"Good" sides and "bad" sides of Dallas? I've never been to Dallas (newbie) (Austin: fit in, apartment)

[UbbyJuice]

Cliff notes please?

What parts of town are the "safe" or "good" parts? What part(s) are the crime or "bad" parts?
North, west, south, east, etc?

Thanks in advance, I've been researching both Dallas and Austin, so right now just trying to sponge up as much information as possible before committing to anything. Both cities interest me, but just doing my homework and due diligence right now

[gtt99]

Dallas is the good, the bad, and the ugly but we're one big family. We don't talk bad about the family. Come and figure it out yourself.

[TurtleCreek80]

Dallas isn't that easy to categorize. There are good and bad neighborhoods on all sides of the city. In general, north and east are nicer / wealthier than south and west....but if you completely skip over south, you'd be missing some of the prettiest neighborboods in all of Dallas. And if you think you're 100% safe in the north side, you could end up renting an apartment in a really dangerous neighborhood.

[UbbyJuice]

Who are the "usual suspects" in Dallas as far as crimes go? Is it whites, hispanics, blacks, etc? Not a racist question, I'm just wondering. I'm currently in Littleton co so haven't experienced crime in a while. Littleton suburbs are very quiet with little crime.

I'm a mestizo so a Latino or white neighborhood would suffice for me, a simple 1-bed and I would be happy. I'm not so sure I would fit in in a black neighborhood. I'm mostly a nerd that rarely leaves the house outside of work and running errands, so to be honest "petty" street crimes don't really concern me or affect me. It's not like I'll be taking walks around the neighborhood or talking to people, I spend much of my days indoors glued to my computer.

I'm also a tall guy, so that acts as a sort of "passive deterrent" to street crimes. I'm not really concerned for these reasons, as long as it's not gunshots-being-heard-in-the-distance i think I can live with a semi-sketchy area. I don't have any kids or pets either, so school system etc also does not concern me.

Any particular neighborhoods in North and East i can Google for more info? Any recommendations? Based on what you guys have told me, it would seem North and NE area of Dallas is a good place to start my homework.

[skyline122]

I'm going to narrow it down to neighborhoods.
"Good" areas (note: these are from a minority who lives one of the "bad areas")
1. Preston Hollow
This ranks no. 1 on the rich white factor and if you are pretentious enough and you have enough money, live there.
2. Pretty much all of far north and near Richardson
The only problem with these neighborhoods (besides them being pretentious) is the rednecks.
3. Lakewood
Lakewood is "near" a rough neighborhood and they try and use that as their excuse, yet in reality, it is a family packed Upper Class neighborhood, I recommend this to the "run down punk rocker turned family man.

"Bad" areas (my faves)
1. Fair Park and Mt. Auburn (My homeland!)
Home to a large amount of Illegal mexicans on one side and a neighborhood full of drug dealers on the other (note: both have equally annoying gang activity [ie. Dolphin Ave. and East Side Ave.]).
2. South OC
Large Black community with a growing mexican presence, The stereotypical "hood"
3. The Grove (Pleasant Grove)
The poor version of Preston Hollow... Ego Ego Ego






Hope you liked the list...

[UbbyJuice]

Originally Posted by skyline122

I'm going to narrow it down to neighborhoods.
"Good" areas (note: these are from a minority who lives one of the "bad areas")
1. Preston Hollow
This ranks no. 1 on the rich white factor and if you are pretentious enough and you have enough money, live there.
2. Pretty much all of far north and near Richardson
The only problem with these neighborhoods (besides them being pretentious) is the rednecks.
3. Lakewood
Lakewood is "near" a rough neighborhood and they try and use that as their excuse, yet in reality, it is a family packed Upper Class neighborhood, I recommend this to the "run down punk rocker turned family man.

"Bad" areas (my faves)
1. Fair Park and Mt. Auburn (My homeland!)
Home to a large amount of Illegal mexicans on one side and a neighborhood full of drug dealers on the other (note: both have equally annoying gang activity [ie. Dolphin Ave. and East Side Ave.]).
2. South OC
Large Black community with a growing mexican presence, The stereotypical "hood"
3. The Grove (Pleasant Grove)
The poor version of Preston Hollow... Ego Ego Ego






Hope you liked the list...

Just the kind of information I was looking for! Repped

[cordata]

You mean Littleton, Colorado? Skyline gave you a decent breakdown.

But to TC80's point, there are probably things that will drive your choice more, like closeness to work or possibly dating opportunities.

If you are single, Lakewood, Preston Hollow and the Park Cities will probably not be very interesting.

More interesting would be Uptown, M Streets, Oak Cliff, maybe old east Dallas like Junius Heights or Hollywood / Santa Monica.

But there are hip sort of developments going on all over the place...

[TurtleCreek80]

Originally Posted by UbbyJuice

Who are the "usual suspects" in Dallas as far as crimes go? Is it whites, hispanics, blacks, etc? Not a racist question, I'm just wondering. I'm currently in Littleton co so haven't experienced crime in a while. Littleton suburbs are very quiet with little crime.

I'm a mestizo so a Latino or white neighborhood would suffice for me, a simple 1-bed and I would be happy. I'm not so sure I would fit in in a black neighborhood. I'm mostly a nerd that rarely leaves the house outside of work and running errands, so to be honest "petty" street crimes don't really concern me or affect me. It's not like I'll be taking walks around the neighborhood or talking to people, I spend much of my days indoors glued to my computer.

I'm also a tall guy, so that acts as a sort of "passive deterrent" to street crimes. I'm not really concerned for these reasons, as long as it's not gunshots-being-heard-in-the-distance i think I can live with a semi-sketchy area. I don't have any kids or pets either, so school system etc also does not concern me.

Any particular neighborhoods in North and East i can Google for more info? Any recommendations? Based on what you guys have told me, it would seem North and NE area of Dallas is a good place to start my homework.

Let's back up for a minute.....you're going about this in a backwards manner (unless you can work from home & truly live anywhere):

1. The DFW metro area is more than 2X the size and population of Denver metro. During rush hour, it can easily take 2+ hours to drive from one end of the DFW area to the opposite end. So....JOB FIRST. Jobs are located all over the metroplex, seriously.

2. Once you have a job nailed down, come back and post with your rent budget and desired drive time in minutes. Public transit is spotty here. It works well if you "park and ride" into downtown from some suburban areas but that's about it.

3. THEN you decide where to live. Because if you fall in love with Rockwall and get a job in Alliance....you won't be living in Rockwall. It's just too far and too many hours in the car each day. So then you did all this research for nothing.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by skyline122

I'm going to narrow it down to neighborhoods.
"Good" areas (note: these are from a minority who lives one of the "bad areas")
1. Preston Hollow
This ranks no. 1 on the rich white factor and if you are pretentious enough and you have enough money, live there.
2. Pretty much all of far north and near Richardson
The only problem with these neighborhoods (besides them being pretentious) is the rednecks.
3. Lakewood
Lakewood is "near" a rough neighborhood and they try and use that as their excuse, yet in reality, it is a family packed Upper Class neighborhood, I recommend this to the "run down punk rocker turned family man.

"Bad" areas (my faves)
1. Fair Park and Mt. Auburn (My homeland!)
Home to a large amount of Illegal mexicans on one side and a neighborhood full of drug dealers on the other (note: both have equally annoying gang activity [ie. Dolphin Ave. and East Side Ave.]).
2. South OC
Large Black community with a growing mexican presence, The stereotypical "hood"
3. The Grove (Pleasant Grove)
The poor version of Preston Hollow... Ego Ego Ego






Hope you liked the list...

If one understands what words actually mean.........there's essentially no/very little pretense in Preston Hollow.

[KerrTown]

Easy. The good side is north of I-30. That's where civilization is. The bad side is south of I-30. That's where the wilderness is.