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Chicago - Can't beat the cost of living in chicago given the area's urban environment, parks, transit, north shore neighborhoods and location on the lake.
Seattle - Love the NW's summers and the neighborhoods of Seattle. Proximity to skiing, Vancouver, Portland and the coast are also great.
Boston - Great neighborhoods and on the water. Close to lots of good weekend excursions.
Asheville - Love the beautiful, preserved downtown with great breweries and restaurants. Not to mention Blue Ridge Parkway, the mountains and nearby mountain towns
Baltimore - Changing city interesting to watch. Cool historic city neighborhoods. Safety definitely an issue though. Also love that it's on the water. Close to DC and Philly and beaches.
San Diego - Amazing climate, great coast, cool neighborhoods and Balboa Park is one of the best parks in the world.
Durham, NC - Great restaurants, laid back, gritty, progressive, affordable, great trails/duke garden/eno river state park. Raleigh and Chapel Hill/Carrboro are just up the road. Eventually when light rail connects durham to chapel hill and connects durham to raleigh, durham will be even better. Unfortunately that's probably at least 10 years off.
Pittsburgh - Pittsburgh has a great setting on three rivers in the mountains with some awesome urban neighborhoods.
Charleston - I love downtown's architecture, the restaurants and the beaches.
Savannah - Similar to Charleston. Public squares are great and no open container laws downtown
This is extremely hard. I live in the Denver suburb of Arvada, CO, and am mostly content there. However,
1. Spokane, WA-Coeur d'Alene, ID and everywhere north and east up to the Missoula County, MT line.
2. San Bernardino Mountains, CA
3. North Bend, WA east to Snoqualmie Pass
4. The mountains west of Denver, CO in Jefferson or Gilpin Counties.
5. Lake Tahoe CA-NV (but I would need to visit to confirm).
6. Yucaipa-Calimesa-Cherry Valley-Beaumont, CA
7. Trinidad, CO/Raton, NM
8. Far Northern CA/Southern Oregon
9. Seattle, WA north to Everett, WA, on the sound.
10 (tie). Los Angeles, CA or Riverside, CA, in the hills
If all of the sudden the need to work vanished, I would probably just bounce around anyway.
1. Plano, TX
Number one in safety as in low crime rate, got the only A rating for crime free in the nation. good jobs,
good economy, good hospitals, low taxes, good housing, beautiful city, low cost of living and the list goes on.
Location: Baghdad by the Bay (San Francisco, California)
3,530 posts, read 5,135,780 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Litefoot
1. Plano, TX
Number one in safety as in low crime rate, got the only A rating for crime free in the nation. good jobs,
good economy, good hospitals, low taxes, good housing, beautiful city, low cost of living and the list goes on.
I find that people who tout low crime rates and hospitals are not really living. Sorry, that's my take.
If you're picking your place in the world based on the hospital nearby, the employment rate, or even the taxes, I think your life is pretty sad. Is the place a healthful environment (screw the hospitals, how's the weather, air, and water quality?)? Is there demand for your individual talent (screw the employment number--Johnny Lunchpail jobs are not a measure of quality of life for creative people with talent. Are companies willing to bid for you to work there?)? Are the taxes affordable (if your heart, talent, vision and drive are properly compensated, who cares what the taxes are?)?
I've been to Plano and it's a suburban wasteland in my opinion. It is truly all the things you say it is, but to most creative, ambitious people, that's a miserable measure of quality of life. Holy ****...Plano?! Jesus...
Last edited by dalparadise; 08-31-2014 at 10:01 PM..
This is only considering cities that I know well. There are a handful of places I haven't spent much time in but could crack the top ten if I was more familiar. Honolulu, Minneapolis, Denver, Charlotte are the ones that come to mind.
1) Chicago
2) Jacksonville
3) Washington DC
4) New York City
5) Seattle
6) San Francisco
7) Dallas
8) Houston
9) Los Angeles
10) Miami
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