountains right next to the city and other areas like the beautiful Jemez mountains nearby.
- Decent ethnic restaurant scene Yes - Albuquerque has a great ethnic restaurant scene as well as various ethnic grocery stores.
- Good housing stock (not forced to live in tract housing) Yes - Albuquerque has tons of houses with character and built to last.
- Walkable neighborhoods Yes - from Downtown to East Downtown to Mountain Road to Old Town to West Downtown to UNM area to Nob Hill, Albuquerque has great walkable neighborhoods to explore.It also has great small towns with interesting and walkable cores nearby, such as Corrales, Bernalillo and Los Ranchos. Santa Fe is nearby as well.
- Friendly/vibrant Yes - Albuquerque is friendly and welcoming to newcomers and has a vibrant cultural, arts and creative scene, with a university and many local arts organizations. The city is getting to be vibrant economically as well right now after a slump, with billions in outside investment, thousands of jobs being created and lots of construction going on.
- Healthy-looking people/active culture Yes - Albuquerque is outdoorsy with an active culture and often ranked among the fittest cities in the country.
- Not rustbelt (I've spent most of my life in it) Yes - Albuquerque is the Sunbelt and returning to its fast-growing ways after a slump.
Would prefer:
- Low state income tax (starting a business) Yes - New Mexico is neither the best or the worst when it comes to income taxes, but nearer to the best than the worst. And it makes up for somewhat high sales/gross receipts taxes with low property taxes. The state is doing all it can to help small businesses, including simplifying the tax structure and lowering taxes and fees.
- Not too grey (at least better than Great Lakes area) Yes - Albuquerque has great, sunny weather most of the year with enough rain and snow to not be monotonous.
- Snow/skiing (<2 hours away) Yes - there's snow in the city, the foothills and the adjacent mountains. There's skiing right next to the city in the mountains at Sandia Peak and within two hours at top places like Taos Ski Valley and Angel Fire.
- Major int'l airport nearby (<2 hours away) Yes - the Albuquerque International Sunport is 53rd busiest in the country and offers direct flights to both coasts and most major cities.
- Tech jobs Yes - over 4,000 tech jobs have been created in Albuquerque this year alone.
- Good live music scene Yes - Downtown Albuquerque has many live music venues offering performances daily.
thanks for the thoughtful reply. i think i'll head out after christmas to check it out. it seems like the job market is the only thing kind of lacking from what i've read, but i love the "ski in the morning and hike in the afternoon" opportunities.
what neighborhoods do you recommend checking out? also, this is probably lame, but i've read alot about problems with roaches and scorpions. for someone who has grown up in the snowbelt his entire life, this is definitely kind of foreign and creeps me out a bit
I've been out there for work. I'm not sure how I feel about it. People are fantastic and it is obviously very scenic, but that development down the 25 corridor seems pretty brutal and it seems like traffic sucks to get to Provo, etc. Also, it seems like the housing stock isn't the best. But this is a pretty uninformed opinion, too.
IDK, I guess I was thinking COS would be cheaper than Denver and it seems like getting outdoors (especially skiing) is a little easier with less traffic. Also, I have family in Denver. When I go out there I am not super enamored with the city. Don't get me wrong, it would be a great place to be, but for the price, I'd rather be in Seattle.
I've never been to COS, but was thinking about heading out for a quick visit in the spring. From what I've read, it looks good, though the job market seems a little so-so. Noted on the housing stock. This seems to be a problem all over CO.
What do you think about Fort Collins? It feels a bit more provincial. I still can't figure out what people do there for work and what justifies the housing prices beyond the university.
COS is a better deal than Denver is still, because Denver's a bit outrageous, but the lamer job market has a little bit to do with those prices. But they'll definately still be sticker shock coming from rust belt areas. I have your same thoughts about Denver lol. COS is closer to the foothills and to the Pikes Peak monolith, so there's definitely outdoor recreation, but for skiing, you need to be above 9000 ft and on the wet side / north face of a mountain, so all the resorts are clustered in that big chuck of mountains that is the central front range, basically where I 70 runs through. So essentially you have to run up to Denver, then get on I70 to go skiing, which takes 2 to 2.5 hours (no traffic) adding about 1 hour to what Denver has. Monarch is also available, but that's 2.5 hours away too. Google Earth will make more sense when you see it aerial.
I really don't know much about Fort Collins. I've rarely been up there.
I live in COS and am a mountain biker as well, I'm also in Seattle 2-4 times a year. Seattle (PNW overall) has amazing mtbing, but it's seasonal compared to Colorado Springs. Colorado Springs can't be beat for proximity of trails (you'd never be more than 20 minutes away from multiple parks), and its building more mtb specific trails in a variety of terrains. Like Phil P pointed out it will take approximately 3 hours to get to a ski resort, but there is less traffic to fight with when taking the southern route.
As far as housing there are some good deals still, the core of COS has the best neighborhoods (old north end, and the West side). Downtown is going through some revitalization, and more options are opening all the time but the city is still west/east segmented.
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.
