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.
It's confusing when I read the best places to live articles online and mostly all have COS as the bottom tier, and the crime stats always paint an ugly picture. Now I understand why majority of houses I've seen mention new roof. Is there anyway to avoid the high winds if not what is the best option to protect yourself from it. We already agreed we will take 2 dogs and if I have to give up some of my hobbies, then be it, but for sure no HOA and no well water. I noticed the street parking looks different is there a problem owning more than 2 vehicles and parking them out in the street. Is it safe to shop at the grocery after late hours and what about going for food after a late movie. Who does this and what places should i avoid walking late at night. We don't do any bar hopping or partying, mostly after watching a movie we usually go for ice cream with the the family and get food from food truck. Is this a normal activity in COS?
Don't know what internet sites your looking at? Colorado Springs ranks high in most best places to live rankings.
Don't know what internet sites your looking at? Colorado Springs ranks high in most best places to live rankings.
Agree. It ranks high is affordability, educated population, clean air and water, schools, libraries, recreation and it has no hurricane or earthquake issues and since 1950, statewide, only about 5 people were killed by tornados, and other positive attributes.
__________________
- Please follow our TOS.
- Any Questions about City-Data? See the FAQ list.
- Want some detailed instructions on using the site? See The Guide for plain english explanation.
- Realtors are welcome here but do see our Realtor Advice to avoid infractions.
- Thank you and enjoy City-Data.
Agreed. We just placed 12th in best places to have a family poll by some big news organization. Granted, most polls are fluff and are somewhat suspect, but we tend to typically perform well in mid sized city concerns. Because of the high military concentration, we do have some higher than average crime stats in some reporting areas, typically domestic abuse, rape, or petty assault. But as I said earlier, these are not difficult to avoid and with society pushing for more reporting and recovery, its reasonable to think these may not be increases in crimes but increases in reporting.
Street parking varies considerably from area to area, but generally two vehicles is about as wide as a property, so that is a general limit, unless you have really understanding neighbors. This is why I suggest you look at larger properties with enough off street parking for your fleet. It actually is against code to leave recreational vehicles and trailers parked on public roadways for more than 24 hours. However, the city is very selective and unmotivated to enforce this. Where I am at, parking in the street is common. In other areas somewhat uncommon, in some places, forbidden for residents. It really depends on where you are at. Cos is geographically very large. We cover a lot of real estate for our population size, so until you can drill down into your top 4-5 areas of consideration, its hard to give exact facts of what you will experience because it is widely variable
Again, nothing here is so crime ridden you can't go out after dark for shopping, movies, activities, etc. The general activity level of most residents and the broad range of attractions means there can still be a fair amount of family oriented stuff going on into the dark hours. Granted, finding food after leaving the midnight movies may be limited to overnight chain restaurants, but is still possible and not dangerous.
Food trucks are not as pervasive here as in many other cities. We are seeing some increases in them, and probably the greatest concentration of them is in the south-east part of the city, but they are here. I typically see two types of trucks; hip, new, connected on social media trucks that are hitting new cafes and breweries and ranging around town, and the old school, latino run trucks providing mid day grub to workers and concentrated on the southeast side. The two don't overlap too much and are typically found in different areas on any given day.
Avoiding the wind is difficult to do. However, it is not typically something to fear. Yes, we do get some high winds and occasional micro bursts, but it won't carry off small dogs and kids. It also is not constant all year round. We may get a few weeks of it in Feb-April time frame. We tend to have mild breezes year round. Occasionally heavy storms will be some high winds in summer. Some years are worse than others. Coming from CA, one thing I'd REALLY want you to understand is you are going to be moving a mile above sea level. This change means weather here is no where near as consistent as you are used to it. We've had above average rain this summer so its been cooler. A few years ago we had less than average and a string of 100+ temp days. It can snow on Halloween. You can wear shorts and flip flops sometimes for Christmas. When you are ready for spring, we will get more snow again. March and April are actually our snowiest months. We have four seasons, sometimes all in one day, but the one take away is the weather here is HIGHLY variable.
Gardening will also be a challenge. Late snow or frost means it may not be safe to plant outdoors until after Mother's Day and that is still not a guarantee. This gives a pretty short growing season. Combined with withering sun, variable rain, occasional hail and sudden cool snaps, it is not easy, but is certainly possible. I actually have had my best batches of tomatoes in years this summer. Squash always tend to do good too. It all depends on what you want and how much effort you put into it. Gardens can't just be planted, watered, and left alone however.
Trees, you will have to live in a more central location of the city to get a lot of trees, or in the area known as Black Forest, and it is predominately pine trees. The city has made a concerted effort to forest its self, so to have any significant tree presence you would need to look for houses that are older than 20-25 years. Obviously the largest trees will be found in the oldest and most central and western parts of the city that has been around for 150 years. Although, as far east as Village Seven, north as Rockrimmon, and south as Fountain have been around long enough to have decent sized trees. Beyond that there may be a pocket of trees here and there, but most of these areas are so new that trees won't be much more than a dozen feet tall and still relatively young.
Can someone please provide me with locations of the bad neighborhoods, ugly areas, run down homes, transient/homeless areas. On my upcoming visit I would like to drive by and see what I might be dealing with. Not trying to stir up controversy but if their is a sanctuary city, town, location I would like to see it. Here in LA everyone knows East LA is Mexicans, McArthur park area central Americans, South Central blacks, etc. I want to get a better feel of the demographics from people that live in COS. I see the reports online the majority of people are Caucasian. How are interracial relationships viewed there. My wife is half Asian and Cuban. My kids speak English, Spanish, Chinese. Will they get bullied in school? Do we have to speak English only when out in public? How bad is the Racism?
I'd steer clear of the southeast area of the city.
__________________
- Please follow our TOS.
- Any Questions about City-Data? See the FAQ list.
- Want some detailed instructions on using the site? See The Guide for plain english explanation.
- Realtors are welcome here but do see our Realtor Advice to avoid infractions.
- Thank you and enjoy City-Data.
The city is indeed mostly caucasian, but interracial relationships are common and rarely a problem in terms of bullying, etc. The further north you go, the more white the city becomes, generally speaking. Colorado Springs is not an official sanctuary city to my knowledge. The races are not largely segregated into neighborhoods here but as I mentioned it is more diverse toward the south and less so to the north. I think there are racists everywhere in the country but for the most part here people are very live and let live and I put this area relatively better on the spectrum for racism problems compared to a lot of the country. I do think once in a great while you are likely to get someone on your case for not speaking English in public here but not that often. When Mike says southeast side of the city - think Harrison School District 2 or the Mitchell High School area of School District 11. It's not all bad but as far as this city goes, those areas are harder to recommend. You'll also notice some areas where the homeless population is more concentrated such as around the Springs Rescue Mission on S. Nevada and surrounding areas, etc. A relatively diverse area that is considered more favorably overall is the Widefield/Security/Fountain community just south of the city.
MY son is white and is married to a Taiwanese girl , the both speak fluent Chinese and English in public they get some staring probably because they converse in both languages which is somewhat unusual to the average american but there is no Overt racism. They Love Colorado. MY daughter in-law had a little trouble because of her heavy accent and was made fun of by stupid ignorant yahoos in a lower class area when she worked at a King Soopers. Where they live now is a middle to upper middle class area and there are intelligent mixed race couples with children.
Otowi is pretty spot on with how demographics change as you migrate north.
For specific neighborhoods to evaluate the "badness" of the area, look at Pikes Peak Park, Deerfield Hills, Eastborough, and Park Hill areas. These areas tend to have lower overall income, lower housing values, and highest mix of different races. I've lived in two of these places and will say that "bad" is certainly a realtive perspective. These areas are like Mayberry compared to bad areas of big eastern cities I've been through, and as mentioned previously, even these places have some nice homes in them.
Transients and homeless tend to collect around free flowing water sources. This means you will see more of these people in the older areas of town. Along Fountain, Monument, Douglas, Cottonwood and other local creeks is where you will find more of these. That means they can still pop up in some of the nicer areas of town on occasion, Like Ivywild, Old North End, and even up on the north Academy/Woodman area. I'd also make a distinction between true homeless and the underemployed. Underemployed panhandlers are found throughout the area irregardless of the neighborhood. Since they have cars, homes, etc, they have the ability to migrate where ever they think they can generate the most handouts and are, IMO, different than the homeless panhandler who crawled up the street out of tent and is grabbing some cash on their way to the shelter for a meal.
Cos has a substantial military population. That means we see regular rotations of base staff through the various bases we have here, which are Army and Air Force. It also means they are bringing in many ex-patriot spouses from all over the world through Cos. Various European, Asian, Pacific Islanders, and Africans live in Cos, although I would say we have a higher percentage of Korean and German ex-pats than any others.
It's confusing when I read the best places to live articles online and mostly all have COS as the bottom tier, and the crime stats always paint an ugly picture. Now I understand why majority of houses I've seen mention new roof. Is there anyway to avoid the high winds if not what is the best option to protect yourself from it. We already agreed we will take 2 dogs and if I have to give up some of my hobbies, then be it, but for sure no HOA and no well water. I noticed the street parking looks different is there a problem owning more than 2 vehicles and parking them out in the street. Is it safe to shop at the grocery after late hours and what about going for food after a late movie. Who does this and what places should i avoid walking late at night. We don't do any bar hopping or partying, mostly after watching a movie we usually go for ice cream with the the family and get food from food truck. Is this a normal activity in COS?
The roof thing is not about winds, it's about hail damage. There's not much you can do. Hail is random & can be quite significant. I've had hail that's broken my skylights. As in, it was hailing indoors. Not common, but it happens. If you're in the wrong place at the wrong time, you get hit. But I've had that happen in Mpls too, just not as frequently as here.
I'm a night owl & I go everywhere in the middle of the night. Grocery stores at midnight, no problem (if you can find one open), post office at 1AM, gym at 2AM. I'm up north, but I've never thought twice about any of this, hike with a friend at GOG at 11PM, walk in my hood at midnight. It's a very safe area. There's no place up north I wouldn't walk at night. Downtown is fine at night, though there can be panhandlers.
I've never seen a food truck around here, but I don't go downtown much.
Parking excess vehicles on the street will again depend on where you live. In many hoods it's frowned upon, but those are usually HOA hoods. My neighbors apologized to me when they had 2 teens, b/c suddenly there were cars in front of our home all the time, since the parents already had several of their own. It does bring property values down if there's a bunch of beaters out in the street. But whether or not your neighbors will care, will depend on the hood. If you have acreage, you wouldn't be parking in the street anyway.
B/C of the huge military population, there are many cross-cultural relationships, not unusual at all. IDK anything about "sanctuary". I think you think this is a much bigger city than it is :-) It's a small city with small city issues, there are no big pockets of major crime, bad hoods, etc. Not like in a real city.
Finally got time off from work. I have 3 days to visit all of Colorado springs. I would like visit local shops, restaurants, anywhere where there is a lot of people* to talk to. I would like to make the best of my trip, any recommendations on what to see or do? I already know the outdoors are great but I'm more interested in the community environment. I have a list of neighborhoods I want to visit but all I can do is drive through, does anyone have a better idea on how to go about getting a better feel for the area
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.
Visiting COS next week..where do I go?
