Why Did You Move to Fort Lauderdale? (Miami, Boca Raton: real estate, rent)

[HotandHumid]

As I look at this area filled with either traffic jams or speeding traffic that makes it unsafe to cross the street or ride a bike along in, at deep pocket developers who are allowed to build monster size complexes and towers in one and two story home neighborhoods and at the side walks where the only pedestrians are usually homeless people from our own community who lost their jobs due to commercial real estate developers and big box stores driving out the smaller businesses that used to employ a large number of people here but who can't afford to stay in business anymore since the car driving majority of people here don't want to walk anywhere and only frequent businesses with huge parking lots, it leaves me wondering what kind of people do find Fort Lauderdale desirable?

When I moved here, there seemed to be elected officials in office who cared about the citizens and tourist industry here. Not too long ago, The Las Olas Riverfront was a great place to go have lunch on the River and watch the boats come in and out from the moorings there and then do some shopping in the mall, maybe take in a movie and then later walk along towards the business district just east on Las Olas along the river to more shopping and places to have dinner. Bike lanes were being constructed along the busier streets and there seemed to be a police force in place that was concerned with public safety out there constantly giving tickets to speeders and other traffic violations.

When I called 911 after witnessing a man being assaulted by some crazy guy who was threatening to shoot the man when he went to the car for supposedly holding up the line at the post office by asking why he had to fill out something on a form, the police never showed up. When I called back to find out where they were after a half hour had gone by, the dispatcher told me they were busy with other things and so they didn't dispatch anyone. The supervisor who I asked to speak to told me I could go to the police station and file a report if I was unhappy with the police conduct in the matter.

There used to be a more relaxed community vibe here but now it seems that people only own houses so they can have a place to park their car for free for a couple of hours when they're not spending the rest of their time driving all over the place or so they can rent them out to vacationers at huge profits instead of buying a house to live in a community and be a part of it.

I don't understand the concept of living somewhere with nice weather and then commuting to another city to work in holed up for hours and hours in an air conditioned car in lanes of traffic. One man I recently met lives in the Homestead area south of Miami and drives up to Fort Lauderdale to work, along with also driving up to Boca Raton to work in a branch store of the company he works for there.

I often hear people saying they moved here for the weather but since I rarely see anyone actually out in it except tourists at the beach as everyone else seems to be working two or three jobs to live here, does this simply mean they moved here for weather that they can drive around in all day and not be concerned about snow or ice on the road?

It doesn't seem to be they moved here for the kind of weather where you can sit outside at an outdoor café since the traffic is so bad. Most people don't want to dine listening to the constant honking of horns, loud altered mufflers on motorcycles and the screeching brakes of drivers who suddenly realized the car in front of them is stopped when they look up from their texting on their phone.

I think the city officials here have only one thing on their mind and that's how many vehicles they can work at getting to move through their city to shopping malls and shopping complexes and not stop at any of the businesses that line the streets on the way to those businesses by making their streets more attractive and people friendly with landscaping, lowered speed limits and bike lanes. It's unbelievable to me that any city could have a street lined with houses and businesses and then have a 45 mile an hour speed limit through that area with children going to and from schools on that street.

Then there's that huge crowd of drivers who feel they need to show to themselves their power and might by driving around in a gas guzzling SUV by themselves as most of the people who live in this area don't have children to be taking around on errands that would fill up such a vehicle and most people here seem to be loners with no large group of friends they are close to that they would commute places with since any social event I've gone riding my bike to usually ends up with most of the people there all driving there alone and filling up the parking lot with their vehicles.

I haven't seen any real social conscience in the people here in regard to doing their part to help slow down Global Warming and that's really weird to me since this area is already seeing flooding due to rising sea levels caused by Global Warming and this area of South Florida is already being affected by rising sea levels flooding some neighborhoods.

It seems to me that a large number of Me decade people have chosen to make Fort Lauderdale their home these days since I rarely see any government or social actions being taken in this place to make this place a better one to live in where you can let someone into traffic in front of you at a red light without a line of cars behind you angrily honking at you because you did so.

[norb123]

I don't live in South Florida anymore. I lived there for about 7 years back in the 90's, but if it makes you feel any better about Ft Lauderdale, almost all of the things you mentioned are happening in most cities in America.