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Although I am a novice fisherman, I truly enjoy to fish when the opportunity arises. For those who are like-minded, where in this great country of ours, the United States of America, would you classify as cities that are good and not so good for fishing?
Let me explain further. Cities (which includes suburban cities of other major, medium and small sized cities) that are good for fishing should have easy and ample opportunities to access lakes, ponds or any other kinds of water bodies, regardless of having a watercraft or not. A city or municipality with good fishing accessibility, should be in close proximity to any particular city's boundaries, that is no more then 15 miles away from the city limits. Cities should also have few restrictions for those without boats, such as allowing bank fishing (of course there will be some restrictions, as there should be too...No toxic dumping, please!).
On the flip side, cities that are not so good for fishing, do not share these qualities as stated earlier.
There are over 300 lakes in the Twin Cities metro, a number of them in Minneapolis proper. You can live in some of the densest urban neighborhoods in Minneapolis and have good walleye, northern and muskie fishing within walking distance. Seeing people on public transportation or walking around the city with fishing tackle is a thing that happens.
When I lived in South Florida fishing was easy and took very little effort. For big cities I would say the Miami area has some of the best fishing in the country.
Atlanta metro leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to fishing. You have to really be patient to have any success.
Redding California, Sacramento, CA - both have the Sacramento River flowing right through town. Lots of other smaller towns along the river, too.
You can also fish off the shore and piers all around the SF Bay Area. I don't think you even need a license to fish off the piers.
My father grew up in Oakland, CA, and he was an Oakland cop. We lived in San Leandro, right next to Oakland. He used to take us to fish off the bridges and piers right in Oakland. We also went crawdad (crayfish) fishing in the creek in Niles Canyon (also in the SF Bay Area).
I'm going to be saltwater biased. I live in Ocean City, MD and it has some of the best offshore fishing in the country for palagics. It has good inshore fishing as well and rockfish (striped bass) can be caught all year with winter being the month's for the larger ones. Accessable beaches can be fished just south of us on Assateque and a bit above us in DE.
That being said, our "neighbors" 2 hours south of us have it better in VA beach and if you need a larger city the VA Beach area with Norfolk and Hampton Roads is definitely that. They have a bit better marlin fishing (our OC boats will fish with the VA beach fleet at times) consistantly and their tunas can be caught all year. Inshore they have a bit more veriety with consistant red drum fishing, speckled trout and rockfish all year and cobias as well. They also have the structure of the bay bridge tunnel to fish. And as an added bonus, some of the best surf fishing in the world is a couole hours south on hatteras Island.
You want a bit warmer? Palm Beach, Stuart, Jupiter, Ft Lauderdale is basically saltwater sportfishings "hub". It can have some good sailfishing right out front and is a good base to travel from, by boat or plane, to any place in the carribean/Latin america. The canals have some good tarpon fishing with fish in the 100lb class or more. Snook, trout, redfish (red drum) fishing is good as well as there are plenty of places along the intercoastal and Canaveral and the Banana River isn't too far away. Neither are the keys. And as a little relaxing bonus, there are countless little lakes and ponds and the big lake Okeechobee if freshwater bass is your thing.
For me, I am going to return back to the Palm Beach area in the next few years. I offshore fish and what we have here in the Mid-Atlantic is overall better then FL for marlin and tuna but the overall variety in S. FL can't be beat. And it's a good base to be out of with access to anywhere.
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